ignorance of the laws of England and of the character of its people; her chief error in believing herself competent to manage their affairs. The lofty notions of the royal Prerogative, and the exclusive and narrow-minded principles with which she sought to impregnate the mind of her son, were not the less pernicious from their having been wellintentioned. She succeeded, indeed, in making him a pious Christian, but no means could be more injudicious than those which she adopted in the hope of making him a good king.

Frederick Prince of Wales expired on the 20th of March 1751, in the forty-ninth year of his age.* The grief of his family, as well as the consternation of his political adherents, were rendered the greater in consequence of the calamity having been altogether unexpected. He had recently, indeed, been suffering from a severe cold, but for some days past had been declared to be convalescent. On the day On the day on which he died, Dodington inserts in his Diary-"I was told at Leicester House at three o'clock that the Prince was much better, and had slept eight hours in the night before. Before ten o'clock at night the Prince was a corpse." He was lying in bed listening to the performance on the violin of Desnoyèrs, a fashionable dancing-master, when, in the midst of a fit of coughing, he suddenly laid his hand upon his stomach, as if in pain, and exclaimed, "Je sens la mort!" The Princess, who was in the apartment, flew to his assistance, but before she could

* The death of Frederick Prince of Wales has been variously represented to have taken place at Kew, Carlton House, and at Leicester House, Leicester Square. There can be no doubt, however, that it occurred in the latter mansion, the same in which, ninety years previously, expired his interesting and ill-fated ancestress, Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia; the same in which Prince Eugene lodged during his secret visit to England in 1712, and in which the Queen of George the Second gave birth to her second son, the hero, or, as some would have it, the "Butcher" of Culloden.-See Cunningham's Handbook of London, articles Carlton House and Leicester House; Dodington's Diary, pp. 96, 97; Walpole's Reign of George 2, vol. i. p. 71 ; and Gentleman's Magazine for 1751, p. 140.

reach his pillow life had become extinct. According to Wraxall, he expired in Desnoyèrs' arms.*

The grief of the Princess at the death of her husband was excessive. Suddenly deprived of the splendid prospect of becoming Queen of England-left the widowed mother of eight children and with the expectation of shortly giving birth to another-it was long before she could be induced to comprehend the terrible reality of her bereavement. For hours no arguments could convince her that life was extinct; for hours she persisted in remaining with the dead body of her husband. When at length, however, she was prevailed upon to retire to her own apartment, her natural fortitude of mind gradually returned to her assistance. Rising from her bed at eight o'clock in the morning, she calmly performed the painful duty of examining the papers of her late consort, and of committing to the flames such as she deemed it impolitic to preserve.†

George the Second, though he had hitherto shown but little partiality for his daughter-in-law, nevertheless behaved towards the Princess, in the first days of her widowhood, with great and unexpected kindness. Lord Lincoln, the Lord in Waiting, was immediately despatched to Leicester House with a message of condolence, and in due time the Mar. 31. King himself visited the afflicted widow. Refusing to make use of a chair of state which had been provided for him, he

Coxe's Memoirs of the Administration of the Right Hon. Henry Pelham, vol. ii. pp. 164-6; Dodington's Diary, pp. 96-8; Walpole's Reign of George 2, vol. i. p. 77; Wraxall's Historical Memoirs of his Own Time, vol. 2. p. 46, 3rd edition. On opening the Prince's body, the cause of his death was found to have been an abscess, which had suddenly burst, and occasioned suffocation. It was on the occasion of the Prince's death that Dr. William George, Provost of Eton, addressed to the youthful Heir Presumptive those admirable Latin Iambics, commencing

"Spes nuper altera, prima nunc Britanniæ "

of which Pope Benedict the 14th observed, that had the author of them been a Catholic, instead of a Protestant Divine, he would have made him a Roman Cardinal.— Nichols's Illustrations of the Literary History of the 18th Century, vol. 9, p. 575. A copy of Dr. George's Iambics will be found in the Appendix.

Walpole's Reign of George 2, vol. i. p. 77.

seated himself on the sofa beside the Princess, and at the sight of her sorrow is said to have been affected even to tears. When his eldest grandchild, the Princess Augusta, attempted to kiss his hand, he not only refused the proffered homage, but, taking her in his arms, embraced her with great apparent affection. To his grandsons he said, "Be brave boys; be obedient to your mother, and endeavour to do credit to the high station to which you are born." The King, moreover, subsequently paid his daughter-in-law the compliment of selecting her to be the guardian of the heir to the throne, and also of awarding her, on her reappearance in public, the same honours that had formerly been enjoyed by the late Queen Caroline.

To his grandson, Prince George, who was now in his thirteenth year, George the Second behaved with no less kindness. "The King," writes the Duke of Newcastle to the Lord Chancellor on the 9th of April, "continues to be perfectly satisfied with the Princess, and is in raptures with the young Prince."* Prince."* He, who had never acted the tender father, delighted, according to Walpole, in playing the "tender grandfather." † Within three weeks after the death of his father, the household' of the young Prince Apr. 10. was declared. The Earl of Sussex, Lord Downe, § and Lord Robert Bertie || were appointed Lords of his Bedchamber, and Colonel John Selwyn ¶ Treasurer of his Household. On the 25th of April the Prince kissed hands on being created Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester.**

* Hardwicke Papers; Harris's Life of Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, vol. ii. p. 436. + Reign of George 2, vol. i. p. 78.

George Augustus Yelverton, second Earl of Sussex, had formerly been a Lord of the Bedchamber to Frederick, Prince of Wales. He died, unmarried, January 8, 1758. § Henry Pleydell, third Viscount Downe, subsequently commanded the 25th Regiment at the battle of Minden in 1759. He was mortally wounded the following year at the Battle of Campen, near Wesel, and died, unmarried, December 9, 1760.

II Fourth son of Robert, first Duke of Ancaster. He was a general officer in the army. Father of the celebrated George Selwyn, and formerly an aide-de-camp to the great Duke of Marlborough. He died November 5, 1751.

** "St. James's, April 20.-His Majesty has been pleased to order Letters Patent

The Prince, to the close of his life, entertained a tender regard for the memory of his father. When his death was first announced to him the child cried bitterly.* Ayscough, his tutor, observing him lay his hand upon his breast, expressed his apprehension that his Royal Highness was unwell. "I feel," said the young Prince, "something here, just as I did when I saw the two workmen fall from the scaffold at Kew." To Viscount Cobham we find him writing shortly after his father's death:

"My Lord,

"LEICESTER HOUSE, April 26, 1751.

"I am obliged to you for your affectionate expressions of concern for my misfortune in losing the best of fathers. "Your attachment to me gives me great pleasure, and I am, with great regard,

"GEORGE P."†

Again, many years after the Prince had ascended the throne-on an occasion of the celebrated Countess of Huntingdon waiting upon him to complain of the balls and routs which, under the primacy of Archbishop Cornwallis, were permitted in Lambeth Palace—we find him alluding in very feeling terms to his father's untimely death. "I remember seeing your ladyship," he said, "when I was young. You then frequented the Court circle, and I cannot forget that you were a favourite with my revered father." +

Towards his grandfather, the Prince entertained no such affectionate feelings. It was a circumstance well known to the sons of George the Third, that George the Second, in

to pass under the Great Seal of Great Britain, for creating His Royal Highness George William Frederick, (the Prince of Great Britain, Electoral Prince of Brunswick Lunenburgh, Duke of Edinburgh, Marquis of the Isle of Ely, Earl of Eltham, Viscount of Lanceston, Baron of Snaudon, and Knight of the Most Noble Order of the Garter) Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester."-London Gazette from April 16 to April 20, 1751.

* Walpole's Reign of George 2, vol. ii. p. 78.

+ Grenville Papers, vol. i. p. 96.

Life and Times of Selina Countess of Huntingdon, vol. ii. p. 283.

a moment of ungovernable rage, so far forgot himself as actually to strike his high-spirited grandson. "I wonder, was an observation of the late Duke of Sussex, while passing through the apartments of Hampton Court, "in which of these rooms it was that George the Second struck my father. The blow so disgusted him with the place, that he could never afterwards be induced to think of it as a residence."*

The fact that Frederick Prince of Wales, notwithstanding his frivolity, took a deep and laudable interest in the education of his sons, is evinced by the following schedule of instructions, drawn up by him for the guidance of their governor, Lord North, of which the original, in the Prince's own handwriting, is in the possession of Baroness North at Wroxton Abbey:

"Clifden, Octbr the 14th, 1750.

"The Hours for the Two Eldest Princes.

"To get up at 7 o'clock.

"At 8 to read with Mr. Scot till 9, and he to stay with 'em till the Doctor + comes. "The Doctor to stay from 9 till Eleven.

"From Eleven to Twelve, Mr. Fung.

"From Twelve to half an hour past Twelve, Ruperti; but Mr. Fung to remain there. "Then to be Their Play hour till 3 o'clock.

"At 3 Dinner.

"Three times a week, at half an hour past four, Denoyer comes.

"At 5, Mr. Fung till half an hour past 6.

"At half an hour past 6 till 8, Mr. Scot.

"At 8, Supper.

"Between 9 and 10 in Bed.

"On Sunday, Prayers exactly at half an hour past 9 above stairs. Then the two Eldest Princes, and the two Eldest Princesses, are to go to Prince George's apartment, to be instructed by Dr. Ayscough in the Principles of Religion till 11 o'clock. "For my Lord North."

[Endorsed in the handwriting of Lord North.]

"The Prince of Wales's Regulation of the Studies of Prince George and Prince Edward. Deliver'd to me October, 1750, upon my being appointed their Governor ; written by his own hand."+

Nevertheless, both previously to, as well as after, the

* This anecdote was related to the author by the person to whom the Duke of Sussex addressed the observation.

The Prince's preceptor, Dr. John Thomas. See post, p. 18.

Notes and Queries, Third Series, vol. vi. p. 7.