Litchfield enquirer., 1872-12-19
From arper's MagAzi: e. GEORGE TAE FOURTH.
BY ". M. TaACKKRAY.

York, the old chancellor became possessed of lock of the defunct princes hair; and and so careful was he respecting the au- thenticity of the relic, that Bessy Eldon his wife sate in the room with the young man from Hamlet's, >. who distributed the ringlet into separate lockets, which each of the Eldon family afterward wore. You know how, when George ". came to Edinburgh, better man than he went on board the royal yacht to welcome the king to his kingdom of Scotland, seized a gob- let from which his majesty had just drunk, vowed 1t should remain forever as an heirloom in his family, clapped the precious glass in his pocket, nd sate down on 1t and broke it when he got home. Suppose the good sheriff prize unbroken now at Abbottsford, should we not smile with something like pity as we beheld 1t Suppose one of those lockets of the mo- Popery princes hair offered for sale at Chrlstie's, QuOt Hbras duce saDanaO anOenies? how many pounds would you find for the nlustrious duke? Madame Tus- saud has got King Georges coronation robes; IS there any man now alive who would kiss the hem of that trumpery? He sleeps since thirty years: do not any of you; who remember him, wonder that you once respected and huzza'd and admired him?
 To make a portrait of him at first seem- ed matter of small difficulty. There is his coat, his star, his wig, his counte- nance simpering under it: with a slate and piece of chalk, I could at this very desk perform a recognizable likeness of him. And yet after reading of him in scores of volumes, hunting him through old magazines and newspapers, having him here at ball, there at public din- ner, there at races aud so forth, you find you have nothing-nothing but a coat and wig and mask smiling below it-nothing but 8 great simulacrum. His sire and grandSires were men. One knows what they were like: what they would do in given circumstances: that on occasion they fought and demeaned themselves like tough good soldiers. They had friends whom they liked acrording to their na- lures; enemies whom they hated fercely; passions, and actions, and individualities of their own. The sailor king who came after George was a man: the Duke of York was man, big, burly, loud, jolly, cursing, courageous. But this George, what was he? look through all his life, and recognize but a bow and grin. I try and take him to pieces, and find silk stockings, padding stays, coat with frogs and fur collar, star and blue rib bon, a pockethandkerchief prodlgiously scented, one of Trueftt's best nutty brown wigs reeking with oil, set of teeth and huge black stock, underwaistcoats, more and then nothing. I know of no sentiment that he ever dis tinctly uttered. Documents are published under his name, but people wrote them private letters, but people spelled them. He put great George P. or George R. at the bottom of the page and fancied he had written the paper: some booksellers clerk, some poor author, some man did the work; saw to the spelling; cleaned up the sloyenly sentences, and gave the lax
 aaudlin slipslop sort of consistency. He must have had an individuality: the dancing master whom he emulated, nay, surpassed-the wig maker who curled his toupee for him-the tailor who cut his coats, had that. But, about George, one can get at nothing actual There may be something behind, but what? We cannot get at the character; no doubt never shall. Will men of the future have nothing bet ter to do than to unswathe and interpret that royal mummy? I own once used to think it would be good sport to pursue him, fasten on him. and pull him down. But now I am ashamed to mount and lay good dogs on, to summon full field, and then to hunt the poor game.
 On the 18th August, 1762, the forty seventh anniversary of the accession of the House of Brunswick to the English throne, all the bells in London pealed in graduation, and announced that an heir to George III. was born. Five days af- terward the king was pleased to pass let ters patent under the great seal, creating H. R. Fl. the Prince of Great Britain, Electoral Prince of Brunswick Luneburg. Duke of Cornwall and Rothsay, Earl of Carrick, Baron of Renfrew, Lord of the Isles, and Great Steward of Scotland, Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester.
 All the people at his birth thronged to see this lovely child; and behind gilt china-screen railing in St. James's Palace, in cradle surmounted by the three princely ostrich feathers, the royal infant was laid to delight the eyes of ieges. Among the earliest instances of homage paid to him, I read that a 'scurious Indian bow and arrows were sent to the prince from his fathers faithful subjects in New York" He was fond of playing with these toys: an old statesman, orator, and wit of his grandfather's and reat-grand- fathers time, never tired of his business, still eager in his old age to be we'll at court, used to play with the little prince, and pretent to fall down dead when the prince shot at him with his toy bow and arrows-and get up and fall down dead over and over again-to the increased de- I Irpht nf %nn n1s G. Alak A. tered from his cradle upward; and before courtiers were busy kissing them.
 There is pretty picture of the royal infant-a beautiful buxom child-asleep in his mothers lap; who turns round and holds finger to her lip, as if she would bid the courtiers around respect the ba- by's slumbers. From that day until his decease, sixty-eight years after, I suppose there were more pictures taken of that parsonage than of any other human being who was ever born and died-in every kind of uniform and every possible court dress-in long fair hair, with powder, with able cocked-hat-in 6 feld-marshal's dirk and claymore Ca stupendous fgure)
 Al - 44V3kO0 A0CA.C0ob W1bu & CO1lAE and tight brooches and silk stockings-in wigs of every color, fair, brown, and black in his famous coronation robes finally, with which performance he was so much in love that he distributed copies of the picture to all the courts and British em- bassies in Europe, and to numberless clubs, town-halls. and private friends. I remember as . young man how almost every dining groom had his portrait.
 There is plenty of biographical tattle about the prince's boyhood. It ls told with what astonishing rapidity he learned all languages, ancient and modern; how he rode beautifully, sang charmingly, and played elegantly on the violoncello That he was beautiful was patent to all eyes. He had . high spirit: and once, when he hadshad difference with his father, burst into the royal closet and called out, ''Wilkes and liberty for ever l" He was so clever that he confounded his very governors in learning; and one of them, Lord Bruce, having made . false quantity in quoting Greek, the admiral young