nd
such a daughter as Burr had.
When all the other witnesses have been heard, let the two Theodosias
be summoned, and especially that daughter who showed toward him an
affectionate veneration unsurpassed by any recorded in history or
romance. Such an advocate as Theodosia the younger must avail in some
degree, even though the culprit were brought before the bar of Heaven
itself.
GEORGE IV. AND MRS. FITZHERBERT
In the last decade of the eighteenth century England was perhaps the
most brilliant nation of the world. Other countries had been humbled
by the splendid armies of France and were destined to be still further
humbled by the emperor who came from Corsica. France had begun to
seize the scepter of power; yet to this picture there was another
side--fearful want and grievous poverty and the horrors of the
Revolution. Russia was too far away, and was still considered too
barbarous, for a brilliant court to flourish there. Prussia had the
prestige that Frederick the Great won for her, but she was still a
comparatively small state. Italy was in a condition of political chaos;
the banks of the Rhine were running blood where the Austrian armies
faced the gallant Frenchmen under the leadership of Moreau. But England,
in spite of the loss of her American colonies, was rich and prosperous,
and her invincible fleets were extending her empire over the seven seas.
At no time in modern England has the court at London seen so much real
splendor or such fine manners. The royalist emigres who fled from France
brought with them names and pedigrees that were older than the Crusades,
and many of them were received with the frankest, freest English
hospitality. If here and there some marquis or baron of ancient blood
was perforce content to teach music to the daughters of tradesmen in
suburban schools, nevertheless they were better off than they had
been in France, harried by the savage gaze-hounds of the guillotine.
Afterward, in the days of the Restoration, when they came back to
their estates, they had probably learned more than one lesson from the
bouledogues of Merry England, who had little tact, perhaps, but who were
at any rate kindly and willing to share their goods with pinched and
poverty-stricken foreigners.
The court, then, as has been said, was brilliant with notables from
Continental countries, and with the historic wealth of the peerage of
England. Only one cloud overspread it; and that was the mental
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