the land. A tent was hastily erected; and, under its scanty shelter, in
a season of extreme rigour, the lady gave birth to a son, who was
baptised by the name of William.

Soothsayers would have augured a stormy existence to the child who thus
first saw light when "the frame and huge foundation of the earth shak'd
like a coward." Such omens might have attended the birth of an
Alexander, a Cæsar, or a Napoleon, marking the advent of one of those
human meteors sent at long intervals to astonish and dazzle the world.
In this instance, if the man born during Nature's most terrible
convulsion, was not destined to exercise a material or lasting influence
on the fate of nations, at least his lot was cast in troublous and
agitated times; he took share in great events, came in contact with
extraordinary men, passed through perils and adventures such as few
encounter, and fewer still survive. The last sixty years, comprising the
most interesting and important chapter in the history of Europe, perhaps
of the world, have been prolific in sudden transformations and startling
reverses of fortune. During that period of revolution and restless
activity, we have seen peasants become princes, private soldiers
occupying the thrones of great and civilized countries, obscure
individuals in every walk of life raised by opportunity, genius, and the
caprice of fate, to the most exalted positions. Some of these have
maintained themselves on the giddy pinnacle on which fortune placed
them. They are the few. Reverses, even more sudden and extraordinary
than their upward progress, have cast down the majority from their high
estate. The transitions have been rapid, from the palace to the prison,
from the sway of kingdoms to the sufferings of emigration, from the
command of mighty armies to the weariness and obscurity of a forced
inactivity. Fortunes built up in a year, have been knocked down in a
month; again reconstructed, they have been yet more rapidly destroyed.