awaited her. Prince Leopold came forward nobly with an offer of an
additional L3000 a year; and the Duchess remained at Kensington.

The child herself was extremely fat, and bore a remarkable resemblance
to her grandfather. "C'est l'image du feu Roi!" exclaimed the Duchess.
"C'est le Roi Georges en jupons," echoed the surrounding ladies, as the
little creature waddled with difficulty from one to the other.

Before long, the world began to be slightly interested in the nursery at
Kensington. When, early in 1821, the Duchess of Clarence's second child,
the Princess Elizabeth, died within three months of its birth, the
interest increased. Great forces and fierce antagonisms seemed to be
moving, obscurely, about the royal cradle. It was a time of faction
and anger, of violent repression and profound discontent. A powerful
movement, which had for long been checked by adverse circumstances, was
now spreading throughout the country. New passions, new desires, were
abroad; or rather old passions and old desires, reincarnated with a new
potency: love of freedom, hatred of injustice, hope for the future
of man. The mighty still sat proudly in their seats, dispensing their
ancient tyranny; but a storm was gathering out of the darkness, and
already there was lightning in the sky. But the vastest forces must
needs operate through frail human instruments; and it seemed for many
years as if the great cause of English liberalism hung upon the life of
the little girl at Kensington. She alone stood between the country and
her terrible uncle, the Duke of Cumberland, the hideous embodiment of
reaction. Inevitably, the Duchess of Kent threw in her lot with her
husband's party; Whig leaders, Radical agitators, rallied round her; she
was intimate with the bold Lord Durham, she was on friendly terms with
the redoubtable O'Connell himself. She received Wilberforce-though, to
be sure, she did not ask him to sit down. She declared in public that