[Footnote 26: In fact, however, the age at which a young prince was
considered competent to exercise the royal authority in person had been
fixed at eighteen; and it is so stated in the speech in which the King,
in 1765, recommended the appointment of a Regent to Parliament.--
_Parliamentary History_, xvi., 52.]

[Footnote 27: This idea was expanded into an epigram, which appeared in
most of the daily papers, and has been thought worthy of being preserved
in the "Parliamentary History," xvii., 401 (note):

"Quoth Dick to Tom, 'This act appears
Absurd, as I'm alive,
To take the crown at eighteen years,
A wife at twenty-five.
The mystery how shall we explain?
For sure, as Dowdeswell said,
Thus early if they're fit to _reign_,
They must be fit to _wed_.'
Quoth Tom to Dick, 'Thou art a fool,
And nothing know'st of life;
Alas! it's easier far to rule
A kingdom than a wife.'"]

[Footnote 28: It is remarkable that this clause on one occasion proved
an obstacle to the punishment of the abettors of such a marriage. In
1793 the Duke of Sussex married Lady Augusta Murray, first at Rome, and
afterward, by banns, at St. George's, Hanover Square. And when the
affair came to be investigated by the Privy Council, Lord Thurlow
denounced the conduct of the pair in violent terms, and angrily asked
the Attorney-general, Sir John Scott, why he had not prosecuted all the