scend; think how unpleasant a situation! he bore it all with a firm and unaffected countenance." *

Notwithstanding the prognostication of Walpole and others, that the Duke would speedily follow his father to the grave, his death did not take place till nearly five years from the date of his recent attack, and then at a period when renewed health and vigour seemed to promise a longer existence. On the morning of the day on which he died he had been to court, apparently totally free from indisposition: he afterwards dined in Arlington Street, and spent the evening with the Duchess of Brunswick. Almost immediately, however, after he had reached his own house he was seized with a shivering fit, and just as the physician, who had been summoned, made his appearance, the Duke staggered into a sofa and expired. His death took place at his house in Upper Grosvenor Street, on the 31st of October, 1765, in the forty-fifth year of

his age.

As the character of the Duke of Cumberland is relieved by no soft, and by few redeeming, traits, we can take but a slight interest in its developement. His nature was stern; he was cold in his feelings, unbending in his disposition, and totally devoid of all those softer qualities which throw a charm over social life. His judgment is said to have been clear, and his understanding vigorous, but we can hardly accord him the merit of a capacious mind, when we find him

* Horace Walpole to George Montagu, 13th November, 1760.

202

WILLIAM, DUKE OF CUMBERLAND.

taking the same interest in the pattern of a military cockade, as in the sacking of a town or the disposition of an army. His best qualities were generosity, a nice sense of honour, personal courage, a contempt of money, and a proper estimate of fame. He was also a dutiful son and a good subject; qualities which prove, that however blind and indiscriminate was the obedience which he exacted from others, he at least practised the same submission himself when it was required. The principal blot on his character was cruelty; an offence so rarely the distinguishing feature of a brave man, that we trust the want of mercy shown by him after the battle of Culloden, as well as on other occasions, resulted rather from his conscientiously prosecuting a line of rigid policy, than from his conceiving any satisfaction in entailing misery on his fellow-creatures. When we call to mind, indeed, his conduct after the affair of ClosterSeven, affording, as it does, one of the noblest examples on record of a victory achieved over human passions, we would willingly believe that the same stern sense of duty also influenced him in other, though less creditable, transactions of his life.

ANNE,

'PRINCESS OF ORANGE.

Eldest daughter of George the Second and Queen Caroline.Born in 1709.-Extract from Suffolk Correspondence.Accomplishments of the Princess.-Her vanity and ambition. -Anecdote.—Married in 1733 to the Prince of Orange.His personal ugliness.-His death.-Lord Holderness sent by George the Second to condole with the Princess.-Her insulting treatment of him.-Her dislike of her father, and the cause. Her death in 1759.

ANNE, eldest daughter of George the Second and Queen Caroline, was born on the 22nd of October, 1709. Dr. Arbuthnot writes to Mrs. Howard, from Tunbridge Wells, on the 4th of July, 1728, when the Princess was in her twentieth year," Her Royal Highness goes on prosperously with the water. I think she is the strongest person in this place, if walking every day (modestly-speaking, as far as would carry her to Seven Oaks) be a sign of bodily strength. Her Highness charms everybody by her affable and courteous behaviour, of which I am not only a witness, but have the honour to be a partaker. I tell her Highness she does more good than

the waters; for she keeps some ladies in exercise and breath that want it. I have a very great respect for her, and I am only sorry that there is no prince in Christendom at present that deserves her." The Princess possessed the several accomplishments of being a painter, a linguist, and an excellent musician, and, in her youth, her parents are said to have entertained a high opinion of her judgment and understanding. future conduct, however, told a different tale, and, as far as we can glean from contemporary accounts, folly, vanity, and ill-nature, appear to have been her most striking characteristics.

Her

It was the misfortune of this Princess to be vain without cause, to be imperious without being dignified, and to be ambitious without the means of gratifying the passion. When ambition and vain glory take root in a weak mind, the one is sure to entail disappointment, and the other contempt.

The first seeds of ambition appear to have been planted in the mind of the Princess in very early youth. When a mere child, she told her mother how much she wished that she had no brothers, in order that she might succeed to the throne. On her mother reproving her," I would die to-morrow," she said, " to be queen to-day."

It seems to have been solely owing to her ambitious character, and her desire to display the talents which she imagined herself to possess,

* Letters to and from Henrietta, Countess of Suffolk, vol. i.

p. 295.

that the Princess, in 1734, was induced to accept the hand of the Prince of Orange, a man, the hideousness of whose person could only have been exceeded, according to all accounts, by that of some repulsive monster of romance. Such was his personal deformity, that the King, in acquainting his daughter of the proposals made by the Prince for her hand, thought it fair to apprize her how very ungainly a husband she was to expect, and gave her full permission to reject him if she thought proper. The Princess replied, that she would marry him even if he were a baboon. "Well, then," said the King, "there is baboon enough for you."

In November, 1733, the Prince arrived in England for the purpose of solemnizing the marriage, but, in consequence of his being seized with a severe illness, the ceremony was delayed till March following, on the 14th of which month he was united to the Princess in the Chapel Royal, St. James's. The Prince, on this interesting occasion, is described as being habited in a suit of cloth of gold; the Princess, in a robe of silver tissue; her train, which was six yards long, being supported by ten young ladies, the daughters of dukes and earls, with dresses of similar materials to her own. At twelve o'clock the lovers supped in public with the royal family, and shortly after two the bride and bridegroom received company, as was formerly the custom, in bed.

Notwithstanding his revolting ugliness, the Princess is said to have been extremely fond of