seldom played anything but the music of his favourite, Handel. His dissolution took place on the 29th January, 1820, in the eighty-second year of his age. Wade's Chronology, p. 753,

PERSON AND CHARACTER.

He was tall, well formed, his features were bold, and his presence commanding. His first entrance into public life, being then but in his twenty-third year, made a great impression; he had a great advantage over his predecessors in greater affability of manner, and in being acquainted with the language, habits, and institutions of the English. "Born and educated in this country," said his majesty, in his opening speech to the parliament, "I glory in the name of Briton, and I hold the civil and religious rights of my people equally dear with the most valuable prerogatives of my crown." And never throughout the course of a long and arduous reign of nearly sixty years, did his actions as man or a prince contradict the boast. Profoundly yet unaffectedly religious, pure in his own morals, and careful to set an example to those around him, George III. was the best husband and father in his own dominions; while, as a king, no man knew better than he the principles of the British constitution; and whether he be regarded in his public or in his private capacity, whether he be tried as a prince or as a man, a more upright character never moved in any circle of society.

Lord Orford, vol. vi., p. 222; and Gleig's History, p. 601.

CHRONICLE.

1760, October 26. George the Third proclaimed king. Being born June 4th, 1738, he had completed his twenty-second year, and was grandson of the late king, and son of Frederick, Prince of Wales, and of Augusta, Princess of Saxe Gotha. Sept. 8. Marriage of the king to the Princess Charlotte of MecklenburgStrelitz, second daughter of the late duke. Sept. 22. Coronation of their majesties. Oct. 5. Mr. Pitt resigned the foreign_secretaryship, and was succeeded by Lord Egremont. 1762, Jan. 4. War declared against Spain. Aug. 12. Prince of Wales born; 21st, Died, aged 72, the celebrated Lady Mary Wortley Montague. Nov. 3. PEACE OF FONTAINBLEAU. Dec. 1. Coals 55s. per chaldron. The king's state coach was finished this year; it cost seven thousand five hundred and sixty-two pounds four shillings and threepence. April 8. Retirement of Lord Bute; 16th, Mr. Fox made a peer by the title of Lord Holland; 30th, John Wilkes committed to the Tower. 1764. At Monmouth assizes a girl, about 18, was burnt, for murdering her mistress. 1765, Feb. 9. The peruke makers being in great distress from the employment of foreigners, and many people wearing their own hair, petition the king for relief; several of the peruke makers who attended gave such offence by their inconsistency in wearing their own hair, that they had it cut off by the populace. May 3. Lord Clive arrived at Calcutta with full power to act as commander-in

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chief, president, and governor of Bengal. June 4. The Crown Inn, at Ware, the oldest in Hertfordshire, began to be pulled down, in order to erect a gentleman's seat. In this inn was the famous large bed in which twenty-six butchers and their wives slept on the night William III. came to the crown. 1768, March 19. Died in his 55th year, of pulmonary consumption, Laurence Sterne, the author of "Tristam Shandy," and the "Sentimental Journey." 1774, April 4. Oliver Goldsmith died, in his 43rd year. 1775, June 17. The battle of Bunker's Hill, in which the king's troops sustained a loss of 1,054 men, of whom 226 were killed. 1780, June 2. Lord George Gordon riots. Oct. 2. Major Andre hanged as a spy by the Americans. Sept. 13. General Elliot's gallant defence of Gibraltar against the united French and Spanish forces. Not a vestige was left on the following day of all the formidable preparations which were collected for the carrying on this celebrated siege. It had now lasted five years, and during that time the enemy had vainly tried all the expedients of warfare. 1784, Dec. 1. Dr. Samuel Johnson died, in his 76th year. 1786. Aug. 2. Margaret Nicholson attempts to assassinate the king. 1788, Feb. 13. Trial of Warren Hastings in Westminster Hall began. 1789, April 28. Mutiny of the Bounty. 1790, January. THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 1791, Dec. 21. The buckle makers of Birmingham sent a deputation to the Prince of Wales to represent their distressed situation, in consequence of the prevailing fashion of wearing shoe strings instead of buckles. 1792. A gang of thieves having clandestinely introduced themselves into the drawing room at St. James's, in dress clothes, tried to hustle and rob the Prince of Wales. Feb. 23. Sir Joshua Reynolds, the celebrated painter, died in his 60th year. Aug. 10. Storming of the Tuilleries. 1793, Jan. 21. Louis XVI. beheaded. Oct. 26. The late Queen of France, after a mock trial before the revolutionary tribunal, was beheaded, and her body interred in the same manner with that of her husband, in a grave filled with quick lime. Marie Antoinette possessed both talents and virtues ; but proud, indiscreet, vindictive, rash, and petulant, she had exercised a political influence that hastened the fall of the monarchy. It is related of her that when laid on the fatal block she turned her head aside to take a last look at the Tuilleries. This accomplished woman, a model of grace and beauty, was in her 38th year. Nov. 8. The celebrated Madame Roland was guillotined. This able and accomplished woman died with Roman fortitude, exclaiming on the scaffold, "O, Liberty! how many crimes are committed in thy name!" Dec. 19. Evacuation of Toulon. 1795, April 8. Marriage of the Prince of Wales with the Princess Caroline, daughter of the Duke of Brunswick; 23rd, Acquittal of Warren Hastings. In this year General Buonaparte first attracted the attention of Europe. 1798, Aug. 1. THE BATTLE OF THE NILE. 1799, Dec. 14. Death of General Washington. 1802. Peace of Amiens. Dec., 1804. Napoleon's pretended invasion from Boulogne. 1805, Oct. 21. VICTORY OF TRAFALGAR,

AND DEATH OF NELSON. 1814. The Restoration of the Bourbons. 1815. Return of Napoleon from Elba. June 18. THE BATTLE OF WATERLOO. 1817, Nov. 6. The Princess Charlotte died, to the great grief of the whole nation. 1818, Nov. 17. Death of Queen Charlotte, at Kew Palace. 1819. Aug. 16. Great Reform Meeting at Manchester, with riots in which 11 persons were killed, and 600 injured. 1820. Jan. 23. Duke of Kent died. Jan. 29. George the Third died, in the 82nd year of his age, having reigned nearly 60 years: he was interred at Windsor, Feb. 16.

REIGN OF GEORGE IV.

FROM 1820 TO 1830-10 YEARS, 4 MONTHS, 28 DAYS.

THE CATO-STREET CONSPIRACY.

In 1820. At Cato-street, John-street, Edgeware-road, Arthur Thistlewood and other conspirators met to assassinate the ministers, who, as they thought, were assembled at a Cabinet dinner, on February 23, at Lord Harrowby's, in Grosvenor-square. Some of the conspirators were to watch the house; one was to call and deliver a despatch-box at the door, the others were to rush in and assassinate the ministers as they sat at dinner, and bring away the heads of Lords Sidmouth and Castlereagh. The conspirators were then to fire the Cavalry Barracks, and the Bank and the Tower were to be taken by the people, who, it was hoped, would rise on the spread of the news. The plot was, however, revealed to the ministers by a spy: the Cabinet dinner did not take place, but this was not known to the conspirators watching in Grosvenorsquare, until it was too late to warn their comrades assembled at Cato-street, in a stable-loft, where, and in their attempted escape, nine were arrested: Thistlewood fled, but a reward of £1,000 was offered for his apprehension, and he was captured next morning. The conspirators were imprisoned in the Tower, and having been tried and convicted, Thistlewood and four others were hanged on May 1; one was pardoned, and five were transported for life.

DEATH OF NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE.

At Longwood, in the Island of St. Helena, after an exile of five years eight months, Napoleon died on the evening of May 5, 1821, of cancer in the stomach, the same disorder which killed his father. "As if to mark a closing point of resemblance betwixt Cromwell and Napoleon, a dreadful tempest arose on the 4th of May, which preceded the day that was to close the mortal existence of this extraordinary man. A willow, which had been the exile's favourite, and under which he had often enjoyed the fresh breeze, was torn

up by the hurricane, and almost all the trees about Longwood shared the same fate. The 5th of May came amid wind and rain. Napoleon's passing spirit was deliriously engaged in a strife more terrible than that of the elements around. The words, " tête d' armée, the last which escaped his lips, intimated that his thoughts were watching the current of a heady fight. About eleven minutes before six in the evening, Napoleon, after a struggle which indicated the original strength of his constitution, breathed his last."-Sir Walter Scott. On the 8th of May his remains were interred, with military honours, near a fountain overhung with willows; here they rested until 1840, when, with the consent of England, they were removed from St. Helena to Paris, and there interred in the Hotel des Invalides; and November 5, 1858, the funeral car of Napoleon was presented by Queen Victoria to the French nation.

The following description of the person of Napoleon is given by Captain Maitland in his Narrative of the Surrender of Bonaparte, in 1815: "He was then a remarkably strong, well-built man, about 5 feet 7 inches high, his limbs particularly well formed, with a fine ancle and a very small foot, of which he seemed very vain, as he always wore, while on board the ship, silk stockings and shoes. His hands were also small, and had the plumpness of a woman's rather than the robustness of a man's. His eyes were light gray, his teeth good; and when he smiled, the expression of his countenance was highly pleasing: when under the influence of disappointment, however, it assumed a dark and gloomy cast. His hair was

a very dark brown, nearly approaching to black; and though a little thin on the top and front, had not a gray hair amongst it. His complexion was a very uncommon one, being of a light sallow colour, different from any other I ever met with. From his being corpulent, he had lost much of his activity."

Sound philosophy and a sound morality equally forbid his being placed amongst the most illustrious characters "whose names adorn the age in which they flourished, and exalt the dignity of human nature." His principal characteristic was an insatiable and selfish ambition, to the gratification of which he sacrificed, without scruple or remorse, the interests and the happiness of all mankind. The good which he did bears no proportion to the misery of which he was, directly or indirectly, the cause: havoc, desolation, and death marked his terrible career, and in the prosecution of his designs and objects he trampled upon every principle of justice and humanity. He had no sympathy with his fellow-creatures and regarded them with such profound contempt that he was indifferent to human suffering, and reckless of human life. It was not from any pleasure in shedding blood, but in order to strike terror into the Royalists, that he caused the Duc d'Enghien to be kidnapped and put to death. When the deed was done, he recoiled from the odium to which he saw that it would expose him, endeavoured to shift it on his instrument, and to cast the blame upon his precipitate zeal, imitating the

behaviour of Queen Elizabeth in respect to the execution of the Scottish queen. Although he became a mighty monarch, he never was actuated by the feelings and sentiments of a gentleman, and he had a total and habitual disregard for truth. His character was not elevated by any moral dignity; and his decline was even more rapid than his rise.-Edinburgh Review.

CORONATION OF GEORGE IV.

This ancient solemnity was performed on July 19, 1821. On the night previous, the King reposed on a couch in a tapestried room of the Speaker's residence, in the Old Palace, at Westminster. Next morning, the royal procession advanced upon a raised platform, covered by an awning, from Westminster Hall to the Abbey, where the king was crowned; and then returned to the Hall, where the banquet was served-this being the last festival of the kind. Sir Walter Scott, who witnessed the solemnity, says: "The effect of the scene in the Abbey was beyond measure magnificent. Imagine long galleries stretched among the aisles of that venerable and august pile, those which rise above the altar pealing back their echoes to a full and magnificent choir of music; those which occupied the sides filled even to crowding with all that Britain has of beautiful and distinguished; and the cross gallery most appropriately occupied by the Westminster school-boys, in their white surplices, many of whom might on that day receive impressions never to be lost during the rest of their lives; imagine this, I say, and then add the spectacle upon the floor- the altars surrounded by the fathers of the church; the king encircled by the nobility of the land, and the councillors of his throne, and by warriors wearing the honoured marks of distinction, bought by many a glorious danger; add to this the rich spectacle of the aisles, crowded with waving plumage, and coronets, and caps of honour, and the sun, which brightened and saddened as if on purpose, now beaming in full lustre on the rich and varied assemblage, and now darting a solitary ray, which catched, as it passed, the glittering folds of a banner, or the edge of a group of battle-axes or partisans, and then rested full on some fair form, the cynosure of neighbouring eyes,' whose circlet of diamonds glistened under its influence. Imagine all this, and then tell me if I have made my journey of four hundred miles to little purpose."

Haydon, the historical painter, describes the Coronation Festivals which he witnessed from the Chamberlain's box: "The Hall doors were opened, and the flower-girls entered strewing flowers. The distant trumpets and shouts of the people, the slow march, and at last the appearance of the King, crowned and under a golden canopy, and the universal burst of the assembly at seeing him, affected every body. . . . . . After the banquet was over, came the most imposing scene of all, the championship. Wellington, in his