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Page 44. line 17. for "appears," read "appear."

55. line 5. for "Anglesea," read" Anglesey," (passim). 81. line 13. for "Cambroune," read " Cambronne." 113. line 9. for "are turned," read "a returned." 132. line 7. for "excess," read "access.

257. line 8. for "touched, but," read " touched but." 278. line 12. for "could be," read "could not be."

MEMOIRS OF THE LIFE AND REIGN

OF

GEORGE THE FOURTH.

CHAP. XXI.

1814-1815.

TRIUMPHANT Counsels, military glory, national exultation, and the sovereign unpopular,—such was the anomalous spectacle presented at the most splendid period of the regent's government. His unpopularity was the result of his conduct and character as an individual, much more than as a sovereign. Personally, rather than politically despotic, he did not, like his father, lie in wait for occasions to grasp prerogative, by stealing upon the liberties of the people; but he disliked truth, he hated independence, he exacted an implicit obedience to his will from all who were dependent upon his pleasure, and he had a spoiled appetite for praise. He was proud of the victories achieved by British valour over a rival, warlike, and victorious nation; but he saw in them only the personal lustre which they

shed upon himself. His was a sentiment which had nothing in common with the national feeling. A subservient tory ministry indulged his worst caprices, and the household party pampered him with flatteries. “Peace, thanks to the prince regent!" was emblazoned as an illumination device on the mansion in Manchester-square; but the indignant sense and better taste of the mob executed summary justice on this outrageous display of adulation and effrontery.

It was contrived by those who had possession of the ear and eye of the regent, that public opinion should reach him only through the corrupt channels and fulsome panegyrics of the court newspapers. The arrival of the allied monarchs first discovered to him the extent of his disgrace with the people. Obliged by the courtesies of hospitality to appear abroad with his guests, and commit himself frankly with the public, he was surprised and shocked by 'the rude licence of the multitude, and reduced to humiliating expedients for evading manifestations of popular disgust.

Upon the departure of the sovereigns he sheltered and consoled himself within the pomps, privacies, and packed audiences of Carlton House and the Pavilion; but the storm of public disapprobation, whilst it could not reach, only pattered the more violently around him. Englishmen, with little of tinsel gallantry, have a manly and moral sense which more effectually shields the weaker sex, and nothing tended more to render the regent unpopular than his behaviour to his wife. His separation from her was, under the circumstances, justifiable, perhaps

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advisable. But his personal dislike descended to mean persecution. His antipathy and influence closed against her every door, public or private, within his reach. The club at White's had the discreditable complaisance to exclude her from a ball given by the members to the allied sovereigns. A protest was recorded by only three members, of whom Lord Sefton, one of the most high-minded men in Europe, was the first.

Hitherto condemned as a bad husband, he was now further censured as a harsh parent. The princess Charlotte of Wales resided with a separate establishment at Warwick House. In the afternoon of the 12th of July, her father came and announced to her that her separate establishment was broken up; that she must reside under the paternal roof at Carlton House and Cranbourne Lodge; that her attendants were dismissed from that moment; and that a retinue of ladies, appointed by him, was in waiting to attend her. The young princess, with her resolute and impassioned temper, seeing the vanity of resistance or solicitation, obtained permission to retire under pretence of tranquillising her spirits, ran secretly and alone out of Warwick House into the next street, threw herself into a hackney coach, and went to the residence of her mother in Connaught Place. Her mother was not at home to receive her. The archbishop of Canterbury proceeded to Connaught Place, charged with the regent's authority to bring back the young princess. He was refused admission by the servants of the princess of Wales. The duke of York was next despatched upon the same errand. In the meantime the princess of Wales

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