Produced by David McClamrock
THE following pages are mainly compiled from certain letters by MissMary Clitherow, which have come into the editor's possession. Theyafford glimpses of the Court at that time, with reference not so muchto public functions as to their Majesties' more private relations withpersons honoured with their friendship. The reader will meet with few,if any, references in them to leaders in political or philanthropicmovements or in the realms of literature or fashion; but it is not tobe inferred that these were regarded with disfavour or treated withcoldness by their Majesties, whose kindly interest in the well-being oftheir people is notorious. There were in this short reign manycommanding personalities whose names must live in our history, and everbe remembered With respect and gratitude. To name only a few: the Dukeof Wellington, Lords Grey, Melbourne, Brougham, Palmerston andShaftesbury, Sir Robert Peel, William Wilberforce, Sir Walter Scott,Robert Southey, Thomas Campbell, S. T. Coleridge, Henry Hallam, BulwerLytton and William Thackeray were among the leading spirits of the time.
With such, however, these pages have no direct concern. They treat ofpersonal friends whose interests lay neither in the Court nor in theSenate, and whose aims had no taint of self-seeking. The knowledge thatWilliam IV.'s intimate friends were high-minded, independent,kind-hearted English gentlefolk assures us that the King's well-knownsimplicity of taste was joined to a kindliness of heart, a sincerity ofcharacter, and a devotion to duty which enabled him to maintain hisheritage of royal responsibility, and to hand it on to his successorwith its honour restored, its resources enlarged, and its securityconfirmed.
II. DEFEAT OF THE MINISTRY—DINNER AT ST. JAMES's, 1830
IT seems almost incredible that in the twentieth century a station onthe Metropolitan Railway should stand amidst quite rural surroundings.About Brentford,[*] however, there are still several fine propertieswhich have hitherto escaped the grip of the speculative builder—e.g.,Osterley Park, the seat of the Earl of Jersey, and Syon Hill, the seatof the Duke of Northumberland—and the immediate neighbourhood ofBoston Road is not yet covered with semi-detached villas, or sordidstreets of jerry-built cottages.