We know that courtiers are a set of base, truckling sycophants; that a mass of brick and mortar, promoted to the rank of a palace, as being the habitation of a King, is a mere gewgaw of the most insufferable vanity, and that all the swelling grandeur, all the pomp, all the outward circumstances of royalty are nothing more than glare and tinsel. We know further, that royalty is inevitably attended with expense, and therefore we are ready to admit, that it would be ungracious to quarrel with that expense, provided it was kept within proper and legal bounds, but when we are told, that the well known private tastes, munificence, public spirit, and other high sounding virtues of George the IV., were one of the greatest blessings ever conferred on the country, we confess that we turn sick at such inflated nonsense, and especially, when we consider the drains which were made upon the pockets of the people, at a time when our streets were filled with mourning, and our houses with woe, merely to uphold the said "tastes, munificence and public spirit" of the royal voluptuary. It may be considered irrelevant, but it will be found, that the extravagances of the princely profligate were in some instances, closely connected with the conduct of the Duke of Clarence, afterwards William the IV., and for that reason, they are here introduced, that a proper clue may be at hand, for the unravelling of many circumstances, which had a direct tendency to impugn the character of the Duke of Clarence, whereas in fact, he acted more as the dupe and instrument of others, than from his own free will or principles.

In 1783, when the Duke of Clarence was in his 19th year, the career of "private tastes, munificence, and public spirit," had been for some time persevered in, the consequence of which was, that the three elder branches of the royal family were overwhelmed with debt. In the above-mentioned year, Parliament voted the Prince of Wales, for the purpose of keeping up the dignity of his high station, and as a separate establishment, his nonage having expired, £50,000 a year, and £60,000 as an outfit. This sum exceeded the revenue of six of the pauper principalities of Germany, from whence the royal

family of this country draw their females, for the perpetuation of the Guelphic race, and twice the amount of the civil list of Denmark or Sweden. This sum, however, which any prudent and economical prince would have found amply sufficient, to provide him with all the luxuries of life, and fully adequate to support the dignity of his station, was by the royal libertine, found wholly insufficient for the support of his profligate habits, and in 1787, his debts, which had been for some time the subject of conversation, and particularly amongst the Jews of Houndsditch, who with their accustomed rascality, were ready to advance their hundreds, or thousands, on receiving cent per cent, were brought before Parliament by the Whig opposition, to which he at that time had attached himself, and the public heard a vast deal of the scandal and shame of allowing the heir apparent of the Crown, to be so overwhelmed with debt, but not a word was uttered of the scandal and shame, attached to the heir apparent, in contracting those debts at all. King George the Third was notoriously, one of the richest men in Europe, but so dense is the veil, which is thrown over the secrets of royalty, that not the slightest information has ever been obtained of the manner in which those riches were disposed of; had a few thousands been appropriated for the honour and dignity of the family, to the liquidation of the debts of his moral son, the Duke of York, several families would have been saved from destitution, and the name of the Duke of York not pronounced, with a heavy curse attached to it. The heir apparent to the Crown is the protegee, or to speak in a humbler strain, the pet of the nation, and therefore how inconsistent, how impolitic would it appear in the vaunted FATHER OF HIS PEOPLE to pay the debts of a son, of whom he was the natural Father, when the people would so gladly and willingly relieve him from such an onerous imposition. He, therefore very wisely sends a message down to his faithful Commons, which, in plain English, is little more than a command; stating that from the fulness of his generosity, which was sheer humbug, he had made an advance of £10.000 a year from the civil list, which

considering what Kings are in general, was a wonder that he could make any advance at all; and with the statement of this unparalleled act of royal munificence, was also sent a statement of the Prince's debts, which exhibited a scene of royal extravagance, unparalleled in all the annals of European royalty. The Whigs were then in power, and as he had attached himself to their party, as a matter of gratitude, that is, if gratitude and a Whig have the slightest relationship with each other, seven hundred and eighty thousand pounds were voted by the conscientious representatives of the people, to enable the royal libertine, to emancipate himself from his honourable and dishonourable encumbrances. To call this by any other terms than a royal and magnificent robbery on the. public purse, were an abuse of language. His father, and the father of his people, was on account of this extraordinary generosity on the part of his faithful Commons, enabled to deposit a few more hundred thousands in the bank of Venice, his own bank of England not being considered sufficiently good security for the large investments which GEORGE GUELPH was in the habit of transmitting to his foreign bank.

Two or three years had scarcely elapsed, when the rumour of the royal embarrassments again intruded itself upon the public ear. At this period, however, the perpetuation of the illustrious house of Brunswick became a matter of very serious consideration with certain individuals, who from prejudice or ignorance attached a greater degree of importance to the subject than, in reality, it deserved. Carlton House was in a state of siege by duns of all description, the Jewish tribe being the foremost in the attack, and evidently constituting the forlorn hope. The bonds of the heir apparent to the Crown of England, were scarcely negotiable on Change, at a discount of 50 per cent. The carriages of the prospective King of England were seized in the streets by John Doe and Richard Roe, and the house of George Guelph junior, was declared in a positive state of insolvency. A meeting of his creditors was called, and it was resolved that an application should be made to the father of the insolvent, offering to take their debts by instal

To this the

ments, if the father would become security father returned an answer, that he was very poor, that he had a rising and expensive family, and referred the applicants to "his faithful Commons," who would undoubtedly see that his son was relieved, either by the Insolvent Court, or by an immediate advance of money, from his present embarrassments. The Commons were well disposed to meet the wishes of the considerate and liberal father, but there was a condition attached to it, which for a time defeated all the hopes of the creditors of ever getting a farthing, and this condition was, that he should marry. He had already one wife living in the person of Mrs. Fitzherbert, who being herself a married woman, when she married the Prince, and a Catholic into the bargain, there was no insurmountable obstacle existing to his marrying one of the female dead weights of the German families, and as he had been himself for some time a dead weight upon his own country, a similarity of condition would it was presumed, produce a happy marriage. The FATHER OF HIS PEOPLE told his son that it was for the benefit of his people that he should marry, and as we are bound to benefit our relations, it was suggested by the father, that he had a niece then living in Germany, who, as having the blood of the Brunswickers pure in her veins, this match of all others was the most eligible that could be fixed upon. It happened, however, that marriage of all acts, was the last which the heir apparent had any inclination to perform; as a patriot Prince, it was, however, incumbent upon him to perform it for the benefit of his people, (Q. E. D.) and as an insolvent, it was incumbent upon him to perform it for the benefit of his creditors.

The bane and antidote were now before him, the payments of his debts and a wife, or insolvency and Mrs Fitzherbert; it was a most trying alternative for him; the benefit which the people would derive from his marriage, was, as became a patriotic Prince, thrown into the scale, and the consent was given to the marriage. He had now done much for the people,

according to the jargon of the Court, and, therefore, out of pure gratitude, the people could not object to do much for him. The father of that people also stepped in very opportunely on the occasion, and down came another message to "his faithful Commons," recommending, or otherwise commanding that a suitable provision be made for the royal pair, and parentally announcing that his son was in great pecuniary embarrassments, and appealing to their liberality, (conscience having nothing to do in the business,) whether they could allow his eldest son, their future monarch, the pride and glory of the Guelphs and Brunswickers, to enter the married state with a debt verging fast upon a million on his head, and in danger of having even the marriage bed swept from under them, to satisfy the demand of some merciless creditor. It was to him an appalling condition; the honour of the country demanded that an immediate arrangement of the debts should take place, and further to show their gratitude for the great sacrifice he had made for the benefit of the people, an act was passed settling on the Prince and his wife £125.000 a year, which with the rents of the duchy of Cornwall, £13.000 a year, and other verquisites, the usual appendages of royalty, formed an annual income of £150.000. This sum was certainly adequate to support the so much talked of dignity of the heir apparent to the Crown, but by the royal individual it was found to be far insufficient, for a very few years afterwards, this most accomplished of all spendthrifts, or, as his mother was wont to call him, "the hopes of the family,"* informed his father that he was again in trouble, inconsistent with the dignity and honour of the heir apparent to the Crown. The King was always a staunch stickler for the dignity and honour of the Crown, and

* This panegyric of the Queen, of her darling son, was always a source of banter to the Duke of York, who regarded it in some respects, as a degradation of himself. One day when the royal brothers had been drinking deeply, and the Prince of Wales was literally lying under the table in a state of beastly intoxication, the Duke of York actuated by a spirit of mischief, conducted the · There Queen to the place, and pointing to the intoxicated Prince, exclaimed mother there lie the hopes of the family."