- From this period little more is left us but to cull from the journals of the day, and from other authorities, such particulars as best describe the state of the royal patient; amongst which we find it recapitulated, that the strength of the King's recollection remained unimpaired almost to the last, but the aberration of his reason was never in any considerable degree diminished. In the earliest stages of his malady an experiment had been made to recall to his recollection, and direct his attention to, public affairs; but it was soon laid aside, as it was found to create that irritation which is the leading symptom of mental derangement. His Majesty's recollection of past events was, indeed, always extremely exact; and the occasional sketches of persons and characters, which formed great part of his soliloquies, afforded the strongest proof of the activity of his mental powers, which were most strikingly exemplified in a particular instance, when the conversation turned upon the merits of a late Lord Sandwich, whom his Majesty designated by the term Jemmy Twitcher, a nick-name with which that nobleman had been marked during the American war.

We find it stated, on good authority, that the total blindness and increasing deafness of His Majesty gave great facility to his medical and other attendants in the performance of their duties. Until very lately it had been his usual custom to dress

and undress himself without any assistance; indeed, he had a particular aversion to any of his domestics assisting him; and hence arose the circumstance of his beard having latterly grown extremely long. It was recently with the greatest reluctance that he permitted the hair-dresser to perform his operation; and he had frequently in consequence let his beard grow for several days, and sometimes weeks, until it became unpleasant to him, and even then he submitted very unwillingly to the necessity of removing it.

Separated as he was thus from his loyal and affectionate subjects, yet George the Third was not forgotten even amidst the glories of the Prince Regent's administration: nay, even in foreign nations, the deep tinge of his misfortunes appears to have thrown a degree of solemn obscurity over his fate, which made his story interesting to all, and to none more than those who once had been his almost implacable enemies. In this point of view we cannot refuse admittance to the following sketch of our departed monarch, from a French paper, which, instead of former diatribes of Corsican rudeness and insolence, observes, that "the following circumstances are related respecting the last years of the life of George the Third:- That august old man was long deprived of sight, and wore a long floating beard. He wandered constantly through his apartments amidst the phantoms of his imagination,

which represented to him all the beings that were dear to him. He spoke to them, and replied to what he thought he heard said. He also frequently remained for hours together in a state of complete depression, his head resting on both arms. He would then suddenly recover, and believe himself among celestial spirits: he would rush forward, and might have fallen with such force as to cause serious consequences, had not the precaution been taken of surrounding the walls of his apartments with cushions. Formerly he used to collect his servants, and make them sit down in the room; then, fancying himself in his parliament, he used to speak during a long time with vehemence, and at last fall into a kind of delirium. When the king took his meals, which were served to him twice a-day, he imagined himself surrounded at his table by his family; and, as in deprivation of reason he had preserved the taste of his youth for music, he made himself be led to his piano-forte, or ordered a violin to be brought to him, and executed from memory pieces of music with a precision which, considering the state of his mind, was surprising."

That this statement is perfectly correct we cannot vouch; but it agrees in many points with wellascertained facts; and we may further add to it, that the royal patient seemed never to forget that he was still a king; and this was strikingly observable in his demeanonr towards his attendants, exhi

biting the same mixture of dignity and affability which had always characterised his conduct to all around him.

On the twenty-fifth of October, 1819, our venerable and afflicted sovereign entered into the sixtieth year of his reign, a period longer than that in which any of His Majesty's predecessors in Britain had occupied the throne. Henry the Third reigned in England fifty-seven years, and James the sixth in Scotland fifty-eight years: but the former was only nine years of age when he succeeded to the monarchy; and the latter was an infant; when, in consequence of the extorted resignation of his mother, he became king; while George the Third was of legitimate age on his accession to the sovereignty of Great Britain and Ireland. Of the peers of Scotland at His Majesty's accession, only the Duke of Gordon, born 1743, who inherited the title 1752, is alive. The twenty judges of the courts of session and exchequer in Scotland have been exactly three times renewed during this reign; the appointments to the bench being sixty in number, exclusive of two promotions of puisne judges to the president's chair. Of the members of the faculty of advocates at the accession, four are alive, viz. Robert Craig, of Riccartoun, and Robert Berry, both admitted in 1754; and Sir Ilay Campbell, and James Ferguson, of Pitfour, the present members of Parliament for Aberdeenshire, both admitted in 1757. Of the so

ciety of writers to the signet, at the accession, only one, Cornelius Elliott, of Woodlee, is in existence. Of the peers of England and Ireland, at the commencement of this reign, five are alive, the Earl, now Marquis of Drogheda, the Earl of Carlisle, Earl Fitzwilliam, Viscount Netterville, and Viscount Bulkely, all of whom were under age at the acces sion, with the exception of the Marquis of Drogheda, now in his ninetieth year, and at the head of the generals of the army.

The venerated monarch may thus be said to have been almost left alone in an empire, which had been so long under his paternal sway: yet even then all hopes of mental recovery were not entirely lost; for although a gentleman, who, by particular favour, saw him in the month of November, describes him as sitting in a satin night-gown, lined with fur, his head reclined upon a table, evidently unconscious of every thing, still were there reports of flashes of intellect like recovery; but too soon followed with hints of a decline of constitution, and even some surmises of an approaching demise. It is a fact, however, that a few months ago the organs of his constitution seemed quite unimpaired; and it was remarked, that few lives promised a surer duration for several years, notwithstanding His Majesty's advanced age; but about December a gradual loss of strength and flesh were perceptible; since which time the medical gentlemen attendant