George III's health had always been unstable. She clearly remembered that it had not been long since he issued the new Habeas Corpus.
But this time, he seemed to be genuinely ill. Cataracts and rheumatism had already made him uncomfortable, and during this episode, he kept bursting into tears for his sister, Princess Louise, Queen of Denmark, who had died in childbirth.
The Helder Peninsula that Home Popham intended to seize with Russian troops lay at Amsterdam's outlet to the sea. From there all the way to Bremen, the coastline was the remnant of an ancient coastal belt.
It was hard to tell how much use Britain would get from occupying that position, but it was a different matter if the Russian Empire took it.
Tsar Alexander made no mention of whether he would accept Malta, but he brought up the Treaty of Teschen signed after the War of the Bavarian Succession in 1779. Russia and France had signed it as guarantors at the time.
Setting aside the treaty's contents, Alexander's action was tantamount to declaring himself the protector of the German Confederation.
Of course, it could also be understood that both France and Russia were protectors of Germany. But just last year, Alexander had issued an edict expelling all Turks from the Danubian Principalities, with the official posts in those principalities filled by greeks and Romanians.
Then there was the Kingdom of Georgia in the Caucasus. It had been under Russian Imperial protection since 1783, yet Eastern Georgia was annexed into the Russian Empire in 1801.
Enclosed by those two regions was ancient Anatolia. Georgiana handed Mr. Merry a book introducing matters concerning the extradition of the Hittite Kingdom, whose territory happened to be Anatolia.
What the Tsar was thinking was none of Georgiana's concern.
All she knew now