PRINCE AND BREWER AS FIREMEN.
His Royal Highness has a great passion for running with the "masheen," as a New York rowdy would term it, and Captain Shaw, of the London Fire Brigade, is greatly admired by the Prince for his gallant management of that very efficient Corps. The latter has often taken a ride on a fire engine through the London streets. The Prince, while on a visit to Brighton some years ago, made the acquaintance of a rich young London brewer, who had more money than brains. This was just the sort of a man to suit the Prince, being very fond of rich young men, who in many cases are only too happy to have the honor of paying the bills contracted by his Royal Highness. This eminent young brewer had, with the Prince, a similar taste for fire engines, and it was suggested by the future King of England that the brewer, who had a fund of good nature, should send to London for a fire engine, at his own expense, and have it transported to Brighton, where in course of time the Prince hoped it might afford them much amusement. The brewer of course complied with the Prince's request, and before long one of those grotesque looking fire machines, that are every now and then to be seen darting through the London streets, made its appearance at Brighton. Night after night the Prince and the brewer made the quiet villas and the Parade of Brighton resound with their shrieks and howls, as they drove at headlong speed through the watering place, the two maniacs sitting astride of the apparatus which was drawn by two horses; and finally the thing became such a nuisance to the residents of Brighton, and so many complaints reached the Queen's ears of the Prince's riotous conduct, that at last he was sent for and severely reprimanded by her Majesty, and for a few days he kept on his good behavior, to relapse again like a fever patient.
It is useless to conjecture as to the probability of the Prince succeeding to the throne, but if ever he does, he will no doubt revive the days of Charles II and his dissolute court. His beautiful and virtuous wife will perhaps fall into the place which Catharine, of Braganza, was compelled to accept as the consort of that rakehelly monarch, and Albert Edward will, no doubt, find in Lord Carington material for a successor to Sir Charles Sedley, and in the Duke of Hamilton a scamp, worthy of the reputation borne by the Earl of Rochester.
It is a mistake to think, moreover, that the Prince of Wales is alone among his family, in his vicious course, or that he has not numerous imitators among the nobles bearing some of the proudest names in England. Although he is yet but a young man of thirty years of age, he has those around him who ape his immorality and copy his disregard for the usages of society.
Still, the Prince cannot be blamed for the follies of his relations. The Duke of Cambridge, cousin to the Queen, and old enough to be the father of the Prince, has as bad if not a worse reputation, than the Prince of Wales.
George Frederick William Charles, Duke of Cambridge, Earl of Tipperary, and Baron of Culloden, is a first cousin of Queen Victoria, a Field Marshal and Commander-in-Chief of the English Army.
This Prince is about fifty years of age, and lives in an unlawful way with a Miss Fairbrother, by whom he has had several children, I believe. It might be expected, of a prince so closely related to the Queen, and occupying such a high position as chief of the British Army, that he would set a good example to the younger branches of the royal family. On the contrary, the Duke is well known, everywhere, as a royal rake, and his shameless amours are beyond number. The old prince is slightly bald from his course of early piety, and suffers so dreadfully from the gout, the result of early dissipation, that he is nothing but a wreck, being compelled annually to pay a visit to the mineral baths of Germany, and American travelers upon the continent at Baden, Ems, and Hombourg, will occasionally encounter an old, broken, and bloated personage, limping on a stick, who will quarrel with a waiter, in Hanoverian Deutsch, for the sake of a kreutzer, and when once excited it is very difficult to calm his rage, which, sometimes, degenerates into a helpless imbecility. This is the Duke of Cambridge.
A MAD KING.
From his illicit connection with the lady to whom I have referred, the mock-title of "Duke of Fairbrother," has been given to this illustrious Commander-in-Chief of the Army. Fancy such a Duke of Cambridge holding the baton of Wellington, and leading such soldiers as Havelock, Outram, Colin Campbell, and Napier of Magdala. And this very same imbecile Duke has had command of the English Army, and notably at the Alma, in the Crimean campaign, his conduct was such as to make the spectators doubt whether he was a madman or a coward. In the heat of the fight, the Duke lost all management of him self, and began to make strange noises, and to act in a strange manner, until he was carried from the field, kicking and biting in a maniacal fashion.
For the taint is in the blood of the English Royal Family, and may never be eradicated. The Duke of Cambridge is a lineal descendant of George III, who, by his inherent madness, lost half of the British Empire, and who was in the habit of answering reasonable questions, with such replies as,—