lities in Europe. The house of commons was further informed, that
the estimates of the current year would be forthwith laid before them.
Addresses of congratulation were then passed both to the king and queen
without a dissentient voice. On that night all London seemed one blaze
of light; an illumination took place, such as that great capital had
never witnessed before. This scene was renewed on the 23rd of April,
which was appointed to be held as a day of public thanksgiving
throughout the kingdom; and when his majesty went in grand procession
to St. Paul's Church, to return thanks to almighty God for his recovery.
His majesty was attended on this occasion by the queen and royal family,
the two houses of parliament, and all the great officers of state,
judges, and foreign ambassadors. The procession entered the cathedral
amidst the peal of organs and the voices of five thousand children of
the city charity schools, who were placed between the pillars on both
sides, and singing that old melody, the hundredth psalm. The king was
much affected; and turning to the dean, near whom he was walking, he
said with great emotion, "I now feel that I have been ill." His emotion
almost overpowered him; but recovering himself be proceeded to the
chair, where the humility with which he at first knelt down, and the
fervour with which he appeared to pour forth the feelings of a grateful
heart, made a deep impression on all within the cathedral. By this
affliction the personal popularity of the king greatly increased. It
became the fashion to call him "the good old king," and men loved to
dwell upon his morals and his virtues. It would be difficult, indeed, to
point out any period in the annals of English history when any monarch
was so universally revered by his subjects. Nor did the steady,
consistent, and constitutional conduct of the prime-minister remain
unacknowledged. While his opponents, by the sentiments which they
had uttered in the heat of debate on the regency-bill, had given
great offence to the people at large, Pitt had risen greatly in their
estimation. He had, also, the warmest approbation of his majesty for
the part he had taken; for on more than one occasion he expressed
the highest satisfaction of his conduct, and that of the majority
in parliament, in regard to the regency question. His majesty also
remarked, that his illness had eventually become a source of happiness
to him, inasmuch as it proved how nobly the people