the grandeur of those who, as they were taught, ruled over
them by a divine right. It would be hard to find, in any class of
society except those reputed infamous, more low, gross, and vulgar
modes of life than have been exhibited generally in the royal palaces
of Europe for the last five hundred years. King James the First has,
among English sovereigns, rather a high character for sobriety and
gravity of deportment, and purity of morals; but the glimpses we get
of the real, every-day routine of his domestic life, are such as to
show that the pomp and parade of royalty is mere glittering tinsel,
after all.

The historians of the day tell such stories as these. The king was at
one time very dejected and melancholy, when Buckingham contrived this
plan to amuse him. In the first place, however, we ought to say, in
order to illustrate the terms on which he and Buckingham lived
together, that the king always called Buckingham _Steeny_, which was a
contraction of Stephen. St. Stephen was always represented in the
Catholic pictures of the saints, as a very handsome man, and
Buckingham being handsome too, James called him Steeny by way of a
compliment. Steeny called the king _his dad_, and used to sign
himself, in his letters, "your slave and dog Steeny." There are extant
some letters which passed between the king and his favorite, written,
on the part of the king, in a style of grossness and indecency such
that the chroniclers of those days said that they were not fit to be
printed. They would not "blot their pages" with them, they said. King
Charles's letters were more properly expressed.

To return, then, to our story. The king was very much dejected and
melancholy. Steeny, in order to divert him, had a pig dressed up in
the clothes of an infant child. Buckingham's mother, who was a
countess, personated the nurse, dressed also carefully for the
occasion. Another person put on a bishop's robes, satin gown, lawn
sleeves, and the other pontifical ornaments. They also provided a
baptismal font, a prayer-book, and other things necessary for a
religious ceremony, and then invited the king to come in to attend a
baptism. The king came, and the pretended bishop began to read the
service, the assistants looking gravely on, until the squealing of the
pig brought all gravity to an end. The king was _not_ pleased; but the
historian thinks the reason was, not any objection which he had to
such a profanation, but to his not happening t