Fox was put up to say that there was no truth in the rumored marriage, and that the lady who was known to be living with the Prince had no canonical claim to be his wife; and Richard Brinsley Sheridan, who was as great a friend of the Prince as Fox was, delivered a speech in eulogy of the lady referred to which charmed the House by its elegance but left everybody in a state of mystification as to what the status of the lady really was.

But despite the Prince's denial, by proxy, and despite what Fox and Pitt and Sheridan had affirmed, a marriage had taken placea perfectly valid marriage, though contrary to the provisions of the Royal Marriage Act-a marriage unprecedented in the conditions which led up to it and by those with which it was surrounded. All the particulars connected with it have now come to light, through the liberality of King Edward in allowing the papers on the subject, after seventy years of repose in the vaults of Coutts' bank, to be used for publication. Mr. W. H. Wilkins takes up the story of Mrs. Fitzherbert's life which Lord Stourton, her relative, had left unfinished, and we are now in full possession of all the facts relating to this unexampled romance of royalty. The marriage took place on the 15th of December, 1785, at Mrs. Fitzherbert's residence, in Park Lane, London, the bride being given away by her uncle, Mr. Henry Errington, and one of her two brothers, Mr. John Smythe, acting as witness. The Rev. Robert Burt, a young Church of England clergyman, officiated. Mrs. Fitzherbert wished to have the ceremony performed by a Catholic priest, but the law at that time made it a serious offense for a priest to join in marriage a member of his own Church and one of the English Church; in the case of the Prince of Wales such an act would probably be construed as treason. But the marriage, as it was, was in every respect valid; and so Prince George genteelly lied when he told Fox, on his honor, there was no marriage with the lady, so that the House of Commons might have no hesitation about paying His Royal Highness' debts, that he might be enabled to go on untrammelled in his pleasant career of dalliance with sirens and singers.

How the marriage was contrived is one of those romances in real life which eclipse the effort of dramatist or fiction writer. It was brought about by a bold trick. The Prince had become quite. an adept in inventions intended for the accomplishment of his plans either to entrap female innocence or indulge his low tastes with pugilists, horsey men and betting men. One time he would be the Honorable Mr. Elliott, another a night watchman, another a lackey, and so on. Like the Caliph Haroun al Raschid he loved to roam around big cities at night time, but with a far different purpose; and his nocturnal amusements frequently got him into scrapes that

required a good deal of money to hush up or escape from. He had laid siege in vain to the heart of the beautiful widow of Edward Weld. She was as prudent as she was beautiful. When she saw that his attentions and compliments meant more than the accepted. persiflage of society she plainly discouraged them. When he protested his devotion she reminded him of the Royal Marriage Act and the Countess of Waldegrave's reply to his brother, the Duke of Gloucester, under similar circumstances, that "she was too inconsiderable to be his wife and too considerable to be his mistress." She took care to emphasize her earnestness of purpose by leaving the country and putting the sea between them; but this only inflamed the Prince, accustomed to have neither resistance nor denial where his passions were concerned, all the more violently. Mrs. Fitzherbert had been brought up in a convent in France, and was deeply imbued with the Catholic sentiment and principle. Not for any consideration whatever would she give up her faith; and she was well aware that the Prince could not change his and remain heir to the throne. But she could hardly resist his pleadings when he made her believe that his life was at stake in the matter. He got up a story that he had stabbed himself in desperation and would die of his wounds unless she consented to come and see him at Carlton House and give him some hope. She relented, and getting the Duchess of Devonshire, a lady of unsullied reputation, to accompany her, she went there and found the Prince, with Lord Southampton and three other friends. Who the three were Mr. Wilkins' narrative does not say, but other authorities give the names of Charles James Fox, Richard Brinsley Sheridan and Edmund Burke. We do not believe the latter to have been a performer in such a disgraceful deception; he was a man of the highest honor; the others were the very opposite, in many ways. The idea was that "some sort of a ceremony" should be gone through before these witnesses. To some extent this piece of black villainy was successful. Mrs. Fitzherbert, on seeing the Prince pale, exhausted and blood-dabbled, believed that he had really endeavored to play the part of Romeo, and she almost fainted. When she came to herself, the Prince began a series of passionate protestations that nothing would induce him to live unless she consented to become his wife. Alarmed at the terrible alternative, she gave a half-hearted assent; a ring was borrowed from the Duchess of Devonshire, the Prince put it on her finger before all the witnesses. This was taken as a betrothal ceremony, and the lady with her friend then left the house, the Prince feeling very much better and calmer. The truth of the matter seems to be that the Prince had made no attempt on his life, but had been bled by his doctor-for bleeding and cupping were much

in vogue at the time as a means of relieving pain; and he had got the royal blood daubed about his clothes in order to pretend that he had really stabbed himself in a paroxysm of despair for love of her. This play was carried to perfection on the stage of real life. Reading of it at this day, the story appears almost incredible. But it is cold, hard, stolid fact-a sober chapter from the history of the present royal family of great Britain.

We doubt that the annals of base rascality ever recorded a parallel for this vile plot against a noble woman, with a royal prince and heir apparent as the principal conspirator. It is one of the blackest chapters in the life of that handsome profligate on whom a cynical fate had bestowed the palm of "first gentleman in Europe."

Mrs. Fitzherbert was not long ere she realized the mistake into which her commiseration and weakness had inveigled her. On reaching home she wrote an indignant letter to Lord Southampton, reproaching him and his companions for their unmanly conduct and repudiating any sort of obligation as accruing from such a farcical ceremony. To emphasize her displeasure, she immediately quitted England again. She remained in France for more than a year. This was the time when the libeller "Nemesis" was busy with her good name in the interests of the anti-Catholic party.

But the "first gentleman" was not to be balked of his quarry so easily. There were some tricks left him still. He sent letter after letter to Mrs. Fitzherbert imploring her to return and promising her a real marriage that would fulfil every requirement of her Church. He wrote her a letter thirty-seven pages long-the longest amatory missive, probably, ever penned-urging his suit and his reasons why she should favor it. It was a lying letter. The Prince stated the deliberate falsehood that his father "would connive at their union," notwithstanding the Royal Marriage Act, for the reason that he (the King) hated him (the Prince) so much that he would like nothing better than an excuse for setting aside his claim to the crown in favor of his favorite, the Duke of York. It would be difficult indeed to imagine any device more malignantly artful than this.

It was successful-and this is hardly to be wondered at. The lady was now persuaded that she was really loved and respected by this persistent, passionate wooer and that she was necessary to his existence, as he had, she believed, once painfully demonstrated. She did not believe that a Prince could fall so low as to tell a lie. She did not know that he had confessed that he did not know how to speak the truth, and blamed his mother, the Queen, for having taught him and his brothers the art of equivocation-a terrible

charge in the mouth of a son. He was determined to marry her, even though by doing so he forfeited his right of succession. He would grant every condition she demanded; all that he asked in return was that the union should be kept secret. She was at length satisfied; if it were a secret marriage it was a valid one, satisfying her conscience and her honor. She was, after all, only woman; and how few women there were who would have resisted a royal suitor so strenuously under similar circumstances! This is a very important point to consider before apportioning the blame in this royal drama or tragedy.

Mr. Wilkins, in endeavoring to explain how it came about that a woman of so pure and noble a character could be induced to make such a surrender of her principles as to assent to a secret marriage, formulates the theory that she really loved the Prince of Wales. It is not at all improbable. All chroniclers describe him as a very fascinating personage. There is no doubt that he had a wheedling tongue as well as a charming way among both men and women. She may, too, have thought that she would be serving the interests. of her persecuted co-religionists in England and Ireland by entering into such an alliance with one who was to sit on the throne of Great Britain. That paragraph in "Nemesis'" letter about Irish monks and the plan for "introducing Catholics into Ireland" throws a lurid light upon the episode. Though the writer seemed to have been under the impression that all the Catholics in Ireland had, as a high judicial authority had declared, no longer any legal existence, they might be restored to life by a little encouragement such as the union of one of their co-religionists with the heir to the English crown would undoubtedly afford. The meaning of Lord George Gordon's appearance on the stage must not be overlooked. This fact, taken in connection with the libel of "Nemesis," has a tremendous bearing on the significance of the case. It shows us the underlying motive for the hostility of the press of the time toward Mrs. Fitzherbert and explains the villainy of the libels on her stainless character.

Much light on this interesting phase of the subject is to be derived by a perusal of a work that appeared many years ago dealing with the affairs of the English Court in the reigns of George III. and George IV. It was written by an historian named Robert Huish, and entitled "Memoirs of George the Fourth;" and the spirit in which the work was carried through suggests an appeal to pruriency rather than any love of genuine historical inquiry. But despite this unsavory tendency the work is extremely valuable because of the evident pains the author took to pick up every scrap of tittletattle bearing on his subject and the remarkable attention with

which he followed every movement of all the personages who filled the stage during the memorable period with which he deals. Mr. Huish professed to be acquainted with every detail of the royal mésalliance; he even put forward as semi-authentic some versions of private conversations between the Prince of Wales and the lady after they had been married-not as Thackeray said, according to the Catholic rite, but still validly-and yet he is shown by the papers recently disclosed to have been on an entirely false scent. Mr. Fox himself was present at the marriage, he asserted; likewise Mr. Sheridan and Mr. Burke; also Mr. Errington and Mr. Throgmorton; and the priest who performed the ceremony was the Abbé Seychamp. This belief, given as history, is now shown to have no basis but the merest gossip of the coffee houses. We can form some opinion of the ideas of honor entertained by those who were at the bottom of this plot to inflame the animosity of the mob and the mob leaders-fanatics like Lord George Gordon-from the fact that Horne Tooke, who asserted emphatically that he knew the name of the clergyman who performed the marriage ceremony, remaining silent while it was being discussed whether it was a Catholic priest, when he knew-unless he was a liar-all about the case. To offset the effect of those inflammatory appeals to bigotry a new campaign was begun with the object of showing that if there was any danger of a lapse of faith in the connection of the Prince with the lady it was not on her part it was to be feared. Huish's "Memoirs" give at some length the particulars of a private conversation between the pair, obtained through some mysterious channel-an eavesdropping domestic or a page, it is hinted-over the disavowal of the marriage by the Prince through the agency of Mr. Fox, in the House of Commons. The lady was very indignant at this disavowal, but the Prince succeeds at length in soothing her ruffled feelings, and he says:

"We might reasonably have expected long ago to be traduced for impiety, for I believe, Fitzherbert, you have not been at Mass since our union."

"No," replied Mrs. Fitzherbert, "nor do I purpose to attend the celebration any more; the Catholic faith was the religion of my ancestors and of those men to whom I gave my hand.

. I am now in a new relation of life, and disposed to consult the honor and happiness of my present connections. Not that religion is a matter of indifference, far from it. It is the heart which constitutes the essence of true religion; without it ceremonies are absurd, and with it they are unnecessary; at least they form so unimportant a part of public and private devotion that I can conscientiously conform, and I will conform, to the established modes.