FORE:On the 9th of June a bulletin was published, which fixed public attention on the precarious state of the king's health. It announced that his Majesty had suffered for some time from an affection of the chest, which had produced considerable[415] weakness. The burden of regal state, assumed at so late a period of life, seemed to have been too much for his strength, and to have caused too great a change in his habits. In the preceding month of April his eldest natural daughter, Lady De Lisle, died, and also the queen's mother, the Dowager Duchess of Meiningen. These events made a deep impression upon his mind, which acted upon his enfeebled constitution and aggravated the symptoms of his disease. From the 9th of June, when the first bulletin was issued, he grew daily worse; the circulation became more languid, and the general decay more apparent. On the 20th of June he expired, in the seventy-third year of his age, having reigned nearly seven years. His kindness of heart and simplicity of character, which had endeared him greatly to all classes of his subjects, caused him to be generally and sincerely lamented. In the House of Peers Lord Melbourne referred to his death as a loss which had deprived the nation of a monarch always anxious for the interest and welfare of his subjects; and added, "which has deprived me of a most generous master, and the world of a man��I would say one of the best of men��a monarch of the strictest integrity that it has ever pleased Divine Providence to place over these realms. The knowledge which he had acquired in the course of his professional education of the colonial service and of civil matters, was found by him exceedingly valuable, and he dealt with the details of practical business in the most familiar and most advantageous manner. A more fair or more just man I have never met with in my intercourse with the world. He gave the most patient attention, even when his own opinion was opposed to what was stated, being most willing to hear what could be urged in opposition to it. These were great and striking qualities in any man, but more striking in a monarch." The declaration doubtless came from the heart, and was the more creditable, because the king's opposition to the Ministry had been most pronounced. He looked upon the second Melbourne Cabinet as forced upon him, and, though he had regard for one or two of them��particularly Lord Melbourne and Lord Palmerston��he made no secret of his dislike to the whole, and never invited them to Windsor. We have already given an instance of one of his discreditable outbursts, and his conduct during his later years was in other respects eccentric in the extreme. Besides, his zeal for reform had long passed away; and he was in complete sympathy with the factious proceedings of the majority of the House of Lords when each Ministerial measure was proposed��for instance, the Church Rates Bill he met with a long and ably argued list of objections which it required all Lord Melbourne's tact and firmness to overcome. But, with all his oddities and faults, William IV. was a thoroughly honourable man, and his opposition to his Ministers entirely aboveboard.But the condition of Canada was very tempting to the cupidity of Madison and his colleagues. We had very few troops there, and the defences had been neglected in the tremendous struggle going on in Europe. At this moment it appeared especially opportune for invading the Canadas from the States, as Britain was engaged not only in the arduous struggle in Spain, but its attention was occupied in watching and promoting the measures that were being prepared in Russia, in Sweden, and throughout Germany, against the general oppressor. At such a moment the Americans��professed zealots for liberty and independence��thought it a worthy object to filch the colonies of the country which, above all others, was maintaining the contest against the universal despot. They thought the French Canadians would rise and join the allies of France against Great Britain. The American Government had accordingly, so early as in 1811, and nearly a year previous to the declaration of war, mustered ten thousand men at Boston, ready for this expedition; and long before the note of war was sounded they had called out fifty thousand volunteers. Still, up to the very moment of declaring war, Madison had continually assured our envoy that there was nothing that he so much wished as the continuance of amicable connections between the two countries.
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FORE:[See larger version]The Assembly of Virginia, meeting in convention at Williamsburg on the 6th of May, drew up a Declaration of Rights, a document which afterwards became the model for the celebrated "Rights of Man" with the French Revolutionists. In this Declaration it was asserted that the rights of the people cannot exist with hereditary monarchy; and in the fourth article it was affirmed, that the idea of "a man being born a magistrate, a legislator, or a judge, is unnatural and absurd." Accordingly, Richard Henry Lee, as one of their delegates, on the 7th of June, moved in General Congress, that "these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved; that measures should immediately be taken for procuring the assistance of foreign Powers, and a confederation be formed to bind the colonies more closely together."
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