The prince, in his early days, was a great | But, before yielding, he was determined to fight patron of this national sport, as his grand-uncle his ministers and parliament; and he did, and Culloden Cumberland had been before him; but he beat them. The time came when George being present at a fight at Brighton, where one IV. was pressed too upon the Catholic claims: of the combatants was killed, the prince pen- the cautious Peel had slipped over to that side; sioned the boxer's widow, and declared he never the grim old Wellington had joined it; and Peel would attend another battle. 66 But, neverthe- tells us, in his Memoirs, what was the conduct less"-I read in the noble language of Pierce of the king. He at first refused to submit; Egan (whose smaller work on Pugilism I have whereupon Peel and the duke offered their resigthe honor to possess)-"he thought it a manly nations, which their gracious master accepted. and decided English feature which ought not to He did these two gentlemen the honor, Peel be destroyed. His majesty had a drawing of the says, to kiss them both when they went away. sporting characters in the Fives' Court placed in (Fancy old Arthur's grim countenance and eagle his boudoir, to remind him of his former attach- beak as the monarch kisses it!) When they ment and support of true courage; and when were gone he sent after them, surrendered, and any fight of note occurred after he was king, ac- wrote to them a letter begging them to remain counts of it were read to him by his desire." in office, and allowing them to have their way. That gives one a fine image of a king taking his Then his majesty had a meeting with Eldon, recreation at ease in a royal dressing-gown-❘ which is related at curious length in the latter's too majestic to read himself, ordering the prime Memoirs. He told Eldon what was not true minister to read him accounts of battles: how about his interview with the new Catholic conCribb punched Molyneux's eye, or Jack Randall verts; utterly misled the old ex-chancellor; cried, thrashed the Game Chicken. whimpered, fell on his neck, and kissed him too. We know old Eldon's own tears were pumped very freely. Did these two fountains gush together? I can't fancy a behavior more unmanly, imbecile, pitiable. This a defender of the faith! This a chief in the crisis of a great nation! This an inheritor of the courage of the Where my prince did actually distinguish himself was in driving. He drove once in four hours and a half from Brighton to Carlton House --fifty-six miles. All the young men of that day were fond of that sport. But the fashion of rapid driving deserted England, and, I believe, trotted over to America. Where are the amusements of our youth? I hear of no gambling now but among obscure ruffians-of no boxing but among the lowest rabble. One solitary four-in-hand still drove round the parks in London last year; but that charioteer must soon disappear. He was very old; he was attired after the fashion of the year 1825. He must drive to the banks of Styx ere long, where the ferry-boat waits to carry him over to the defunct revelers who boxed and gambled and drank and drove with King George. Georges! Many of my hearers no doubt have journeyed to the pretty old town of Brunswick, in company with that most worthy, prudent, and polite gentleman, the Earl of Malmesbury, and fetched away Princess Caroline for her longing husband, the Prince of Wales. Old Queen Charlotte would have had her eldest son marry a niece of her own, that famous Louisa of Strelitz, afterward Queen of Prussia, and who shares with Marie Antoinette in the last age the sad pre-eminence of beauty and misfortune. But George III. had a niece at Brunswick: she was a richer princess than her Serene Highness of Strelitz: in fine, the Princess Caroline was selected to marry the heir to the English throne. We follow my Lord Malmesbury in quest of her; we are introduced to her illustrious father and royal mother; we witness the balls and fêtes of the The bravery of the Brunswicks, that all the family must have it, that George possessed it, are points which all English writers have agreed to admit; and yet I can not see how George IV. should have been endowed with this quality. Swaddled in feather-beds all his life, lazy, obese, perpetually eating and drinking, his education was quite unlike that of his tough old progeni-old court; we are presented to the princess hertors. His grandsires had confronted hardship and war, and ridden up and fired their pistols undaunted into the face of death. His father had conquered luxury, and overcome indolence. Here was one who never resisted any temptation; never had a desire but he coddled and pampered it; if ever he had any nerve, frittered it away among cooks, and tailors, and barbers, and furniture-mongers, and opera dancers. What muscle would not grow flaccid in such a life-a life that was never strung up to any action-an endless Capua without any campaign-all fiddling, and flowers, and feasting, and flattery, and folly? When George III. was pressed by the Catholic question and the India Bill, he said he would retire to Hanover rather than yield upon either point; and he would have done what he said. self, with her fair hair, her blue eyes, and her impertinent shoulders—a lively, bouncing, romping princess, who takes the advice of her courtly English mentor most generously and kindly. We can be present at her very toilet, if we like, regarding which, and for very good reasons, the British courtier implores her to be particular. What a strange court! What a queer privacy of morals and manners do we look into! Shall we regard it as preachers and moralists, and cry, Woe, against the open vice and selfishness and corruption; or look at it as we do at the king in the pantomime, with his pantomime wife, and pantomime courtiers, whose big heads he knocks together, whom he pokes with his pantomime sceptre, whom he orders to prison under the guard of his pantomime beef-eaters, as he sits down to dine on his pantomime pudding? It | ly enduring love-had it not survived remorse, is grave, it is sad, it is theme most curious for was it not accustomed to desertion? moral and political speculation; it is monstrous, Malmesbury gives us the beginning of the grotesque, laughable, with its prodigious little-marriage story ;-how the prince reeled into nesses, etiquettes, ceremonials, sham moralities; it is as serious as a sermon, and as absurd and outrageous as Punch's puppet-show. Malmesbury tells us of the private life of the duke, Princess Caroline's father, who was to die, like his warlike son, in arms against the French; presents us to his courtiers, his favorite; his duchess, George III.'s sister, a grim old princess, who took the British envoy aside and told him wicked old stories of wicked old dead people and times; who came to England afterward when her nephew was regent, and lived in a shabby furnished lodging, old, and dingy, and deserted, and grotesque, but somehow royal. And we go with him to the duke to demand the princess's hand in form, and we hear the Brunswick guns fire their adieux of salute, as H.R.H. the Princess of Wales departs in the frost and snow; and we visit the domains of the Prince Bishop of Osnaburg-the Duke of York of our early time; and we dodge about from the French revolutionists, whose ragged legions are pouring over Holland and Germany, and gayly trampling down the old world to the tune of ça ira; and we take shipping at Slade, and we land at Greenwich, where the princess's ladies and the prince's ladies are in waiting to receive her royal highness. What a history follows! Arrived in London, the bridegroom hastened eagerly to receive his bride. When she was first presented to him, Lord Malmesbury says she very properly attempted to kneel. He raised her gracefully enough, embraced her, and turning round to me, said, chapel to be married; how he hiccoughed out his vows of fidelity—you know how he kept them; how he pursued the woman whom he had married; to what a state he brought her; with what blows he struck her; with what malignity he pursued her; what his treatment of his daughter was; and what his own life. He the first gentleman of Europe! There is no stronger satire on the proud English society of that day than that they admired George. No, thank God, we can tell of better gentlemen; and while our eyes turn away, shocked, from this monstrous image of pride, vanity, weakness, they may see in that England over which the last George pretended to reign some who merit indeed the title of gentlemen, some who make our hearts beat when we hear their names, and whose memory we fondly salute when that of yonder imperial manikin is tumbled into oblivion. I will take men of my own profession of letters. I will take Walter Scott, who loved the king, and who was his sword and buckler, and championed him like that brave Highlander in his own story, who fights round his craven chief. What a good gentleman! What a friendly soul, what a generous hand, what an amiable life was that of the noble Sir Walter! I will take another man of letters, whose life I admire even more-an English worthy, doing his duty for fifty noble years of labor, day by day storing up learning, day by day working for scant wages, most charitable out of his small means, bravely faithful to the calling which he had chosen, refusing to turn from his path for popular praise "Harris, I am not well; pray get me a glass or princes' favor-I mean Robert Southey. We of brandy.' I said, “Sir, had you not better have a glass of water ?" Upon which, much out of humor, he said, with an oath, "No; I will go to the queen." What could be expected from a wedding which had such a beginning-from such a bridegroom and such a bride? I am not going to carry you through the scandal of that story, or follow the poor princess through all her vagaries; her balls and her dances, her travels to Jerusalem and Naples, her jigs and her junketings and her tears. As I read her trial in history, I vote she is not guilty. I don't say it is an impartial verdict; but as one reads her story the heart bleeds for the kindly, generous, outraged creature. If wrong there be, let it lie at his door who wickedly thrust her from it. Spite of her follies, the great, hearty people of England loved, and protected, and pitied her. "God bless you! we will bring your husband back to you," said à mechanic one day, as she told Lady Charlotte Bury with tears streaming down her cheeks. They could not bring that husband back; they could not cleanse that selfish heart. Was hers the only one he had wounded? Steeped in selfishness, impotent for faithful attachment and man have left his old political landmarks miles and miles behind; we protest against his dogmatism; nay, we begin to forget it and his politics: but I hope his life will not be forgotten, for it is sublime in its simplicity, its energy, its honor, its affection. In the combat between Time and Thalaba, I suspect the former destroyer has conquered. Kehama's curse frightens very few readers now; but Southey's private letters are worth piles of epies, and are sure to last among us as long as kind hearts like to sympathize with goodness and purity, and love and upright life. "If your feelings are like mine," he writes to his wife, "I will not go to Lisbon without you, or I will stay at home, and not part from you. For though not unhappy when away, still without you I am not happy. For your sake, as well as my own and little Edith's, I will not consent to any separation; the growth of a year's love between her and me, if it please God she should live, is a thing too delightful in itself, and too valuable in its consequences, to be given up for any light inconvenience on your part or mine... On these things we will talk at leisure; only, dear, dear Edith, we must not part!" This was a poor literary gentleman. The First Gentleman in Europe had a wife and daughter too. Did he love them so? Was he faithful to them? Did he sacrifice ease for them, or show them the sacred examples of religion and honor? Heaven gave the Great English Prodigal no such good fortune. Peel proposed to make a baronet of Southey; and to this advancement the king agreed. The poet nobly rejected the offered promotion. into the fight, he said, "What would Nelson give to be here!" After the action of the 1st of June, he writes: "We cruised for a few days, like disappointed people looking for what they could not find, until the morning of little Sarah's birthday, between eight and nine o'clock, when the French fleet, of twenty-five sail of the line, was discovered to windward. We chased them, and they bore down within about five miles of us. The night was spent in watching and preparation for the succeeding day; and many a blessing did I send forth to my Sarah, lest I should never bless her more. At dawn we made our approach on the enemy, then drew up, dressed our ranks, and it was about eight when the admiral made the sig "I have," he wrote, "a pension of £200 a year, conferred upon me by the good offices of my old friend C. Wynn, and I have the laureateship. The salary of the latter was immediately appropriated, as far as it went, to a life-insurance for £3000, which, with an earlier insurance, is the sole provision I have made for my family. All beyond must be derived from my own in-nal for each ship to engage her opponent, and dustry. Writing for a livelihood, a livelihood is all that I have gained; for, having also something better in view, and never, therefore, having courted popularity, nor written for the mere sake of gain, it has not been possible for me to lay by any thing. Last year, for the first time in my life, I was provided with a year's expenditure beforehand. This exposition may show how unbecoming and unwise it would be to accept the rank which, so greatly to my honor, you have solicited for me." How noble his poverty is compared to the wealth of his master! His acceptance even of a pension was made the object of his opponents' satire: but think of the merit and modesty of this State pensioner; and that other enormous drawer of public money, who receives £100,000 a year, and comes to Parliament with a request for £650,000 more! Another true knight of those days was Cuthbert Collingwood; and I think, since Heaven made gentlemen, there is no record of a better one than that. Of brighter deeds, I grant you, we may read performed by others; but where of a nobler, kinder, more beautiful life of duty, of a gentler, truer heart? Beyond dazzle of success and blaze of genius, I fancy shining a hundred and a hundred times higher the sublime purity of Collingwood's gentle glory. His heroism stirs British hearts when we recall it. His love, and goodness, and piety make one thrill with happy emotion. As one reads of him and his great comrade going into the victory with which their names are immortally connected, how the old English word comes up, and that old English feeling of what I should like to call Christian honor! What gentlemen they were, what great hearts they had! "We can, my dear Coll," writes Nelson to him, "have no little jealousies; we have only one great object in view that of meeting the enemy, and getting a glorious peace for our country." At Trafalgar, when the Royal Sovereign was pressing alone into the midst of the combined fleets, Lord Nelson said to Captain Blackwood, "See how that noble fellow, Collingwood, takes his ship into action! How I envy him!" The very same throb and impulse of heroic generosity was beating in Collingwood's honest bosom. As he led bring her to close action; and then down we went under a crowd of sail, and in a manner that would have animated the coldest heart, and struck terror into the most intrepid enemy. The ship we were to engage was two ahead of the French admiral, so we had to go through his fire and that of two ships next to him, and received all their broadsides, two or three times, before we fired a gun. It was then near ten o'clock. I observed to the admiral, that about that time our wives were going to church, but that I thought the peal we should ring about the Frenchman's ears would outdo their parish bells." There are no words to tell what the heart feels in reading the simple phrases of such a hero. Here is victory and courage, but love sublimer and superior. Here is a Christian soldier spending the night before battle in watching and preparing for the succeeding day, thinking of his dearest home, and sending many blessings forth to his Sarah, "lest he should never bless her more." Who would not say Amen to his supplication? It was a benediction to his country-the prayer of that intrepid, loving heart. We have spoken of a good soldier and good men of letters as specimens of English gentlemen of the age just past: may we not also-many of my elder hearers, I am sure, have read, and fondly remember his delightful story-speak of a good divine, and mention Reginald Heber as one of the best of English gentlemen? The charming poet, the happy possessor of all sorts of gifts and accomplishments, birth, wit, fame, high character, competence-he was the beloved parish priest in his own home of Hoderel, "counseling his people in their troubles, advising them in their difficulties, comforting them in distress, kneeling often at their sick beds at the hazard of his own life; exhorting, encouraging where there was need; where there was strife the peacemaker; where there was want the free giver." When the Indian bishopric was offered to him he refused at first; but after communing with himself (and committing his case to the quarter whither such pious men are wont to carry their doubts), he withdrew his refusal, and prepared himself for his mission, and to leave his beloved parish. "Little children, love one another, and forgive one another," were the last sacred words he said to his weeping people. He parted with them, knowing, perhaps, he should see them no more. Like those other good men of whom we have just spoken, love and duty were his life's aim. Happy he, happy they who were so gloriously faithful to both! He writes to his wife those charming lines on his journey: "If thou, my love, wert by my side, My babies at my knee, How gladly would our pinnace glide "I miss thee at the dawning gray, "I miss thee when by Gunga's stream But most beneath the lamp's pale beam "I spread my books, my pencil try, "But when of morn and eve the star I feel, though thou art distant far, "Then on, then on, where duty leads "That course nor Delhi's kingly gates, For sweet the bliss us both awaits "Thy towers, Bombay, gleam bright, they say, But ne'er were hearts so blithe and gay Is it not Collingwood and Sarah, and Southey How touching is a remark Heber makes in his Travels through India, that on inquiring of the natives at a town which of the governors of India stood highest in the opinion of the people, he found that though Lord Wellesley and Warren Hastings were honored as the two greatest men who ever ruled this part of the world, the people spoke with chief affection of Judge Cleaveland, who had died, aged twenty-nine, in 1784. The people have built a monument over him, and still hold a religious feast in his memory. So does his own country still tend with a heart's regard the memory of the gentle Heber. the European Magazine of March, 1784, I came straightway upon it: "The alterations at Carlton House being finished, we lay before our readers a description of the state apartments as they appeared on the 10th instant, when H.R.H. gave a grand ball to the principal nobility and gentry. . . . . The entrance to the state room fills the mind with an inexpressible idea of greatness and splendor. "The state chair is of a gold frame, covered with crimson damask; on each corner of the feet is a lion's head, expressive of fortitude and strength; the feet of the chair have serpents twining round them, to denote wisdom. Facing the throne appears the helmet of Minerva; and over the windows glory is represented by a Saint George with a superb gloria. "But the saloon may be styled the chef-d'au vre, and in every ornament discovers great invention. It is hung with a figured lemon satin. The window curtains, sofas, and chairs are of the same color. The ceiling is ornamented with emblematical paintings, representing the Graces and Muses, together with Jupiter, Mercury, Apollo, and Paris. Two ormolu chandeliers are placed here. It is impossible by expression to do justice to the extraordinary workmanship, as well as design, of the ornaments. They each consist of a palm, branching out in five directions for the reception of lights. A beautiful figure of a rural nymph is represented entwining the stems of the tree with wreaths of flowers. In the centre of the room is a rich chandelier. To see this apartment dans son plus beau jour, it should be viewed in the glass over the chimneypiece. The range of apartments from the saloon to the ball-room, when the doors are open, formed one of the grandest spectacles that ever was beheld." In the Gentleman's Magazine, for the very same month and year-March, 1784-is an account of another festival, in which another great gentleman of English extraction is represented as taking a principal share: "According to order, H. E. the Commanderin-Chief was admitted to a public audience of Congress; and, being seated, the president, after a pause, informed him that the United States assembled were ready to receive his communications. Whereupon he arose, and spoke as follows: "Mr. President,-The great events on which my resignation depended having at length taken place, I present myself before Congress to surrender into their hands the trust committed to me, and to claim the indulgence of retiring from the service of my country. And Cleaveland died in 1784, and is still loved by the heathen, is he? Why, that year "Happy in the confirmation of our independ1784 was remarkable in the life of our friend ence and sovereignty, I resign the appointment the First Gentleman of Europe. Do you not I accepted with diffidence; which, however, was know that he was twenty-one in that year, and superseded by a confidence in the rectitude of our opened Carlton House with a grand ball to the cause, the support of the supreme power of the nobility and gentry, and doubtless wore that nation, and the patronage of Heaven. I close lovely pink coat which we have described. I this last act of my official life, by commending was eager to read about the ball, and looked to the interests of our dearest country to the prothe old magazines for information. The enter- tection of Almighty God, and those who have tainment took place on the 10th February. In the superintendence of them to His holy keep ing. Having finished the work assigned me, I retire from the great theatre of action; and, bidding an affectionate farewell to this august body under whose orders I have so long acted, I here offer my commission and take my leave of the employments of my public life.' To which the president replied: "Sir, having defended the standard of liberty in the New World, having taught a lesson useful to those who inflict, and those who feel oppression, you retire with the blessings of your fellow-citizens; though the glory of your virtues will not terminate with your military command, but will descend to remotest ages. Which was the most splendid spectacle ever witnessed-the opening feast of Prince George in London, or the resignation of Washington? Which is the noble character for after-ages to admire-yon fribble dancing in lace and spangles, or yonder hero who sheathes his sword after a life of spotless honor, a purity unreproached, a courage indomitable, and a consummate victory? Which of these is the true gentleman? What is it to be a gentleman? Is it to have lofty aims, to lead a pure life, to keep your honor virgin; to have the esteem of your fellow-citizens, and the love of your fireside; to bear good fortune meekly; to suffer evil with constancy; and through evil or good to maintain truth always? Show me the happy man whose life exhibits these qualities, and him we will salute as gentleman, whatever his rank may be; show me the prince who possesses them, and he may be sure of our love and loyalty. The heart of Britain still beats kindly for George III.-not because he was wise and just, but because he was pure in life, honest in intent, and because according to his lights he worshiped Heaven. I think we acknowledge in the inheritrix of his sceptre a wiser rule and a life as honorable and pure; and I am sure the future painter of our manners will pay a willing allegiance to that good life, and be loyal to the memory of that unsullied virtue. A FALLEN STAR. I. I SAUNTERED home across the Park, And slowly smoked my last cigar; The summer night was still and dark, With not a single star. And conjured by I know not what And thought of now with pain. A brilliant boy that once I knew, Fresh crowned with college victory, A figure sinewy, lithe, and strongA laugh infectious in its gleeA voice as beautiful as song, When heard along the sea. On me, the man of sombre thought, The radiance of his friendship won, As round an autumn tree is wrought The enchantment of the sun. He loved me with a tender truth, Together hand in hand we walked- For me he drew aside the vail That trembled on his tongue. He read me songs and amorous lays, Where through each slender line a fire Of love flashed lambently, as plays The lightning through the wire. A nobler maid he never knew Along the shores of life. Thus rearing diamond arches up Whereon his future life to build, He quaffed all day the golden cup That youthful fancy filled. Like fruit upon a southern slope, He ripened on all natural food, The winds that thrill the skyey cope, The sunlight's golden blood. And in his talk I oft discerned The first faint notes the poet's breast, Utter with strange delight. Thus rich with promise was the boy, When, swept abroad by circumstance, We parted-he to live, enjoy, And I to war with Chance. II. The air was rich with fumes of wine |