Note 20 — Chapter III

The reader is aware that the king was already quite imbecile, and had frequent attacks of mania. But, in order to remove the slightest doubts about Christian VII.'s condition of mind at this time, I will quote the following instances from Molbeck's "Historic Journal for 1852:"—

"One Sunday, during divine service, when the queen was diverting herself in the riding-house in the rear of Christiansborg Palace, the king was standing on the balcony over the gateway with his black and his white boys, and threw from thence logs of fire-wood, tongs, shovels, books, papers, and entire drawers, down into the court-yard, and at last wanted to hurl his favourite Gourmand and the negro boy over the balustrade. Among the papers thrown down was a secret list of the fleet and the condition of each ship, which the lackey of a foreign minister found and carried to his master. In the following June the king broke all the windows in his own and the queen's apartments at Hirschholm, smashed looking-glasses, chairs, tables, and costly china vases, and threw the fragments through the windows into the yard, in which his playmates helped him with all their might. At first such amusements on the part of the sovereign excited great surprise among the public, but they soon grew accustomed to them through their frequent repetition."