GEOKGE I. AS A SPORTSMAN. 263 



On June 3, 1727, the King set out for Hanover, ac- 

 companied by the Duchess of Kendal, Lord Townshend, and 

 suite. On the 9th the royal travellers arrived at Delden, the 

 King apparently being in perfect health, as he resumed his 

 journey at 4 a.m. next morning. But as he was travelling 

 that forenoon he was seized with an apoplectic fit in his coach, 

 and was dead in a few hours afterwards. Thus suddenly 

 closed his chequered and eventful, but, on the whole, pros- 

 perous and indulgent reign. Like William of Orange, George 

 the First was brought hither to fill the English throne by a 

 political faction mainly for their own purposes. He had no 

 sympathy with the inhabitants of these islands, whose manners 

 and customs he could not understand and whose language he 

 could not speak. He was to all practical intents and purposes 

 a mere puppet in the hands of his unprincipled ministers. 

 Many hard things have been said of George I., a few of which 

 may be true. Most of them are foul calumny. It is absurd 

 for us to accuse him of callousness or indifference in connection 

 with the exalted station we compelled him, much against his 

 inclination, to fulfil. We were alone to blame in the matter ; 

 if things did not turn out to our liking, why, serve us right. 

 Without his crown and sceptre George I. was not a bad fellow. 

 He was a good sportsman, though his conception of sport was 

 not our sport. Evidently he intended to participate in the 

 pleasures of the chase at the time when he built the New or 

 Stone Lodge in Richmond Park, from a design by the Earl 

 of Pembroke, with the intention to use it as a villa venatica, 

 "after the fatigues of the chase." He was a good judge of 

 a horse ; liked racing, but disliked the surrounding of our 

 racecourses. He won the first race in which any of his 

 horses ran — i.e., in the Plate of 50^. at Guildford, on Tuesday, 

 June 5, 1715, for which six horses competed ; and he named 

 the winner before the start. He never saw this horse before, 

 did not know to whom it belonged, and picked it out as the 

 best of the lot solely from knowledge of horseflesh. True, he 

 discontinued the gold cups which were given to be run for 

 in Queen Anne's reign ; but in lieu of them he gave several 



