hen, ten years afterward, it
became necessary to provide for the possibility of Queen Victoria dying
during the minority of her heir. The parent of the infant sovereign,
Prince Albert, was appointed Regent, with the cordial approval of the
nation; the dissent of the Queen's uncle, the Duke of Sussex who, with a
very misplaced ambition, urged instead the appointment of a Council of
Regency, of which he hoped to become the most influential member, only
serving to make the unanimity of the rest of the Parliament more
conspicuous.

A somewhat kindred question, inasmuch as it affected the personal
arrangements, if they may be so termed, of the sovereign, was settled in
the same session, and on a new principle. What was called the Civil List
had hitherto been placed on a footing which was at once unintelligible
and misleading. The expression was first used at the Revolution, and was
applied not only to that portion of the revenue which was devoted to the
personal expenses of the sovereign, but also to many branches of the
civil expenditure of the state, with which, in fact, he had no concern
whatever. Not only the salaries of the great officers of the household,
but those also of the ministers, ambassadors, and of the judges, were
paid out of it, as well as those of many place-holders of various
classes, and pensions to a large amount. Amounts embracing such a
variety of miscellaneous and unconnected expenses could hardly be
expected to be kept with regularity, and there was lavish waste in every
department. Burke's bill had rectified some of the abuses, and had also
pointed out the way to some other reforms which were gradually adopted;
but still numbers of charges were left untouched, and there was scarcely
any one subject which afforded more topics to unscrupulous demagogues
than the amount of the Civil List, which the ignorant multitude were
constantly assured that the King enjoyed to squander on his own
pleasures, though, in fact, the greater part of it was expended in the
service of the state, and was entirely free from his control. Only a
portion of the sum which went under this name was voted annually by the
Parliament. A portion was derived from the Crown Lands, from duties
known as Droits of the Crown and Droits of the Admiralty, etc., the
amount of which fluctuated, and with which Parliament was admitted to
have no right to interfere. But the working of the whole was
satisfactory to no one--neither to the King hims