George the First was a sober, decent, steady-going person of fifty-four when he arrived to undertake the superintendence of England, by the day, week, month, or year; and, in fact, to do monarch's work in general. He was proclaimed king in London, on the 1st of August, 1714, but was in no particular hurry to enter upon his new dignity, for he only arrived, via Greenwich, on the 18th of September, and his coronation took place on the 20th of October following. He was of course old enough to know pretty well what he was about; and though he had attained that respectable maturity which, among the feathered tribe, is believed to form a protection against capture by chaff, he seems to have acted on the impression that younger birds might certainly be caught by the same unsatisfactory material. His first plan, therefore, upon his arrival, was to go about uttering what he called his "maxim," which he said was "never to abandon his friends, to do justice to all the world, and to fear no man." This egotistical puff for his own qualities may have been politic, but it was by no means dignified, and reminds us more of the old self-laudatory naval song, commencing "We tars have a maxim, d'ye see," than of any language or sentiment becoming to the mouth and mind of a monarch. If the English people had put upon the clap-trap sentiment of the Hanoverian its true interpretation, they would have seen that it pledged him more to his old subjects than engaged him to his new ones; and the result of his reign quite justified the view we are disposed to take of the meaning of his "maxim."

Immediately on the death of Anne, the Privy Council had met and deputed the Earl of Dorset to go over and apprise George of his accession to the Crown, when the earl mixed up the announcement with so many fulsome compliments, that flattery took the name of Dorset butter—a figure that has remained in force from those days to the present.

One of the best, and perhaps the boldest acts of the Council, was the appointment of Mr. Addison—the celebrated contributor to what was termed par excellence the P. P. or popular periodical of the day—to a post in the Government. The late ministry had been ignominiously displaced, and Bolingbroke used to dangle about at the door of the Council-room with a bag of papers in his hand, expecting, or at least hoping to be called in, while menials were instructed to deride, or, as the modern phrase has it, to "chaff" him in the passages. Bolingbroke was mean enough to brook even this for the chance of place; but he would occasionally turn round and shake his fist, including his bag, in a menacing manner at the crew who passed upon him these insults. Occasionally they would slap him on the back, exclaiming, "Well, Bolly, my boy, you are indeed a regular out-and-outer." Nor can it be doubted that, had the air been popular at the period, the Ethiopian melody of "Who's dat knocking at de door?" would have been frequently sung or whistled in the face of Bolingbroke by the scamps in the waiting-room.

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The king had only just arrived, and had merely gone into his bedroom to put on a clean collar—that of the Order of the Garter, if we may hazard a shrewd guess—when a party of Whigs rushed in, and began to ear-whig him with the utmost industry. In fact, the touting that took place for the vacant offices can only be imagined by an individual who has once landed at Boulogne, and found him-self torn to pieces by the hirsute representatives of some fifty hotels, each anxious to accommodate the new arrival. The whole of the Whig party pounced upon George, and thrust their pretensions before him with the perseverance of the class of Frenchmen, commonly called commissioners, to whom we have alluded. As these persons snatch at a traveller's cloak, walking-stick, or carpet-bag, the Whig touters almost snatched at gold sticks, official portfolios, or anything else they could lay their hands upon. "Allow me to take charge of your conscience, sir," roared Lord Cowper; "you'll find it very heavy to carry, sir; pray give it to me, sir; I'll take it down for you, sir;" and thus the Chancellorship was in a measure seized by this determined place-hunter. "You'll lose that privy seal, sir, if you don't take care," bellowed the Earl of Wharton; "you had much better entrust it to me; there are some very bad characters about just now,"—and thus, by a mixture of warning and worry, the privy seal was secured for himself by the rapacious nobleman.

Bolingbroke, after hanging about the official passages for a short time longer, now listening at the door, now peeping through the keyhole, and alternately bullied or bantered by his more fortunate rivals as they passed to and fro, resolved on flying to the Continent. Several significant exclamations of "You'd better be off!" "Come, come, this won't do!" and "We can't have a parcel of idle fellows lurking about the Treasury!" convinced him that he had nothing to hope, and everything to fear from the new Parliament. He accordingly took from the corner of his sitting-room an old official wand, and sobbing out, "Farewell, my once cherished stick!" he cut it for ever. The monopoly of all the snug places by the Whigs rendered them extremely overbearing, and as "Britons never, never, never will be slaves" to the same party for any considerable length of time, they became impatient of Whig arrogance, and ready for an alterative in the shape of some regular old Tory tyranny. The king became unpopular, and his birthday passed over without the smallest notice, as if to hint to him that he was not to be borne at all, unless he changed his system.

George, instead of conciliating, attempted to crush the disaffected, and like a bad equestrian mounted on a restive horse, he began pulling at the rein ana tightening the curb, instead of mildly but firmly exclaiming, "Wo, wo, boys! steady, boys; steady!" to his now somewhat frisky people. The Habeas Corpus Act—the great British Free List—was suspended, and the Pretender was used as a pretence to alarm the people, and reconcile them to the most arbitrary measures. The Riot Act was in this year, 1715, read a third time and passed, but it has this peculiarity, which distinguishes it from every other legislative Act, that it requires to be read again on every occasion of its being brought into requisition.