missioner Grey, to solicit a passage for you on board the Antelope, although I am not personally acquainted with him, and sincerely hope that it will be attended with the desired effect. Being much hurried to-day, I have only time to desire my best regards to the Commissioner and your good General, and to subscribe myself &c., &c., EDWARD. KENSINGTON PALACE, 5th June, 1810. DEAR DE SALABERRY,-It is with real satisfaction that I now inclose to you Sir John Duckworth's polite answer to my request, from which you will perceive that he not only gives you a passage on board of the Antelope, but promises to promote your getting to Canada with the utmost despatch. Being greatly hurried to-day, I have only time to say to you, that I beg you will endeavor to find out and give me the earliest notice of the day upon which you are likely to be called upon to embark, in order that I may be able to write to your good father, and as many more of my Canadian correspondents as my incessant occupation and the obligation I am under to divide a portion of my time, between my poor sick sister at Windsor, and my unfortunate wounded brother in London, will admit of. I remain, &c., EDWARD. The circumstances referred to at the close of the preceding letter, bring under notice two events in connexion with the Royal family, which caused much sorrow to them, and, one of them, a most important crisis to the nation. On the 31st May, 1810, H. R. Highness the Duke of Cumberland returned from a concert about half-past twelve, and retired to bed immediately. About 2 a. m., he was aroused from sleep by a heavy blow with a sabre on his head, and springing out of bed, he received on his arm which he had raised to protect his head another severe stroke. Six wounds in all were inflicted by his assailant, one of which nearly severed a finger. The alarm was given and the household aroused. The assassin who had fled, and who turned out to be one of the Duke's valets, a Swiss of the name of Sellis, was found in his own bed, dead, with his head nearly severed from his body. The wounds on the 'Duke had been inflicted with his own sabre, those on Sellis, by the Duke's razor. Jealousy was ascribed as the motive which instigated the crime. Mr. Home, a distinguished Surgeon, after a careful examination of the wounds of the Duke, pronounced none of them mortal. A coroner's jury was empanelled, and after an investigation of four hours, returned a verdict of "felo de se in the case of Sellis. A surgeon of some note saw Sellis after death, and gave it as his opinion, that the cuts on the back of the head could not have been inflicted by the deceased himself, and he subsequently made it the subject of lecture to his class, boldly declaring that if Sellis died by his own hands, he certainly had not cut and hacked himself on the back of his neck. As might have been expected great public excitement followed the delivery of this lecture, which tended very much to lower the Duke of Cumberland in public estimation, and a very general opinion prevailed that he had suppressed some very important facts, and if the truth had been all told, it would have shown that the Duke finding himself so treacherously and murderously attacked, had seized, under the impulse of the moment, his razor, and in the ungovernable influence of the moment had inflicted the wounds on Sellis. Some with whom the Duke had never been popular, did not hesitate to lay a more serious crime to his charge. The Duke of Kent felt this most keenly. "We can have," said he, "no separate interests, and no individual eminence; traduce one, and you injure all." And, "my brother has had two assassins to cope with, one, who was bent on the destruction of his body, the other on the destruction of his character; of the two, the latter is by far the most dastardly;" and he ever afterwards showed his feeling on the subject, by "looking down," the lecturer, whom he had previously always greeted with the most marked courtesy. In this year also came the Jubilee. George III. had sat for fifty years on the throne of his fathers, and the nation who really loved him, rejoiced with an exceeding great joy, but their rejoicing was soon turned into mourning. The Princess Amelia, the Kings youngest and favorite daughter, whose health had been long declining, now assumed very alarming symptoms, and so much was the King affected, that the Duke of Kent thus spoke to Dr. Collyer: "My father never imparts his sorrows to his family. If there be anything to give him pleasure, he never fails to make us all participate in it; but he reserves the whole weight of his sufferings and disappointments to himself. I can see him working up his mind to the highest pitch of endurance, yet he utters no complaints. Dearly as I love my sister, and grieved as I shall be to part with her, I could almost wish the conflict were now closed. I dread a firmness on the part of the King, amidst his evident agony, which I am persuaded will not give way unless his mental powers fail; these I fear will suddenly yield to a pressure no longer to be borne." This fear was unfortunately too soon realized. A little before her death there was presented to the King a ring with a lock of her hair, and the word Remember; the firmness of the man and father gave way, and reason fled. During the discussions which took place in the House of Lords on the Regency Bill, the Duke of Kent entered warmly into the feelings of his brother the Prince of Wales, and opposed every parliamentary restriction, conceiving that the Regency ought of right descend on the heir apparent, he being then of age, and on Lord Lansdowne's amendment which gave the administration of the Royal authority to the Prince of Wales, "subject to such limitations and restrictions as shall be made and appointed," which was carried by 105 against 102, he voted with the majority. CHAPTER XVII. Enters on Public life-Mrs. Clarke and "The Rival Princes"-McCallum-Consults Sir Samuel Romilly-Death of Maurice and Lewis de Salaberry in India. 1810, 1811, AND 1812. "They grew in beauty side by side, She had each folded flower in sight,- Up to this date the Duke, paying that deference to the expressed wish of his father for which he had always been noted, had abstained "from decidedly intermeddling with public affairs," and even in his efforts for the advancement of benevolent objects, had confined himself to his private support of them. So, with his great sense of delicacy, while there was any hope of his father's recovery, he still refrained from taking any prominent part, lest his father, on his restoration to health, should think the injunction he had seen fit to lay on his sons had been forgotten. KENSINGTON PALACE, 7th June, 1810. DEAR DE SALABERRY,-I have just received your letter, from which I perceive that you are almost immediately to sail for Torbay, and that as Sir John Duckworth is expected to embark and proceed to sea immediately upon the arrival of the Antelope there, I have no time to lose in preparing my Canadian letters, which I will therefore immediately set about, and endeavor to have in readiness, to forward to you by Saturday, or at latest Monday night's mail, addressed to the Post office at Bresham. I am delighted to find that you are so well pleased with the arrangements which have been made for your passage, and which, as it is insured to you as far as the Magdalen Islands, cannot I think fail of being as short as under any circumstances can be expected at this season of the year. I rejoice to find that my old friend Commissioner Grey has shown you so much attention, but it is no more than I expected from our old friendship, and his natural hospitality and good nature. I am as much surprised as you can be to find that General de Rottenburg has not yet made his appearance at Portsmouth, and fully agree with you that he stands a good chance of missing the next convoy by his delay; however you have done your duty in urging him not to be dilatory, and if he be disappointed of his passage the fault will all be his own. Should Captain James Murray still be within your reach, pray tell him that so far from being offended with him, there is none of my naval protégés whom I esteem higher, and that although he may not have received my letters, I never to my knowledge ever left one of his unacknowledged, and but a few weeks before Col. Downey went to Spain, I expressed very strongly to that officer, who had known him when engaged in Miranda's expedition to the Caraccas, the opinion I entertained of his merit; I shall therefore be most happy at all times to hear from him. I must now conclude, to avoid being too late for the post, and therefore have only time to add the best remembrance of Madame de St. Laurent, and to subscribe myself, &c., &c., EDWARD. P. S.-I fear from mistake between Beck and Severn your harness has not yet been sent off. I have therefore directed it to be shipped on board some ship in the river, destined for Canada, of which you shall be apprised as soon as it is on board. CASTLE HILL LODGE, 9th June, 1810. DEAR DE SALABERRY,-Hoping that this may yet reach you before you leave Portsmouth, I write to inform you that Beck has assured me that he sent off your harness to Gosport, the very day he received it from Severn, which was the first of June, but as he has not said whether by wagon or coach, and from his being at Kensington, I cannot get at him in time to have this explained before my letters must be made up for the mail, I trust it to you to find out that by your own inquiries on that head. I hope to be able to write my Canada letters between this Monday and Tuesday, but hitherto I have been too much hurried to set about it. I remain, &c., EDWARD. P. S.-I open my letter again to acknowledge yours of yesterday, this moment come to hand, and to say that in consequence of its contents I propose writing a few lines to General de Rottenburg by to-night's mail, addressed to the post office at Portsmouth, in which |