Struensee's relations with the queen were offensive to a nation which had a traditional veneration for the royal House of Oldenburg, while Caroline Matilda's conduct in public scandalized the populace. The society which daily gathered round the king and queen excited the derision of the foreign ambassadors. The unhappy king was little more than the butt of his environment, but occasionally the king would put up a show of obstinacy and refuse to carry out Brandt's or Struensee's orders. And once, when he threatened his keeper, Brandt, with a flogging for some impertinence, Brandt ended up in a struggle with the king, and in the course of this he struck the king in the face.