t Dr Hampden, and the Bishop of
Exeter[26] is gone so far, in the Queen's opinion, that he might be
prosecuted for it, in calling the Act settling the supremacy on the
Crown a _foul act_ and _the Magna Charta of Tyranny_.

The Queen is glad to hear that Lord John is quite recovered. We are
going to Windsor the day after to-morrow.

[Footnote 26: Henry Phillpotts, Bishop of Exeter, 1830-1869.]

[Pageheading: LORD MELBOURNE]

_Viscount Melbourne to Queen Victoria._

BROCKET HALL, _30th December 1847._

Lord Melbourne presents his humble duty to your Majesty. He has
received with great pleasure your Majesty's letter of this morning,
and reciprocates with the most cordial heartiness your Majesty's good
wishes of the season, both for your Majesty and His Royal Highness.
Lord Melbourne is pretty well in health, perhaps rather better than he
has been, but low and depressed in spirits for a cause which has long
pressed upon his mind, but which he has never before communicated to
your Majesty. Lord Melbourne has for a long time found himself much
straitened in his pecuniary circumstances, and these embarrassments
are growing now every day more and more urgent, so that he dreads
before long that he shall be obliged to add another to the list of
failures and bankruptcies of which there have lately been so many.
This is the true reason why Lord Melbourne has always avoided the
honour of the Garter, when pressed upon him by his late Majesty
and also by your Majesty. Lord Melbourne knows that the expense of
accepting the blue ribbon amounts to L1000, and there has been of late
years no period at which it would not have been seriously inconvenient
to Lord Melbourne to lay down such a sum.[27]

[Footnote 27: The Queen, through the agency of Mr Anson,
advanced Lord Melbourne a considerable sum of money, which
seems to have been repaid at his death. Apparently Lord
Melbourne's declining health caused him to magnify his
difficulties. The report which Mr Anson made shows that he was
in no sense seriously embarrassed.]

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

TO CHAPTER XVII

At the outset of the year 1848 great alarm was felt throughout England
at the supposed inadequacy of her defences, a panic being caused by
the indiscreet publication of a confidential letter from the Duke of
Wellington to Sir John Burgoyne, to the effect that in his judgment
the whole South Coast was open to invasion, and that there