And now what rests for me but to express my gratitude to all who have assisted me by their advice or their support, and to beg, that if, in discharging my part to the best of my abilities, it has been my misfortune to give offence to any one of them, he will believe that I sinned not intentionally, and forgive me as well as he can.
I have also to return thanks to many gentlemen who have honoured me by marks of individual kindness. It would be painful for me to leave this spot without assuring them, that in all places, and under all circumstances, I shall have a lively recollection of the attention they have shown me, and the interest they have expressed in my success.
But most of all, I have to speak my feelings to him who, at my earnest solicitations, undertook to bear an equal portion of my fatigues and my responsibility—to him who has performed so diligently the labours which he entered upon so reluctantly—to him who has been the constant companion of my hopes and fears, my good and ill fortune—to him who, by the assiduity of his own attention, and the genius of the contributors whose good offices he secured, has ensured the success of the Etonian.
I began this letter in a light and jesting vein, but I find that I cannot keep it up. My departure from Eton and the Etonian is really too serious a business for a jest or a gibe. I have felt my spirits sinking by little and little, until I have become downright melancholy. I shall make haste, therefore, to come to a conclusion. I have done, and I subscribe myself (for the last time),
My dear Public,
Your obliged and devoted servant,
Peregrine Courtenay.
[Pg 217]
ABDICATION OF THE KING OF CLUBS.
We, Peregrine, by Our own choice, and the public favour, King of Clubs, and editor of the Etonian, in the ninth month of Our reign, being this day in possession of Our full and unimpaired faculties both of mind and body, do, by these presents, address Ourselves to all Our loving subjects, whether holding place and profit under Us, or not.
Inasmuch as We are sensible that We must shortly be removed from this state of trial, and translated to another life, leaving behind Us all the trappings of royalty, all the duties of government, all the concerns of this condition of being, it does seem good to Us, before We are withdrawn from the eyes of Our dearly beloved friends and subjects, to abdicate and divest Ourselves of all the ensigns of power and authority which We have hitherto borne; and We do hereby willingly abdicate and divest Ourselves of the same.
And be it, by all whom it may concern, remembered, that the cares and labours of Peregrine, sometime King of Clubs, are henceforth directed to another world; and that if any one shall assume the sceptre and the style of Peregrine, the first King of Clubs, such person is a liar and usurper.