peared that George 3rd—by having neglected to enquire of the Commissioners of Longitude, if a
specimen of which, from the crucible, on being assayed, proved of the same alloy as the French crowns. We cannot drop this Monarch without a tribute of respect to his Successor, the most virtuous and the most unfortunate that ever sat on the throne of France. He wanted the firmness of George 3rd, and like Charles I. was too fatally influenced by uxorious counsels;[subnote 1] but in cultivating science and in humanity, the parallel is remarkable between these individuals of such exalted rank. In the Parisian intelligence circulated in our papers in 1814, we find—His Majesty, the Emperor of Austria this day visited the Mazarine Library. He considered with particular attention the fine globe of varnished bronze which Lewis XVI. had made for his own use. The copy of the projet for the voyage of La Peyrouse, which belonged to the above Monarch, having been presented to the Emperor, he cast his eyes upon some marginal notes. He was informed that they were in the hand-writing of Lewis XVI. himself, and that they proved the extent of his industry and talents, although he had been represented by the factious as ignorant and stupid. 'It is with Kings as it is with other men,' observed his Majesty, 'those who make the most noise do not always merit the most renown, and justice is never done them in their life-time.'—This observation, of the descendant of Rudolph of Hapsburgh, applies correctly, we would say, to the particulars of George 3rd preserved in these pages; equally disregarded, as they were in that day, by the ignorant, who could not be expected to notice, and by the learned, whose path they crossed, and whose duty it was to have brought the world acquainted with facts peculiarly interesting in an inheritor of the regal office. But we are justified in the persuasion
- ↑ The Memoirs of M. Bertrand de Moleville, an emigrant of distinction, are explanatory of this allusion.
