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SON, HUSBAND, FATHER, FRIEND, AND SOVEREIGN.

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SECRET ANECDOTES OF HIS MAJESTY, THE ROYAL FAMILY, AND OTHER DISTINGUISHED
CHARACTERS, CONNECTED WITH THE BRITISH COURT ;

The whole Collected from the most Authentic Sources,

AND TENDING TO ILLUSTRATE THE CAUSES, PROGRESS, AND EFFECTS, OF THE PRINCIPAL
POLITICAL EVENTS OF HIS GLORIOUS REIGN.

COMPRISING, ALSO, A MOST VALUABLE AND INTERESTING

HISTORICAL MEMOIR OF THE HOUSE OF BRUNSWICK,

FROM ITS EARLY FOUNDATION TO THE PRESENT PERIOD,

TRANSLATED EXPRESSLY FOR THIS HISTORY, FROM THE CELEBRATED LATIN WORK, ENTITLED
ORIGINES GUELPHICE.

WITH PORTRAITS AND OTHER ILLUSTRATIONS.

BY ROBERT HUISH, ESQ.

AUTHOR OF THE MEMOIRS OF THE PRINCESS CHARLOTTE, LIFE OF QUEEN CAROLINE, &c. &c.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR THOMAS KELLY, No. 17, PATERNOSTER-ROW,

AND SOLD BY ALL BOOKSELLERS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM.

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ALP

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As it is not the custom of this country to approach a Personage of such exalted distinction but according to the rules of courtly etiquette, I may be thought to have taken an indecorous license, in dedicating this work to Your Majesty. Indeed, I should be the foremost to pass a judgment of censure on my own obtrusion, did I not flatter myself that the subject to which I solicit your condescending attention, will effectually secure me from such a sentence. Happily for me I stand before Your Majesty on this occasion, not as an insignificant individual, but as the humble Representative of Millions.

you

Seated on the throne of your Illustrious Predecessors, their bright and splendid example must be ever present to your contemplation, whether recall to your consideration the mighty deeds which they achieved for their country's welfare, or the noble intrepidity which they ever displayed in defence, and in support, of the Glorious Constitution of the Land. Splendid, indeed, have been the deeds your Ancestors, but brightest and foremost in the rank of English Sovereigns

of

stands

stands your late Honoured Sire; nor, while memory lasts, will your manly sensibilities suffer you to dismiss from it the gratifying, though melancholy, recollection of those Tears which a Nation shed, when he exchanged his Earthly for an Heavenly Crown-you then beheld with what unabating fervency and zeal the English People can attach themselves to a Sovereign, whose Parental Regards, whose Personal Virtues, and whose Beneficent Attentions to their Prosperity, both merited and commanded their Veneration and their Love.

The Country proudly acknowledges the Virtues of your Father as their Patriot King; and to Your Majesty the example of such a Sire, must be ever dear and valued. Though the great Original is, by the Will of Providence, removed to a better sphere, his memory still lives with You and Your People. In the following Work you may again trace him in the relation of your Sovereign and your Father; and though the remembrance may wake a sigh, the Splendour of his Deeds, his Sentiments, and Principles, will remain with you for ever, as the most valued Legacy he could bequeath to you.

Honoured as this Work has been with Your Royal Patronage, I am emboldened to entertain the pleasing idea that this humble offering will be deemed neither officious nor impertinent-were such my thoughts, no excess of apology should be wanting on my part. With the most humble submission, I therefore lay it at the feet of Your Majesty, earnestly entreating you will have the condescension to estimate it, not according to the abilities of the writer, but according to the grandeur of his aim.

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INTRODUCTION.

EMPIRES have their origin, their progress, their glory, and their fall, and they who are by Heaven appointed to wield the destinies of Nations, are subject to the same mutations. Death has rioted in our palaces, and the arrow, which flieth by day and by night, has reached its victims: Corruption has claimed its tribute over royalty, and in the shroud now lie the earthly remains of our Monarch; Majesty, however, may pass and be forgotten, when it is unallied with endearing virtues, or it may be remembered with a curse, when it has wielded a despotic sceptre, and clothed itself in terrors; but Majesty, known only as a mild and protecting Providence, is blessed by millions whilst it runs its earthly course, and regretted by succeeding generations when it has been recalled to its native Heaven.

The Historian, in recording the noble deeds of his compatriots,-in enrolling the names of those who have benefited their country by their discoveries, or who, by their philanthropic acts, have lessened the sum of human misery, feels his breast swell high with pride, that he can call the land his own which gave them birth, and with exultation he calls upon posterity to bless the benefactors which his country has produced; but it is with a trembling hand that he writes the number of the slain in battle, or the private fall of a virtuous man; in the latter case, one of the finest links in the chain of human society is broken, and a chasm is created, which may not be filled during the lapse of centuries. There is a hallowed veil which covers departed virtue, to be lifted only by the delicate hand; and when virtue, in its dearest and fondest relations, accompanies royalty to the tomb, the human mind, pondering on the instability of human happiness, is sunk with grief at the loss which the nation has sustained. George III. now sleeps with his fathers, and another Sovereign already fills the throne of this great Empire; but his memory shall not fade; it is implanted too deeply in the hearts of a whole people to wither beneath the awful visitation; it

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