THE PRINCE 9 



and protract his nonage. It went so absurdly Car that 

 lie was made to wear a shirt with a frilled collar like 

 that of babies. He one day took hold of his collar 

 and said to a domestic, ' See how I am treated ! ' " 



The Duke of Montagu, too. was charged with the 

 education of the Prince, and " he was utterly incapable 

 of giving him any kind of instruction. . . . The 

 Prince was so good-natured, but so uninformed, that 

 he often said, ' I wish anybody would tell me what I 

 ought to do ; nobody gives me any instruction for my 

 conduct.' The absolute poverty of the instruction 

 afforded him. the false and narrow ways of the royal 

 household, and the evil example and low companionship 

 of his uncle, the Duke of Cumberland, did much to 

 spoil the Prince. 



To quote Walpole again : " It made men smile 

 to find that in the palace of piety and pride his Royal 

 Highness had learnt nothing but the dialect of footmen 

 and grooms. . . . He drunk hard, swore, and passed 

 every night in * . . . ; such were the fruits of his 

 being locked up in the palace of piety." 



He proved, too, an intractable and undutiful son : 

 but that was the result to be expected, and we cannot 

 join Thackeray in his sentimental snivel over George 

 the Third. 



He was a faithless husband, but his wife was 

 impossible, and even the mob who supported her 

 quailed when the Marquis of Anglesey, baited in front of 

 his house and compelled to drink her health, did so with 

 the titter rider, "And may all your wives be like her ! " 



All high-spirited young England flocked to the side 

 of the Prince of Wales. He was the Grand Master of 

 Corinthianism and Tom-and-Jerryism. It was he who 

 peopled these roads with a numerous and brilliant 

 concourse of whirling travellers, where before had been 

 only infrequent plodders amidst the Sussex sloughs. 

 To his princely presence, radiant by the Old Steyne, 

 hasted all manner of people ; prince and prizefighter, 



* Hiatus in the Journals, arranged by the editor for benefit of 

 the Young Person ! 



