CHAPTER VIII.

DEATH OF CAROLINE MATILDA.

THE TYPHUS FEVER--DEATH OF THE PAGE--THE QUEEN'S VISIT--SYMPTOMS OF ILLNESS--DR. ZIMMERMANN--PASTOR LEHZEN--CAROLINE MATILDA'S GOODNESS OF HEART--HER DEATH--THE FUNERAL--GENERAL GRIEF--THE MONUMENTS--LETTER TO GEORGE III.--PROOFS OF CAROLINE MATILDA'S INNOCENCE--THE QUEEN'S CHARACTER.

We have seen that in the early part of 1775 the queen of Denmark appeared the picture of blooming health. Her _entourage_, and all who were of the same age with her, consequently felt the most confident expectations that they would long enjoy her pleasant and gracious society. But the news from Altona, the hope of a justification in the sight of the world, and of a reunion with her children, and at the same time apprehensions as to the decisive result of Mr. Wraxall's mission to her obstinate brother, kept her in a constant state of excitement, while she was obliged to place a restraint on the feelings that disturbed her mind, in order not to arouse any suspicion among her suite, or with her ever-watching sister. Therefore, it was not surprising that her constitution, thus rendered susceptible to external dangers, met a catastrophe half way, which destroyed all the hopes of her friends about the apparently blooming princess enjoying a long life.

A dangerous scarlet fever had spread over the neighbourhood after the severe and tempestuous winter, and one of the queen's young pages was attacked by it, and died in a few days. When he was dead, and laid in his coffin for interment, her Majesty expressed a great desire to see him. The ladies opposed this wish, and requested her not to do it. She still persisted in her resolution, and went down to the apartment in which he lay. Mantel, the queen's valet, had purposely locked the door and taken the key, and when Caroline Matilda asked him for it, he answered her that it could not be found. After several vain endeavours, therefore, she went up-stairs again. Mantel carried in the tea to her Majesty. In a few minutes the queen suddenly got up, and before any of her ladies could stop or prevent her, she ran down to the chamber where the corpse lay. Unfortunately, the door was then open. She stepped in, and stayed about a minute--not more--looking at it. She expressed no particular horror or emotion, more than was natural on looking at such an object.[56]

This took place on May 2nd, 1775. On the next morning the queen complained to her bed-chamber woman that the image of the dead page had appeared to her all through the night, and filled her with terror.[57] Still she slightly recovered herself, although a little girl of four years of age, Sophie von Benningsen, whom she had adopted when left an orphan, and as some consolation for the loss of her own daughter, had also been attacked by the disease, and filled her with fresh alarm. She went as usual to the Jardin François, but felt unwell, and evidently had the seeds of infection within her, for, on the third day after the visit to the chamber of death, she was unable to ascend the stairs leading to her apartments without the help of her lady-in-waiting.

"I must force myself to seem less tired than I really am," she said to her companion, "so that my good Omptéda (the grand maîtresse), who did not like my driving out, may not scold me."

She complained of sore-throat and chill, but sat down to dinner with her court, though she was unable to eat anything. When the card-tables were placed in the evening, the queen felt too indisposed to play. The ladies proposed her having a sofa, and looking on at them; but Mantel then presumed to speak, and advised her Majesty going immediately to bed. The queen consented, and ordered her women to undress her. The illness, however, made such alarming progress, that the grande maîtresse on the next morning called in Dr. von Leyser, the physician in ordinary.

"You have twice," the queen said to the physician, "extricated me from a dangerous indisposition since the month of October; but this exceeds your skill: I know I am not within the help of medicine."

Leyser affected cheerfulness; but at once requested that Dr. Zimmermann, a very celebrated physician at Hanover, might be called in.

In the meanwhile the queen's condition grew worse every moment, and she requested to see Magister Lehzen, the pastor of the city church. The latter at once arrived, and, in the ante-chamber, was informed by Dr. Zimmermann of the great danger that menaced the queen's life. When he was shown into the bed-room, the queen said to him, in a weak voice:

"You did not imagine me so ill as you find me."

Lehzen assured Caroline Matilda how greatly he lamented it, and tried to console the exalted sufferer with the consoling words of faith, read her spiritual hymns, more especially Gellert's beautiful canticle, "Ne'er will I seek to injure him;" and concluded with a prayer on the text of St. Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians:--

"Unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think."

The worthy clergyman returned in the afternoon, and again in the evening, and found the queen, in spite of her indescribably violent illness, rather more calm; and when he returned to the castle on the next morning, he found that Superintendent General Jacob had already been with the patient, and the two physicians were still with her. On the faces of the physicians he fancied he could read a certain calmness, and, in fact, the patient was better, as she herself said. It was the usual lucid interval which takes place before departure from life, the harbinger of imminent death, dressed in the garb of mercy for the friends of the departing.

The queen employed these last moments in the exercise of a good deed. She requested the clergyman to write a few words for her to her brother, which would show that she had not forgotten her attendants, but recommended them to the King of England. She tried to dictate the words to him, but her tongue was already refusing to obey her, and she left it to the pastor to write what he thought proper. When he had finished, she took the paper in her hand, but returned it to him again immediately, that he might read it to her and seal it before her eyes. The letter was then handed by the queen to Director von Marenholz, whom she had ever deeply respected, for transmission to the king.

Toward evening the condition of the queen had evidently grown so serious, that her dissolution might be apprehended at any moment. She was told that the whole city was alarmed about her, and that even the Jewish community had offered up prayers for her.

"How this sympathy alleviates my sufferings!" the queen answered, in a weak voice; and the clergyman offered up a prayer in words which her eyes confirmed as her own.

Then she inquired after the condition of Sophie von Benningsen; and when the physician gave her the assurance that the child was out of all danger, she breathed the words, "Then I die soothed," and fell asleep not to wake again.

Pastor Lehzen, who was present at the queen's death, describes it in the following words:--

"My office has often enabled me to witness the last hours of my fellow-mortals, but I never remember so easy a dissolution, in which death loses all its terrors. The expression of the Scriptures was literally true in this case: she fell asleep like a tired wayfarer."

Caroline Matilda died on May 11, 1775, at 10 minutes past 11 P.M., at the age of twenty-three years, nine months, and twenty days.

As was very natural in those days, the queen's sudden death aroused suspicions of poison. Mr. Wraxall, however, who asked Mantel about the circumstances, gives us the following account, which may be regarded as authentic:--

I desired to know if there was the shadow of reason to suspect poison or any unnatural means.

"Sir," said he, "God only knows, but I think not. The inhabitants of Zell are all as firmly persuaded of her having been poisoned, as if they had seen her swallow it. They accuse an Italian of it, though the man had not been near the queen's person for near or quite a year before. He had been in the service of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, and being recommended as an Intendant, was brought here from Vienna. He was a profligate, unprincipled man. He brought with him a very pretty young woman whom he called his daughter, but was in reality his mistress. While he stayed here, he contracted a number of debts, and being unable to discharge them, went off with his mistress to Brunswick and Berlin. He has not been heard of since. The prejudiced people accuse him of having been gained by the Danish court, and of having administered a slow poison to the queen before his departure, but I am really not inclined to believe this suspicion."

To this statement Mr. Wraxall adds: "Among the many princes and crowned heads whom the ignorant and misjudging multitude have supposed to be dispatched by poison, none seems to have less foundation for such an apprehension than the Queen of Denmark. She was exactly a subject for an inflammatory or malignant distemper. She had already had repeated attacks of the same nature, though not so violent as the last. It was in the beginning of May, and the weather remarkably hot. The queen was accustomed to use great exercise, and probably overheated herself. She was young, large, and of a plethoric habit of body. When all these circumstances are considered, who can wonder at the nature of her disorder and death? Nothing so likely or natural."

Owing to the mortification that at once set in, it was found absolutely necessary to deposit the body in the vault of the Dukes of Celle until the King of England had arranged the funeral ceremonies. This was done at midnight, on May 13, with great order and decorum by Grand Maréchal von Lichtenstein. At the sermons in the church, the whole congregation, from the highest to the lowest, burst into tears. The queen's affability and gentleness had gained her the hearts of even the lowest people, who offered up heart-felt prayers for their _lieben und guten Königinn_. Her Majesty's remains, accompanied by sixteen captains, were carried in a hearse, drawn by six horses, and attended by a double guard of soldiers, to the royal vault. The burial expenses, amounting to £3,000, though the funeral was quite private, were defrayed, by order, out of George III.'s privy purse.[58]

A general mourning was appointed in England, and on May 24 a committee of the Lords, with staves, and also a committee of the House of Commons, who were of the privy council, waited on his Majesty at St. James's, with their address of condolence on the Queen of Denmark's death. To which George III. replied: that "he returned his thanks to that House for the concern they have expressed for the great loss which has happened to his family by the death of his sister, the Queen of Denmark." The king also recommended the succession of the late queen, for the advantage of her children, to the care of the Regency of Hanover, and Baron von Seckendorf was consequently entrusted with its administration.

The British court sent a formal notification of the death of Queen Caroline Matilda to Copenhagen. It arrived on a day when a court ball was appointed, and the vengeance of old Juliana Maria went so far, that, careless of decency, she did not even order the ball to be put off. The usual ceremonial, however, had to be observed--for instance, the ordinary court mourning of four weeks--as for foreign reigning princes and princesses, and the children of the deceased were placed in deep mourning. It is nevertheless certain that this foolhardy behaviour on the part of the Danish usurpers proved most offensive at the court of St. James's, and heightened the aversion George III. felt for the Danes.

The unfortunate queen, however, was all the more regretted in the land of her exile, and in the widest circles. The two Chambers of the principality of Lüneburg, immediately after the death of this consoler of all the poor and suffering in Celle, applied to her brother with a request that they might be allowed to erect a monument to the deceased queen, in that Jardin François of which she had been so fond, so that there might be at this spot a memorial of the universal devotion with which the great and noble qualities of the late Queen of Denmark were revered among them, and to give remotest posterity an opportunity of honouring, with silent emotion, the memory and reputation of the best and most amiable of queens.

George III. expressed his thanks for this offer, and we can easily understand how welcome to him was this public proof of the veneration and love which were felt for his sister, who had been so cruelly hurled from her throne.

After receiving the king's assent, the Chambers of Lüneburg had the monument erected by Professor Oeser, of Leipzig, and to the present day it is an ornament of the Jardin François, which travellers gaze on with sympathy and regret.

The governor of Celle, a prince of Mecklenburg Strelitz, also had a monument erected in memory of Caroline Matilda in his English garden, and it is well known that the Danish poets Baggesen and Oehlenschläger have erected permanent memorials to her in their works.

Some years ago, the following letter was discovered in the secret archives of Hanover.[59] It was probably written by Caroline Matilda in the first days of her illness, when she had a presentiment of her death. When she was first attacked, she had said to her faithful valet--"Mantel, I am very ill, and fully believe I shall die."

SIRE,

In the most solemn hour of my life, I turn to you, my royal brother, to express my heart's thanks for all the kindness you have shown me during my whole life, and especially in my misfortune.

I die willingly, for nothing holds me back--neither my youth, nor the pleasures which might await me, near or remote. How could life possess any charms for me, who am separated from all those I love--my husband, my children, and my relatives? I, who am myself a queen and of royal blood, have lived the most wretched life, and stand before the world an example that neither crown nor sceptre affords any protection against misfortune!

But I die innocent--I write this with a trembling hand, and feeling death imminent--I am innocent! Oh, that it might please the Almighty to convince the world after my death, that I did not deserve any of the frightful accusations, by which the calumnies of my enemies stained my character, wounded my heart, traduced my honour, and trampled on my dignity!

Sire! believe your dying sister, a queen, and even more, a Christian, who would gaze with terror on the other world, if her last confession were a falsehood. I die willingly: for the unhappy bless the tomb.

But more than all else, and even than death, it pains me that not one of all those whom I loved in life, is standing by my dying bed, to grant me a last consolation by a pressure of the hand, or a glance of compassion, and to close my eyes in death.

Still, I am not alone: God, the sole witness of my innocence, is looking down on my bed of agony, which causes me such sufferings. My guardian angel is hovering over me, and will soon guide me to the spot, where I shall be able to pray for my friends, and also for my persecutors.

Farewell, then, my royal brother! May Heaven bless you, my husband--my children--England--Denmark--and the whole world! Permit my corpse to rest in the grave of my ancestors, and now the last, unspeakably long farewell from your unfortunate

CAROLINE MATILDA.

We have further and valuable testimony to the unstained memory of Queen Caroline Matilda in the following extract from Falckenskjold's "Memoirs:"--

In 1780, I had an opportunity at Hanover of forming the acquaintance of M. Roques, pastor of the French Protestant Church in Celle. One day, I spoke to him about Queen Caroline Matilda:--

"I was summoned almost daily by that princess," he said to me, "either to read or converse with her, and most frequently to obtain information relative to the poor of my parish. I visited her more constantly during the last days of her life, and I was near her a little before she drew her last breath. Although very weak, she retained her presence of mind. After I had recited the prayers for the dying, she said to me, in a voice which seemed to become more animated:

"_M. Roques, I am about to appear before_ GOD: _I protest that I am innocent of the crimes imputed against me, and that I was never faithless to my husband_."

M. Roques added, that the queen had never spoken to him, even indirectly, of the accusations brought against her.

I wrote down on the same day (March 7, 1780) what M. Roques said to me, as coming from a man distinguished by his integrity of character.

Such is everything that can be learned of the death of Caroline Matilda. Sacrificed in the first bloom of youth, and decked with the fillets of misery, she was sent, an inexperienced victim, to become the bride of a man who was a compound of insanity and brutality. In less than seven years she experienced all the honours, but also all the wretchedness, which a royal throne can offer. Then she died in the flower of life in exile, the victim of the most scandalous conspiracy.

Several descriptions of Caroline Matilda were written at the period of her death in England--among others, one in the "Annual Register," by my grandfather. From among them I have selected the one I consider the best, which first appeared in the "Universal Magazine" for May, 1775:--

* * * * *

The virtues of this unfortunate princess were many of them concealed with as much art as if they had been her reproach. She had a ready and quick apprehension, a lively and strong imagination, with a large compass of thought. She excelled in an uncommon turn for conversation, assisted by a natural vivacity, and very peculiar talents for mirth and humour. She loved a repartee, was happy in making one herself, and bearing it from others. And as this talent was rendered not only inoffensive, but amiable by the greatest good-nature and cheerfulness of disposition, she was the life of the company, and the delight of all that had the honour to approach her. And though it generally requires much care and resolution to govern any extraordinary degree of life and spirit, she had no pains of that sort to overcome, having been blessed with a natural serenity and calmness of mind that was inexpressible, and is hardly ever accompanied with such uncommon share of vivacity; but in her it had so much the ascendant, that it was invariably the same, and constantly remained with her through the whole course of her misfortunes, so that she had reason to express her thankfulness to God, as she often did, that he had given her a temper which enabled her to support herself under the load of injuries she sustained.

Her gentleness of nature showed itself in every instance, both in public and private, and inclined her to study all the ways of making herself agreeable, and of suiting her discourse to the persons with whom she conversed. But though her general manner of receiving company in public was very obliging and gracious, she knew how to distinguish persons of real merit, and had an effectual way of making those for whom she had any particular regard fully sensible of the distinction she made. The same softness of behaviour, and the same command of herself that appeared in the drawing-room, went along with her into her private apartments, and delighted every one that was about her, down to her meanest attendant.

Her generosity was extended in the most impartial manner to persons of different sects and parties; but her principal regards were paid to such as were in the greatest distress, to those who were under the disability of receiving a maintenance from the public, as well as to the widows and children of clergymen and officers whose families, by their deaths, were reduced at once from a state of plenty to a want of the common necessaries of life.

In these acts of benevolence she avoided all appearance of show and ostentation so much, that many persons who subsisted by her bounty were really ignorant of their benefactor. She conversed in private with persons of all the different turns of genius in the whole compass of arts and sciences; and with a few whom she honoured with a more particular regard, she entered into all the freedoms of private and familiar life, and showed that she could let herself down from her dignity as if she had never possessed it, and could resume it again as if she had never parted with it.

It was this affability, however, that enabled her enemies to ruin her. Perfectly innocent, and even virtuous in her conduct, her levity and good humour threw her off her guard, and made her less circumspect than her situation required. She conformed with difficulty to the strict ceremonial which was observed at the court of Copenhagen; a vanity, inseparable from the youthful part of the female sex, made her pleased to see the influence of her beauty on all around her, and she indulged herself in an easy familiarity with persons who were more remarkable for their knowledge and abilities than the greatness of their rank. Wicked instruments were planted by her unrelenting enemy the queen dowager, who put a malignant interpretation on all the harmless liberties taken by this amiable princess; and, paying no regard either to truth or humanity in the calumnies which they suggested, insinuated the most cruel suspicions into the king's ear, and took the most criminal methods to destroy her character with the public.

To these infernal machinations the amiable Matilda fell a sacrifice, in the bloom of youth and beauty, and the zenith of power. After her retirement to Zell she was often heard to wish for death, which the innocence of her life, as well as the misfortunes to which she had been exposed, rendered a most welcome guest; and her last moments passed in imploring forgiveness for her enemies, and recommending her children, for whose safety she was exceedingly apprehensive, to the protection of the Almighty.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 56: Mantel's own words to Mr. Wraxall in 1777. He added, however, "I neither believe the body could communicate any infection, nor that she stayed long enough, had there been any, to receive it. Whether it might have made any deep or injurious impression on her mind, I cannot say; but I cannot in any degree attribute her consequent illness and death to this accident."]

[Footnote 57: Lehzen's "Die Letzten Stunden der Königinn von Danemark."]

[Footnote 58: It is a strange coincidence that the body of Caroline Matilda should be deposited close to that of her unhappy ancestress, Sophia Dorothea, whose fate was in so many respects like her own. Both have been bespattered for many years by calumny, but Dr. Doran took up the cause of Sophia Dorothea, and amply proved her innocence. My only hope is that I may have been equally successful in the cause of Caroline Matilda.]

[Footnote 59: The authenticity of this letter is incontestable. It has reached me through the Duchess of Augustenburg, who was allowed to take a copy by the late King of Hanover.]