Page:Life of Her Majesty Queen Victoria (IA lifeofhermajesty01fawc).pdf/29

Rh attention than her position justified her in demanding. A Council was summoned at Windsor on one occasion (in 1833) for the sole purpose of checking the manifestations of loyalty which the appearance of the Duchess and her daughter provoked. The King was devoured by spleen on hearing that salutes had been fired at the Isle of Wight in honor of these progresses of the heiress-presumptive and her mother. After absurd negotiations on the subject between the King and his sister-in-law, when neither had the good grace to give way, the fleet was commanded, by Order in Council, not to salute the Royal Standard unless the King or Queen was on board. On another occasion, offence seems to have been taken by the King where none was intended, because an address, received by the Duchess in 1835 at Burghley, alluded to her daughter as "destined to mount the throne of these realms." It was an additional offence that Sir John Conroy, the Duchess's controller of the household, "handed the answer, just as the Prime Minister does to the King." With every action, even on the part of others, thus misinterpreted, it was no wonder that the Duchess could have no cordial feelings towards her husband's family. George IV. openly showed his dislike for her, the Duke of Cumberland never lost an opportunity of aggravating the unfriendliness of their relations. When William IV. succeeded, the Duchess of Kent wrote to the Duke of Wellington, as Prime Minister, to request that she might be treated as a Dowager Princess of Wales, with an income suitable for herself and her daughter, for whom she also asked recognition as heiress to the throne. These requests met with a positive refusal, at which the Duchess expressed considerable vexation. Afterwards, when a Regency Bill was brought forward to provide for the event of the death of the King while