The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-02-26


thought of its inward purity, has very rarely
preserved greater semblance OF exterior
decency than at present And certainly the
English court has never, under any member
of the Tudor, the Stuart, or the brunswick
line, been of better report than during the
reign of her present Majesty. 1t is impossi-
BILE to calculate the conservative effect
this simplicity and sobriety of the court
have had upon the nation. But 1t
is beyond question that its effect has been
great. If, in addition to the spread of demo
cratic opinions among the people, and the
extraordinary burdens they have been called
on TO bear they had been actuated by any
personal sanimosity to the reigning monarch
or the reigning dynasty, the elements which
now visibly shoulder might long ago have
broken out into consuming flame. Misgov-
ernment never SO gross has rarely been re-
sisted, in European existence, by popular
outbreaks, unless the sovereign, besides being
tyrannical, had been prohigate. One of the
surest means towards the overthrow Of the
British throne would be an universal popular
notion that its occupant disgraced it.
Such an impression exists with regard to
the probable successor to it; and the rumors
of conjugal infdelity which have been so
long floating in innuendo, have now at last
taken such tangible shape as to break through
the divinity that is supposed to hedge his
box to testify to the character of his relations
with the wife of an English gentleman of
rank and fortune. Whatever the truth of his
statements in that behalf may be-and we by
no means dispute the truth of them-the fact
appears from his own published letters, and
from the pressure of public scandal which
forced him to testify in trial between two
of his future subjects, that his conduct has
been of that degree of imprudence which is
orlu q cha1a 1acc hlool than aotnal orinni
nality. And it is further to be noted that
the sentiment of that class whose sentiments
the Prince of Wales may fairly be supposed
to reflect, would much more readily condone
the offense of man who should perjure him
self than the offense of q man who should tell
the truth to the betrayal of a woman.
The bench was quite ''loyal as might be
expected of fallible judges who know from
what quarter their preferment is to come.
The judge kindly cautioned the Prince before
the beginning of his evidence that he was
not bound to incriminate himself of adultery.
This admonltion was proper enough, no
doubt, but it was curious that it should have
been delivered, unless the judge had reason
to suspect that truthful answers might sub
jeet his Royal Highness to the predicament
against which he warned him. And "the
bench, we are told, Expressed indignation
against the publication in the journals of the
| leIIeIS lTOlu lue ICluce 10 Iduy hlOruduuJ
That publication is, indeed, one of the
most significant circumstances of the case.
George Fourth's profigacies were much more
scandalous than the worst of those charged
against his grandnephew. Yet neither during
his regency nor his reign did they form the
topic of anything like SO open animadversion,
and they were mostly handed down to pub
fishing posterity by tradition. Even the lam
poons upon the trial of Queen Caroline,
which became party question, were circu-
lated in secret and under certain terror of
the law" But the far lighter offenses alleged
| of the Prince of Wales in the same kind are
visited with prompt publicity, and the criti-
cism of them seems hardly to be mitigated at
all by the position of the person alleged to be
an offender.
In fact, scan. mag. is obsolete as a crime,
as well legally as socially. And the increas
ing boldness of the British press ought tc
move the heir to the British Crown that, if he
wishes to enjoy peaceable possession of it
it behooves him to walk with extreme cir
| cumspection.