"In 1817, Sir Thomas Lawrence was commissioned to paint the portrait of the
princess a second time, and he staid at Claremont during nine days. He one
morning filled up a few vacant hours in writing to his friend, and his
description of the habits of the newly-married and juvenile offsprings and
heirs of royalty, forms a calm, unostentatious, and delightful picture of
domestic life. How ill such pleasures would have been exchanged for the
public splendour and costly amusements by which they were tempted. It is a
source of infinite gratification to lay before the country such a testimony
to the disposition and virtues of one, in whom centered so much of the
public hope and love."


"_Extracts from Letters of Sir Thomas Lawrence._"


"I am now returned from Claremont, my visit to which was agreeable to me in
every respect; both in what regarded myself, my reception, and the complete
success of my professional labours, and in the satisfaction of seeing the
perfect harmony in which this young couple now live, and of observing the
good qualities which promise to make it lasting."

"The princess is, as you know, wanting in elegance of deportment, but has
nothing of the hoyden or of that boisterous hilarity which has been
ascribed to her: her manner is exceedingly frank and simple, but not rudely
abrupt nor coarse; and I have, in this little residence of nine days,
witnessed undeniable evidence of an honest, just, English nature, that
reminded me, from its immediate decision between the right and wrong of a
subject, and the downrightness of the feeling that governed it, of the good
king, her grandfather. If she does nothing gracefully, she does everything