Lord Thurlow, until the meeting of Parliament. Intrigue now went to work in the palace from the cellar to the attic. The Prince of Wales, who had the first claim to the office of Regent, was at enmity with Pitt, Lord Thurlow supported the Prince's right, while Mr. Pitt, in defiance of every dictate of reason and right, intrigued for the Queen, who had never before been made the instrument of political manoeuvring, until Mr. Pitt deemed it necessary for his objects to play off the mother against the son. The Prince's friends were too slow and deliberate in their measures, while Mr. Pitt pushed his designs with great activity. On the assembling of Parliament, the state of the King's health was communicated; the Privy Council met; the report of the physicians was received discussed, and the whole proceedings which followed displayed a struggle so unworthy a great empire in its details, and shewed the petty measures of statesmen in such odious colours that it might for the honour of men of fortune and talent be well spared to the world, were not the advantage of such a lesson, in the way of instruction, likely to possess great uses in exhibiting a true picture of the dark side of human character for a warning to future politicians.

It was fortunate for Prince William that he was absent at this time, and that he knew nothing of what was going on, except by letter. That his Royal Highness was intensely anxious as to the result cannot be doubted, but when he received orders to return to England, and arrived home after a short passage of twenty-one days, he found his father convalescent, and the stormy scenes in and out of Parliament hushed by his father's assumption of the directing authority of the state. The Prince reached Portsmouth on the 29th of April, and Windsor on the 2d of May, where his royal parents received him with great satisfaction, as indeed was the case with the whole of the royal family. Great rejoicings were at that moment taking place on account of the King's recovery, and from one end of the kingdom to the other, the illuminations and festivities were more than usually brilliant and imposing His Royal Highness Prince William was enabled to take part

in some of the latest of these fetes, and to give himself an entertainment to his brothers, after having been present at Ranelagh at a splendid banquet to which he was invited by the Spanish minister, the Marquis del Compo.

The dinner giving to his royal brothers and their friends took place at Willis' rooms; and was in consequence of the King having advanced his Royal Highness to the dignity of Duke of the kingdom of Great Britain, and Earl of the kingdom, by the titles of the Duke of Clarence and of St. Andrews, and Earl of Munster.

This dinner evidently shewed that there was a strong party to which the Princes were attached, which was opposed to the party in power; to which the Queen, and consequently her consort, had given their support. At this dinner there were banners and incriptions indicative of the feelings of the three brothers, that they were determined to be "united for ever," though they were opposed by the rest of the world. At public entertainments given by the foreign ministers, it was noticed that the three princes sat repeatedly from the rest of the royal family. The truth was, the Duke of Clarence, as he was now styled, could not brook the slight put upon the Prince of Wales by Mr. Pitt; he felt the injustice done to the heir-apparent, and he was too generous and high-spirited to remain neuter, much less join the party, where intrigues against the undoubted right of the heir-apparent had been so successful. It was not in the nature of things to overlook the parties who had been concerned in this injustice, any more than the injustice itself. The Queen had, naturally, the other branches of the royal family on her side. The King on his recovery, was naturally, from his dislike to the heir-apparent, enrolled with the partner of his throne, were she right or wrong, in the proceedings with Mr. Pitt. There was nothing the King more enjoyed than the humiliation of the Prince of Wales, who, though in the matter of the Regency unquestionably right, had given his father great cause of offence, by his dissipated life and great profli

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gacy of manners. But these were not the sole causes-the Prince was heir-apparent, and had questioned his father's will. Thus it was, that matters stood, when Prince William Henry returned, and at once took part with his brothers. The King soon afterwards wrote his Royal Highness a letter, expressing his disapprobation of the conduct of the Prince of Wales and his party, throughout the office of the Regency. The Prince had been guilty of the crime of opposing the minister of George III., during his mental alienation, in a question that concerned the Prince himself intimately. His Royal Highness had been opposed to Mr. Pitt, who had made his mother a test of his ambition; and although the Prince of Wales was arrived at full years of discretion, being twenty-seven, he was not to presume that he had a will of his own, in a matter that concerned himself alone. Thus monarchs allow no opinion of their own to others; and George III., no doubt, thought it contumacious in the heir apparent, or any of his sons to oppose his minister under circumstances of any kind that could possible occur. It may be remarked here, that the Duke of Clarence exhibited to his elder brother by permission, the letter of his father, and drew forth that reply to the royal epistle, which was attributed to Mr. Sheridan's dictation. That letter clearly shews, making every allowance for royal professions, that the great sin of the Prince was what has been surmised. The King, however, was not very forgiving. The opposition made by the Prince of Wales to Pitt and his party, cancelled in the royal view every other feeling. The very idea of a justification of the Prince's conduct, in the opposition to sic vol, sic jubeo of the monarch, whether capable or not of judging—whether in or out of his senses-was an affront to his majesty the monarch, and not to be passed over.

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The Prince of Wales led his brother Clarence any way liked. The duel between the Duke of York and Colonel Lennox is well known. The Duke of York, it must be acknowledged, carried himself with a far more noble bearing on the occasion, in one affair, than the Prince of Wales. The Duke

had inflicted an injury, by saying, that Colonel Lennox "had put up with language, unfit for any gentleman to bear ;" and did not deny having done so, while he refused to give up the author. This was doing a great injustice: the Duke said " Colonel Lennex might consider him as an officer of the regiment; it is not in those days to be borne, that mere family connexion with the sovereign, shall be a sanction for inflicting an injury upon any man of honour and spirit with impunity." The Duke felt that it must not be, and went out with Colonel Lennox, declining to fire at him; but his Royal Highness did not give any other satisfaction. When the affair was over, the Duke conducted himself like a gentleman, taking no more notice, than if the affair had never occurred. It was not so with the Prince of Wales. Colonel Lennox, a giddy man, soon afterwards attended a ball at court, where, as not more than a month had elapsed from the affair of honour, it was certainly bad taste to go. The Prince of Wales, seeing him present, as he was coming down to Colonel Lennox's place in the dance, instantly led his partner to the bottom of the room. The Duke of York followed next, and turned the Colonel without the least exception, as if nothing had ever occurred between them; but the Duke of Clarence followed the example of the Prince of Wales. The ball was broken up in consequence of the Queen's retiring with the Princesses only a single country dance having been gone down. The Prince of Wales had prejudices naturally enough on the side of his family, imagining, no doubt, that Colonel Lennox should have pocketed any affront from the brother of the heir apparent. If he did not so imagine, why was he angry? In the second place, whatever the Prince thought, the display of his temper on the injudicious appearance of Colonel Lennox, who had done no wrong, was not that of the man of thorough good-breeding. The Duke of York's conduct at the ball, on the other hand was brave and above all praise, though his royal Highness had reflected upon a man of honour, and had given no explanation of his conduct; he no doubt thought it very ill taste of Colonel Lennox to appear so quickly at Court. But his Royal Highness rea

soned, that as a man of spirit, acting up to the fashion of the times, the Colonel had done right, in vindicating his own honour against any individual, however high his station; and having only done this, he was not to be marked out in society, for doing as any man would have done in his circumstances, however high that society might be. It is probable, that the presence of Colonel Lennox at the ball was expected beforehand, from the simultaneous act of the Prince and the Duke of Clarence; for the latter must have been very quick indeed, else, to penetrate the reason of the Prince's conduct and copy it almost in a breath.

The Duke of Clarence had been absent, and therefore was not actively concerned in opposing Pitt's party. No long time afterwards he was honoured by his father's recognition, and even had a private audience before his Majesty's first levee after his attack of insanity. A story is related about this time of the Duke and Madame Schwellenberg, one of those German dependents of the Court that have always in goodly train followed the fortunes of their betters to this country. Queen Charlotte had given her a post in the royal palace-" placed her," as Peter Pindar sung,

"In a most important sphere, Inspectress-general of the royal gear."

The poet doubts too whether ever one solitary grace had even in youth adorned her countenance. The Duke of Clarence entered where the nondescript lady was sitting, when she arose, and was retiring with great haste; then seeming to recollect herself, she returned, and attempted to apologise, by saying that she thought it was the Duke of York. "And suppose it was the Duke of York," said the Prince, giving old Schwellenberg a no very gracious look as she went off, adding, "-a round dozen before all the pages of the back stairs." This old German lady died at Buckingham House in 1787. It is to be observed, that the Prince did not make the speech, all of which is not given above, to the old lady's face, but