aside the state and dignity of a great sovereign, and mingle with the poor and ignorant, entering into their wants and feelings, and sympathizing with them, as if he would show them that he considered himself to be their father, as well as their king. And here I will mention one little anecdote which shows him in this point of view, and which I am sure will interest and please you.

The king was one day, according to his usual custom, taking a solitary walk in the neighbourhood of Windsor Castle. As he strolled along, he saw a little boy about ten years old, sitting on a wall, with a book in his hand, sometimes reading, and sometimes watching his sheep as they fed in the adjoining field. Now this boy was not one of those pretty rosy-cheeked children we sometimes see in the country, looking so bright and fresh that it is no wonder if they do now and then attract the notice of passers-by. No; there was nothing at all attractive in this boy's appearance. On the contrary, he was plain and unpleasing; and his manners were coarse and rough, as is indeed too often the case among the peasantry of our land, even in the present day, when they enjoy so many opportunities of education and improvement. But notwithstanding all these untoward circumstances connected with our little friend on the wall, he attracted the

king's notice. Whether this was owing to the book in his hand, or simply to the desire in the king himself to do good to all his subjects, whoever or whatever they might be, I cannot tell; but so it was, that George III. stopped short in his walk, and thus began talking with the boy. "What book have you there?" he asked. "The A B C book," replied the child, quite unabashed, for he was not at all aware who the questioner was. "And can you read?" enquired the king again. "A little," was the answer. "Well let us hear; and so saying, the king took the book from the boy's hand, and began to examine him in spelling, very much as any master might do in a village school. "Can you spell words of two syllables ?" "Yes, I think so." "Well then," continued the king, wishing to try him, "spell abbot, and crimson." The boy spelt the words correctly, and acquitted himself to the king's satisfaction, and to his own. "Well done. That will be enough. Do you go to school? Can you read as well as spell? and have you got a Bible?" The boy said that his mother was too poor to send him to school, and that she had only an old Bible, so much torn that it was of little or no use. "Ah, that is bad, very bad," said the king. "What is your name, and where does your mother live?" The child told his name, and his

place of abode; the king wrote both down in his pocket-book, wished his young companion "good bye," and then returned to the Castle. Perhaps the boy supposed that so the matter would end, and that he should hear no more of the good-natured old gentleman who had examined him in spelling, and talked to him so kindly, but it was not so. George III was not one of those who feel a momentary interest in some particular case, and then suffer it to pass from their minds altogether. No, he could act as well as feel; he was particularly practical in all his ways and habits.

So as soon as he reached the Castle that day, he sent for his Secretary, and said to him, "The poor people around here have not sufficient means of instruction,-more therefore must be provided for them." And then, putting a parcel into the Secretary's hands, he added, "This packet is to be immediately sent to the person to whom it is addressed; but at the same time, let it be expressly signified to the poor woman for whom it is intended, that this book is presented to her by us, only on condition that she shall continue to have her child instructed in reading. Let her circumstances also be enquired into, and provide her with the means to send her son to school."

The parcel, as you have already guessed, contained a Bible for the mother of the little

boy who had so much engaged the thoughts of the king that day. "Let it be sent forthwith," he said again to the Secretary, “for it is our will that every one in the kingdom shall have the opportunity of reading the Bible."

What a moment of delight was in store for the young shepherd boy, when he returned to his humble home that evening, after his daily work was over! You may imagine the joy and surprise with which he and his mother opened the packet, drew from it a new and handsome Bible, and read on the title-page, in the king's own hand-writing, "From George III., for M." And this was not all. To make the present more valuable still, there was enclosed within its leaves a five-pound note, which the good king himself had placed there, a welcome gift no doubt to the poor woman. You will not wonder to hear that she prized that Bible above everything else she possessed; and when, after the death of her honoured sovereign, she was offered for it a large sum of money, she declared that she would never part with it during her life, and desired that, when it should please God to lay her on her dying bed, that Bible might be placed beneath her pillow, to be her companion and her comfort in her last hours.

I am sure this story will make you love the name of George III., and it will show you

more of his real character, than many an account of a less simple nature could do. It is almost time that we should close this long reign, but there is still another event, or rather a series of events, of a very different kind from any which has previously occupied us, to be recorded. As it may lead to rather a lengthy story however, and will extend even to another reign, I will now end the present chapter, and leave what I have further to say respecting king George III., to another day.