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that among one important class of the community it would go on increasing, yet it was of a nature which by no means indicated any decay of general prosperity. It arose from a change which the natural course of events was gradually bringing about in the distribution of wealth among us, and from circumstances which placed us in a more advantageous relation to the other nations of Europe than had for some time subsisted between us and them.

The opening of the year was marked by events of a melancholy kind. The duke of Kent had accompanied his wife and infant daughter to Sidmouth, in Devonshire. There, an injudicious exposure of himself to wet and cold, after a long walk on the 13th of January, brought on, towards the evening, feverish symptoms, accompanied accompanied with hoarseness. Trusting to the goodness of his constitution, he neglected to employ the remedies which his physician recommended. By the following morning the inflammatory symptons had increased in violence, and the disease proved to be an inflammation of the lungs. Recourse was now had to every aid which art could supply, and particularly to copious and repeated bleedings; but all was in vain.

After temporary variations of the malady, which, at two different times, held out hopes of a favourable termination, the prince expired on the 23rd of January. He left behind him a widow, the sister of prince Leopold, and a daughter only eight months old, aud to them, by a will dated on the day preceding his death, he bequeathed all his property.

The body of his royal highness lay in state at Woodbrook cottage,

till Monday the 7th of February. On that day the funeral procession set out, and on the following Sunday arrived at Windsor. On the same evening the body was committed to the vault, with all the solemnities usual on such occasions.

His royal highness was in his fifty-third year at the time of his death. The rigorous discipline, which, in his military capacity, at an early period of his life, he had enforced, brought on him at one time no small degree of unpopularity; but this had long been forgotten in the amiable conduct, which he uniformly manifested in all the civil relations of life. A munificent patron and an active supporter of every scheme of public charity, it was chiefly on occasions interesting to humanity, that he could be prevailed upon to quit the habitual privacy of his life, and present himself to the eyes of his countrymen. He took little share in the political transactions of the times. His sentiments on politics were liberal and temperate, inclining more to the side of Opposition than to that of ministers, but never manifested with violence, or in a manner unbecoming his princely station, or so as to embroil him with his royal brothers. This manly and frank character was well fitted to procure him the general esteem of Englishmen. High birth and station have a fascinating influence, which imparts a dazzling gloss even to common civility and condescension; but if we may trust those who lived in intimacy with him, the social qualities of the duke of Kent possessed a charm which even royalty seldom confers.

The death of the duke of Kent,

though the least expected, was neither the only nor the greatest loss, which the royal family sustained in the beginning of the present year. The bulletin, issued by his majesty's physicians on the first of January, stated, that the king's disorder had undergone no sensible alteration, and that his bodily health, though it had partaken of some of the infirmi ties of age, had been generally good during the preceding month. The infirmities of age, to which allusion was thus made, consisted in the gradual loss of flesh and decay of strength, which had been accelerated in its course by a slight diarrhoea. This bowel disorder, the first attack of which, though it lasted only two days, left him much debilitated, returned after some interval with increased violence. The digestive organs were now so much impaired, as no longer to perform their functions: appetite failed; the stomach rejected all animal food; the bowels had completely lost their tone; no aliments, however nutritious, had any effect in invigorating the exhausted frame of the royal sufferer. He lost his remaining teeth, and seemed to suffer so much from cold, that, though every proper means was adopted to raise the temperature of his apart ments, this symptom of the decay of the vital principle, and of the torpor of the blood, manifested itself with increasing strength. Even in this last stage of the approach to dissolution, his habitual activity did not forsake him; and though he no longer rose at his usual early hour, it was not till within two days of his death, that he was confined entirely to bed. On the night of Friday the 28th of January, the symptoms became

so alarming, that it was evident that this long reign was drawing fast to a close. On the following morning, Sir Henry Halford came to London, and instantly had an interview with the duke of York. His royal highness hastened to Windsor without a moment's delay. On his arrival there, he found his royal parent in a state that afforded no room for hope. The weakness of his majesty increased with every hour; but it was a consolation to those around him, that the approach of death was not embittered by pain. As the evening drew on, nature sunk exhausted; and at 35 minutes past So'clock, George III. expired without a struggle, having retained his recollection almost to the last, though without the presence of any lucid interval.

The death-bed of a sovereign is at all times one of the most striking scenes which the world can exhibit; but in that of George III. there is something more than usually imposing. The purity of his individual character-the situation and temper of the people over whom he ruled

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the length of his reign-the vicissitudes which it had witnessed-the degradation, which, in ́ the course of these vicissitudes, every throne, except his own, had suffered- all tend to throw around the last moments of George III. a more solemn splendor, than ever consecrated the death of any other sovereign of modern times. Great as was the noise which Louis XIV. had made in the world, and large as was the space which he had, for half a century, filled in the eyes of Europe, the removal of that ostentatious monarch from this earthly scene was an event less

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fitted to make a deep impression, than the decease of our late sovereign. Louis XIV. with some brilliant qualities, had numerous vices and numerous foibles. He had been the theme of foolish admiration rather than of respect, and had been more flattered than loved his private life had hibited a constant succession of vicious indulgences; his public conduct had been tainted with persecuting bigotry, and unprincipled ambition. Though fortune had for a time spread a radiance around his name, the days of his old age were days of sorrow and misfortune. The laurels which the generals of his early years had twined around his diadem, faded away, and nothing but defeat and disaster was his lot. Private misfortunes were mingled with public. He saw the props of his family drop successively into the tomb before him; and, after all the glitter and tumult of his long reign, he left his kingdom humiliated abroad, exhausted within, with all the hopes of his race resting upon a single sickly boy. How infinitely less imposing is such a death of such a sovereign, than that of our late king. George III. stood alone among the kings of the earth, as a memorial. of the past times of Europe. He had seen the most ancient thrones crumble into the dust. While all had been forced to bend the knee before base and tyrannical usurpation, his kingly dignity alone had remained unsoiled. Though a world had been arrayed in arms against him and his kingdom, his people had never, for a moment, shrunk from the duty which they owed to him, to themselves, and to the human race; and they had at last achieved

their own salvation and that of Europe. With his name were linked the proudest, yet most awful recollections; and on his disappearance from among us, it seemed as if the sovereigns of the earth had lost a father, a patriarch, a tutelary angel.

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Seldom has so much private virtue adorned a throne, as in the person of George III. It may be said of him with truth (and no higher praise can a king of England receive), that he had not among his subjects a worthier man than himself. His habits of temperance, of early rising, and of regular exercise, enabled him to retain long, and to enjoy fully, the blessings of the vigorous constitution which he had received from nature. His pleasures were all simple and innocent; they consisted chiefly in the gratification which his domestic affections found in the bosom of his numerous family, varied by the sports of the field, and by agricultural pursuits. He had no propensity to vain or ostentatious expense, though the splendor of his court was maintained with due decorum. As a husband, as a father, as a master, he was a model worthy of the imitation of his subjects.

These virtues found their appropriate reward in the love and respect, which they universally inspired. George III., besides enjoying a greater share of public regard, had probably more individuals attached to him personally, than ever fell to the lot of any other sovereign. To judge of the value of this regard and attachment, we must not forget, that he had none of that tinsel which glitters in the eyes of the multitude, and, without any in

trinsic worth, 'draws forth their plaudits. His qualities were of a solid kind, and not fitted to strike at first view, or to gain the applause of the unthinking, but such as must be well known and well tried, before they can be justly estimated. The political factions of the earlier part of his reign involved him in much temporary odium. Party leaders and party writers, in calumniating their opponents, found it convenient to calumniate their sovereign too. But the clouds, thus raised, were soon dissipated by the rays of his steady and undeviating virtue.

If his moral qualities were of the very highest order, his intellectual powers and attainments were, to say the least, highly respectable. In spite of the disadvantages of a neglected, or rather of an ill-conducted education, in which the paltry objects of petty court intrigue were too often preferred to the improvement of the royal pupil, he possessed a sound understanding, which was constantly on the alert, and which displayed itself both in conversation and in the management of business. In the course of his long reign, he was brought into frequent and close contact with some of the ablest men whom the world has produced; and no one of them ever left him without feeling respect for his capacity. Estimating capacity in merely a literary point of view, and judging of his from the few letters of his composition, lately published by the bishop of Winchester in the Life of Pitt, we find in them a precision and elegance of style seldom equalled in written communications on matters of business. The firm

ness and strength of purpose, which the same letters exhibit, should be the theme of different and higher praise.

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His understanding had been much exercised on men, and he generally formed sound and sagacious opinions of their characters. It must be admitted to be no slight proof of his talents, that none ever succeeded in making him the tool of their own intrigues. In spite of the loud clamour respecting favouritism, which was raised in the early part of his reign, cabal seems to have had little influence over him. He had no favourites; and if there were some in whom he reposed more confidence than in others, the selection was, for the most part, such as to do honour to his judgment. His confidence, if once given, was not easily withdrawn; so that his friends and ministers had little reason dread the fickleness of court predilection. Steady in his attachments as well as in his aversious, he was exempt from a failing to which sovereigns are peculiarly liable, though in them it is especially mischievous-that of suffering caprice and love of change to influence the course of their administration. He is said to have been obstinate; but his obstinacy was merely the firmness of a good man in purposes of which his conscience approved. When it was in vain to struggle longer with circumstances, he yielded manfully, though reluctautly, and, in the new course which it was necessary to follow, acted with the same honesty and steadiness as before. His speech to the American envoy, upon the first appearance of that minister at court after the acknow

Jedgment of the independence of the United States, was highly expressive of his character: I was the last man in England," said he, "to consent to your independence; henceforth I shall be the last to call it in question." His upright mind was a stranger to that royal casuistry by which the rulers of mankind set themselves free from the obligations of morality, conceiving nothing to be right except what is expedient. In his eyes the sanctions of morality were even more venerable, when they related to public political conduct, than in the concerns of private life.

In every instance he manifested a sincere desire of maintaining the honour, and promoting the happiness of his people. He did not willingly part with rights, which belonged to the throne or to the country; for to have done so, would have been to betray the trust reposed in him: but he never abused his prerogatives, or showed the least wish to extend his own dominions by unjust aggressions on his neighbours. On more than one occasion he incurred some unpopularity for withholding his confidence from ministers, who were supposed to be friendly to the rights of the people. If these rights are to be set in opposition to the prerogatives of the crown, and if the friends of the former are to be regarded as peculiarly prone to circumscribe the latter, it would be absurd in any sovereign to prefer the service of those who view the authority of his office with a suspicious eye; especially, when he is conscious to himself of having no wish but for the public good. If the people ought to keep a jealous watch on the proceedings

of the crown, and to give their confidence to such as sympathize with their jealousy; it is equally natural and equally justifiable in the crown, to keep an observant eye on the popular part of the constitution, and to entrust its powers to those who are least likely to suffer them to be abridged.

He was blamed at the commencement of his reign for endeavouring to form a party peculiarly attached to himself, instead of putting himself in the hands of any of the existing factions. The accusation was never proved, though Mr. Burke wrote a very long, and very able work, not to establish the fact, but, taking the fact for granted, to trace its operation; and even if it had been proved satisfactorily, it would amount to nothing blameworthy. An attentive examination of the political changes of the latter part of George 2nd's reign (and, of late, valuable materials for such an examination have been given to the public) will show, that intrigue, more than principle, determined the political combinations of those days. The duke of Newcastle had his adherents: a second party looked to the first Pitt as a leader ; the first Fox was the director of the movements of a third faction: and in the formation and dissolution of the various administrations that came into power during the six years immediately prior to the accession of his late majesty, personal connexion and private ambition seem to have been the only ruling motives of action. George II. had occasion, more than once, to complain bitterly, that the grandees of his kingdom chose rather to be the friends and servants of the duke of Newcastle,

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