The Diary and Collected Letters of Madame D'Arblay, Frances Burney. Frances Burney
I was left with the princesses, they both came up to me, and began conversing in the most easy, unaffected, cheerful, and obliging manner that can be conceived.
When the queen returned, the bell was rung for the bedchamber woman; the etiquette of court-days requiring that one of them should finish her dress.
It happened now to be my acquaintance, Mrs. Fielding. She only tied on the necklace, and handed the fan and gloves. The queen then leaves the dressing-room, her train being carried by the bedchamber woman. The princesses follow. She goes to the ante-room, where she sends for the lady of the bedchamber in waiting, who then becomes the first train-bearer, and they all proceed to the Drawing-room.
We returned to Kew to dinner, very late.
Absence of State at Kew
Friday, July 28.—The Kew life, you will perceive, is different from the Windsor. As there are no early prayers, the queen rises later; and as there is no form or ceremony here of any sort, her dress is plain, and the hour for the second toilette extremely uncertain. The royal family are here always in so very retired a way, that they live as the simplest country gentlefolks. The king has not even an equerry with him, nor the queen any lady to attend her when she goes her airings.
Miss Planta belongs here to our table; so does anybody that comes, as there is no other kept. There is no excuse for parting after dinner, and therefore I live unremittingly with Mrs. Schwellenberg after the morning.
It is a still greater difficulty to see company here than at Windsor, for as my apartments are upstairs, there is a greater danger of encountering some of the royal family; and I find all the household are more delicate in inviting or admitting any friends here than elsewhere, on account of the very easy and unreserved way in which the family live, running about from one end of the house to the other, without precaution or care.
Miss Burney’s first Evening out
Windsor, July 28.—To-day I made my first evening visit, and for the first time failed Mrs. Schwellenberg’s tea-table entirely. You will be surprised to hear for whom I took this effort—Lady Effingham! But I found from Mrs. Delany she had been a little hurt by the passage-scene, and seemed to think I meant to avoid her future visits and civilities. Mrs. Delany, therefore, advised me to go to Stoke, her country-seat, by way of apologizing, and to request the queen’s permission, Promising to carry me herself.
I never hesitate where she counsels. I thought it, too, a good opportunity of trying my length of liberty, as Lady Effingham is one of the ladies of the bedchamber, and is frequently at the Lodge as a private visitor.
It was inexpressibly awkward to me to ask leave to go out, and awkwardly enough I believe I did it, only saying that if her majesty had no objection, Mrs. Delany would carry me in the evening to Stoke. She smiled immediate approbation, and nothing more passed.
I had then to tell my intention to Mrs. Schwellenberg who was, I believe, a little surprised. Fortunately, Major Price came upstairs to coffee. A little surprised, too, I am sure, was Major Price, when I made off for the whole evening. Everybody had taken it for granted I must necessarily pursue the footsteps of Mrs. Haggerdorn, and never stir out. But, thank God, I am not in the same situation; she had no connections—I have such as no one, I believe, ever had before.
The evening was rainy; but, my leave asked and obtained, my kind Mrs. Delany would not defer the excursion. Stoke is about three miles off.
We were received in the civilest manner possible by Lady Effingham, and Sir George Howard and Lady Frances. There were also several of their relations with them. Lady Effingham seems a mighty good-humoured, friendly woman. Sir George is pompous, yet he, too, is as good-humoured in his manners as his Lady.
Casual Callers to be Kept Off: a New Arrival
July 31.—I had a very pleasant visit from Mrs. Hastings175 this morning, whose gay good-humour is very enlivening: but she detained me from my dress, and I was not ready for the queen; and I have now adopted the measure of stationing John in the gallery while I am at that noble occupation, and making him keep off all callers, by telling them I am dressing for the queen. I have no other way; and being too late, or even the fear of being too late, makes me nervous and ill.
Every little failure of this sort, though always from causes unknown to her majesty, she has borne without even a look of surprise or of gravity; though she never waits an instant, for if Mrs. Schwellenberg is not with her, she employs Mrs. Thielky, or goes on with her dress or her undress without either.
This graciousness, however, makes me but the more earnest to grow punctual; especially as I am now always employed, when present and in time.
I went in the afternoon to Mrs. de Luc. When I returned here, to the conclusion of the tea-drinking, I found a new gentleman, dressed in the king’s Windsor uniform—which is blue and gold, turned up with red, and worn by all the men who belong to his majesty, and come into his presence at Windsor.
Major Price immediately presented us to each other. It was General Bude: what his post may be I have not yet learned, but he is continually, I am told, at Windsor, and always resides in this Lodge, and eats with the equerries.
I do not quite know what to say of General Bude; except that his person is tall and showy, and his manners and appearance are fashionable. But he has a sneer in his smile that looks sarcastic, and a distance in his manner that seems haughty.
The Royal Princesses
Wednesday, 2.—This morning, for the first time, I made a little sort of acquaintance with the two younger princesses. I was coming from the queen’s room, very early, when I met the Princess Mary, just arrived from the lower Lodge: she was capering upstairs to her elder sisters, but instantly stopped at sight of me, and then coming up to me, inquired how I did, with all the elegant composure of a woman of maturest age. Amazingly well are all these children brought up. The readiness and the grace of their civilities, even in the midst of their happiest wildnesses and freedom, are at once a surprise and a charm to all who see them.
The queen, when she goes to early prayers, often leaves me the charge of her little favourite dog, Badine. To-day, after her return, she sent her page for him; and presently after, I had a rap again at the door, and the little Princess Sophia entered. “Miss Burney,” cried she, curtseying and colouring, “Mamma has sent me for the little dog’s basket.”
I begged her permission to carry it to the queen’s room but she would not suffer me, and insisted upon taking it herself, with a mingled modesty and good breeding extremely striking in one so young.
About half an hour after she returned again, accompanying the princess royal. The queen had given me a new collection of German books, just sent over, to cut open for her; and she employed the princess royal to label them. She came most smilingly to the occupation, and said she would write down their names, “if I pleased,” in my room. You may believe I was not much displeased. I gave her a pencil, and she seized a piece of whity-brown paper, inquiring “if she might have it?”—I would fain have got her better, but she began writing immediately, stooping to the table.
I was now in a momentary doubt whether or not it would be proper, or too great a liberty, to ask her royal highness to be seated; but, after a moment’s hesitation, I thought it best to place her a chair, and say nothing.
I did; and she turned about to me with a most graceful curtsey, and immediately accepted it, with a most condescending apology for my trouble. I then, thus encouraged, put another chair for the little Princess Sophia, who took it as sweetly.
“Pray sit down too,” cried the princess royal: “I beg you will, Miss Burney!”
I resisted a little while; but she would not hear me, insisting, with the most obliging earnestness, upon carrying her point.
She writes