and dismay. England had never known ten such years of anxiety and distress. In the ashes of one revolution were living the germs of another. The expense, the heartburning and the rankling dissatisfaction of the Revolution were followed by a war more oppressive in its burdens and more unsatisfactory in its results. Marvellous achievements were performed from time to time by English admirals and English captains. The triumph of Nelson at Bastia was succeeded by that of Sydney Smith at Toulon, and that again by others which equally maintained the honour of England's bulwarks. Never were the debates of the legislative assembly more fiery. Never were questions of greater constitutional or diplomatic moment more eagerly contested. The eighteenth century closed amidst the throes of the Irish rebellion. The nineteenth century dawned on the union of Great Britain and Ireland. The king remained tolerably sane until the year 1811. In the month of October, however, his dejection was worse than it had ever been. A Regency now became an imperative necessity. A bill to that end was accordingly introduced into Parliament by the ministry of which Spencer Perceval was the head-Pitt, the statesman that was dearest to the royal heart,having died five years before. The Regency Bill constituted the Prince of Wales regent of the realm, under certain restrictive provisions, which were to cease at the end of a year. To Charlotte was committed the care of her husband, and the disposition of the royal household. The prince was empowered to grant peerages only for services that had been rendered to the army and navy. On the 5th of February, 1811, the Regency Bill was presented by the Lord Chancellor to the king, who, with a melancholy countenance, expressed his assent to its proposals.

Thus the Regency of George, Prince of Wales, was initiated, and who is there who is so ignorant as not to know how much is summed up in it? For more than nine years that Regency lasted, and it is not going too far to say that it is a period of our history which finds its parallel only in the reign of Charles the Second. Midnight banquets, from which the guests were carried away speechlessly drunk-gambling tables from which miners who had sat down in opulence rose up in indigence-balls and assemblies graced by the presence of notorious demi-reps and courtezans-such were the features of this epoch. Nor should it

be forgotten that it was during this reign that foppery reached its nadir. Beau Brummel, an impudent coxcomb, arrogated to himself the functions of arbiter of fashion, and constituted himself an oracle from which no appeal could lie. No sooner did he pronounce an opinion than that opinion became law, and woe betide the luckless wights who what time they heard the sound of the lute, harp, sackbut, psaltery, dulcimer and all kinds of music, refused to bow down and worship the golden image which Nebuchadnezzar, the king, had set up.

In 1795, the Prince Regent, in order to extricate himself from debt, agreed to accept in marriage the hand of Caroline of Brunswick. Ten years previously he had been secretly wedded to the beautiful Mrs. Fitzherbert. But this secret had oozed out, as secrets will, and the public had never forgiven the insult to the national faith, for Mrs. Fitzherbert was a Papist. The Gordon riots, which in 1780 had nearly laid the town in ashes, had plainly demonstrated the temper of the popular mind in respect of Popery, and yet in the face of this the Regent had the assurance to force a Catholic lady, who was, it is only just to say, infinitely better than her creed, into marrying him. It redounds to the credit of Queen Charlotte that throughout life she treated Mrs. Fitzherbert as a daughter, and groaned in spirit at the disgusting way in which she was treated by the prince. It was mainly through the interest of Queen Charlotte and the Duke of York that this excellent lady received an annuity of six thousand pounds.

In April, 1795, the Regent formally married the hapless Princess Caroline of Brunswick, at the Chapel Royal in St. James's Palace. That the prince was averse from the marriage was well known, but the ceremony, notwithstanding, was performed. His Royal Highness' dejection was only too apparent, and had he not kept his spirits up by pouring spirits down there is no saying what might have happened. Long afterwards Caroline asserted that her husband was dead drunk the best part of the wedding night, which in all probability was the case. The birth of their only child occurred in the following year. This child was known as the Princess Charlotte, and instead of healing the differences which existed between her parents, only made matters worse. In May, 1796, all marital regard finally disappeared. Husband and wife now regarded one another with

mutual aversion. The queen, it was said, encouraged her eldest son in the part he played, and manifested her contempt too openly for her hapless daughter-in-law. To what extent these allegations can be said to be true, it is difficult to say. Probably the queen was induced to lend too willing an ear to the representations of some of Caroline's enemies, who, after the committee appointed for investigating her character in 1805, became exceedingly numerous. At last, goaded beyond endurance by the insults which were repeatedly heaped on her by the prince and by some of his disreputable lady friends, Caroline determined to seek peace and comfort on the Continent. Contrary to the strong representations of her best friends she left England in 1814, with the view of travelling in Italy and Greece, and Queen Charlotte never set eyes on her again. Possibly she concurred in the belief that in the circumstances it was extremely desirable that her daughter-in-law should be away from England, and from the charmed precincts of the court of England. Be that as it may, we do not hear that she ever expressed any interest in her welfare, or any wish that she should take up her abode with her husband and seek a reconciliation. Her only child, the Princess Charlotte, died in 1817, but even this sad event did not bring her grief-stricken mother to England. Nor did the death of Charlotte in the following year have any effect on her chequered fortunes.

In the interim it had been discovered that it was an utter improbability that the king would ever again be sane.* Yet most exemplary was the behaviour of Charlotte in these trying circumstances. All that was exacted of her, she performed. How distasteful her appearances in public must at times have been only she herself could say. Still, wherever duty called her, thither she went. So late as 1816, when seventy-three years of age, she attended Ascot races, with three of her daughters and her niece, the Princess Sophia of Gloucester. During the course of the following year Charlotte gratified the scholars of Eton College by attending their ancient Montem, and by giving a fête in her private gardens at Frogmore in their honour on the following day. In the month of April, 1818, she was present at the wedding of the daughter whom she loved so dearly, the Princess

*Twiss's "Life of Eldon," ii., 197.

Elizabeth, who gave her hand to the hereditary Prince of HesseHomburg. Rush, minister plenipotentiary from the United States, who witnessed this ceremony, says that the queen went the rounds of the company, speaking to all. "There was a kindliness in her manner," he says, "from which time had struck away useless forms. No one did she omit. Around her neck hung a miniature portrait of the king. He was absent, scathed by the hand of Heaven." Hardly had half a year elapsed from the celebration of these nuptials than the queen received the solemn summons which no one can disobey. Death, who knocks with equal foot at the door of the royal palace and the cottage of the hind, prostrated her. She had suffered much for some years past, but in November, 1818, it became apparent that the royal sufferer was fast breaking up. The 17th of November dawned. The queen having been placed in her easy-chair, her children gathered affectionately round her to receive the last pressure of their mother's hand. As she held the palm of her wayward son, the Prince Regent, one sweet smile stole over her countenance. In another instant the gentle spirit had fled, "to where beyond these voices there is peace."

Genuine sorrow affected the inhabitants of London, and, indeed, it would not be going too far to say, affected the whole empire, when, far and near, in solemn tones, from the belfries of the churches, it was proclaimed that the king was a widower. In the universal sorrow the queen's venial political offences were freely forgiven. Slander held its tongue. The press ceased its libels. Rival politicians forgot to quarrel.

On the 2nd of December, a dark, dreary, winter's day, half London went out to see the funeral ceremony. From Kew Palace, the coffin was borne to Windsor and interred by torchlight the same night in St. George's Chapel, with all the boast of heraldry and pomp of power. The king was absent. He did not know, nor was he to know, that his wife was dead. Yet a few more months and that same vault in Windsor's nave opened its ponderous jaws once more to receive all that was mortal of George, King of England, who after suffering more than the tongue could tell or the pen recite, the august sufferer had succumbed on the 29th of January, 1820, to partake of that rest which remaineth for the people of God.

This is hardly the place for a detailed character of Charlotte

From what we have said, most of our readers will be able to deduce some estimate of her character for themselves. That she was not before her age is undeniable, but then nobody can be blamed for not being before their age. We live in an age when much nonsense is talked about queens and their duties to their subjects. Queens, after all, are only women, and are not exempt from the infirmities which are incidental to human nature. Tried even by the severest standard, Charlotte's character will bear the closest scrutiny. No amount of what has been called "dry light," no amount of searching into the archives of the past, will make Charlotte's character different from what it was.

disrespect to her memory to say that she never rose above mediocrity, and that she was quite a cipher in the political world. At the same time, it must not be forgotten that she had a very trying position to fill at a very critical period of the national history; that she succeeded in maintaining that position, where many others similarly situated would have come to grief, and that she had in a pre-eminent degree the satisfaction of having conscientiously striven to do her best, which, after all, is the highest success to which any queen can aspire.

WILLIAM CONNOR SYDNEY.