Than a new follower rose, and swell'd as proudly."


Scarcely had the impulse, which his own genius had given to the
prosecution of Hastings, begun to abate, when the indisposition of the
King opened another field, not only for the display of all his various
powers, but for the fondest speculations of his interest and ambition.

The robust health and temperate habits of the Monarch, while they held
out the temptation of a long lease of power, to those who either enjoyed
or were inclined to speculate in his favor, gave proportionally the grace
of disinterestedness to the followers of an Heir-Apparent, whose means of
rewarding their devotion were, from the same causes, uncertain and
remote. The alarming illness of the Monarch, however, gave a new turn to
the prospect:--Hope was now seen, like the winged Victory of the
ancients, to change sides; and both the expectations of those who looked
forward to the reign of the Prince, as the great and happy millennium of
Whiggism, and the apprehensions of the far greater number, to whom the
morals of his Royal Highness and his friends were not less formidable
than their politics, seemed now on the very eve of being realized.

On the first meeting of Parliament, after the illness of His Majesty was
known, it was resolved, from considerations of delicacy, that the House
should adjourn for a fortnight; at the end of which period it was
expected that another short adjournment would be proposed by the
Minister. In this interval, the following judicious letter was addressed
to the Prince of Wales by Mr. Sheridan:--

"SIR,