Year: 1871


his condition leave no room to hope for his re-
covery from the disease by which he has been
stricken down in the vigor Of his manhood.
The prostration that followed The more violent
stages Of the fever has continued SO long as
to leave fatal termination almost certain.
A great nation already mourns him as dead.
The people are waiting breathlessly for the
confirmation of their worst fears The palace
| is in gloom. A wife about to be widowed
weeps and refuses comfort; widowed
mother. with the old wounds Of her heart
bleeding afresh. bends in anguish over the
| deathbed of her irst-born son; and helpless
children, with wet eyes, alphabetically
yielding to influences which they cannot
explain, lend intensity to the all-prevailing
sorrow.


All our reports 60 to show that the excite
ment in London and throughout the British
Isles is almost, if not entirely unprecedented,
and the feeling is general that in the present
condition of the empire the death of the heir to
the throne will be really national calamity.
All kinds of stocks have gone down, and the
money market generally is depressed. Wher-
ever, throughout the three kingdoms, the
painful intelligence flashed across the tele-
graphic wires has been received, the hopeless
condition of the Prince is the one absorbing
topic Of conversation, and grief is depicted on
every countenance. The Importance of the
approaching event is felt, not in the British
Isles alone, but In every one of the vast and nu-
merous dependencies Of the British Grown, and,
indeed, in every great centre of population
throughout the civilized world. The coming
death of the Prince is as much talked OF,
and its probable results are as much can
vassed In New York and Washington, In
Toronto and Quebec, in Bombay and Cal
cutta, In Berlin and st. Petersburg, in Paris
and Vienna, in Rome and Constantinople, as in
London or Liverpool, in Edinburg or Glas-
gov, in Dublin or Belfast. With the presence
Of death we are all more or less familiar. II
is no wonderful thing that death should come
to the palace. Princes are not, any more than
peasants, exempted from. the common fate of
humanity. But it is rot every day that
Prince of Wales, the heir of the grandest of
the European monarchies, the prospective





ceases to shine, himself still in the heyday of
life, passes away from the scenes of living
men. The august position Of the dying Prince,
the grandeur of his prospects, his youth and
all the interesting family surroundings, lend
to this sad event an interest and invest it with
an Importance to which no one, whatever
his race or whatever his creed, whatever his
country or whatever his cline, can afford to
be Indifferent.


No such darkness has gathered over-no
such sorrow has fallen upon the British gov
ernment and people since the death of the
Prince Consort in 1861. Then the sorrow
was, indeed, deep and general; for it was felt
that good, great and useful man had been
taken away. 1t is true that Prince Albert
was more honored in his death than in his
| life; but 1t is not less true that the
entire body Of the people have since had time
to learn how great calamity befell them in the
death Of Albert the Good. Much as the
Prince of Wales will be lamented, unaffected
as will be the tears which are shed, and
honest as will be the sympathy extended to
the Princess, to the Queen and to all the
more immediate sufferers, the general grief
would not have been less sincere, the
sympathy would not have been less genuine
if the dying Prince had been more attentive to
the precepts Of his father. Many hard things
have been said of the Prince during his life
time. 1t is not to be denied that some of the
reports put into circulation regarding his pri-
vate character are true. It must at the same
time be admitted that some of the reports
are false and that many Of them are exagge-
rated He has never been much of a popular
favorite. Even in his boyhood be was less
successful than his brother Alfred in winning
the public confidence. Since his fathers death,
but more particularly since his marriage, he
has shown a grievous want of discretion. 1t
is possible that he has not been an offender
above the mass OF the young men of his age
and order; but he has paraded his sins with
| an ostentatous recklessness totally unpar-
donabe. The memory of George the Fourth
! is not yet forgotten in England, and it has
long been matter of public talk that all the
vices Of George the Fourth have been repro
duced in Albert Edward, Prince Of Wales
To-day, however, more, perhaps, for the sake
of his mother and for the sake of his young and
beloved Princess and her youthful family
than for bis own, his sins are forgiven, if not
forgotten; and the nation wraps itself in sack
cloth and sheds its tear ofsorrow as the shadow
of the untimely death of its eldest son gathers
| closer and more darkly around it.


There are many who indulge the hope that
the Prince IL epared mipht vet prove n
useful and capable ruler. The follies of
youth do not necessarily cling to man for
ever. 1t would not be the first time in English
history that wayward and selfish prince has
] cut his connection with the past and put ON