“. . . Maria Copley says Miss Canning is quite broken-hearted at going [to India]. She says that her forte is her memory, as proof of which she gave me two instances. One was, getting by heart in a few hours the 39 Articles: the other was, in a somewhat longer time, repeating the whole of a Times newspaper, from beginning to end, advertisements and all. Maria says Lady Charlotte Greville, having dined at the Pavilion not long ago, and having sat next the King, describes him as grown the greatest bore she ever saw. . . . His irritability of temper, they say, is become quite intolerable; his prevailing subject of complaint is his old age, at which he feels, of course, the most royal indignation. . . .”
