All England shared in the grief of her young husband, Prince Leopold of Saxe-Cobourg. He was destined subsequently to be the first to ascend the throne of Belgium, assisted thereto by new family ties that he contracted in France, as well as by the affection still cherished for him in England. He was sagacious enough to make use of both these influences for the good of his adopted country, as well as a beneficial influence in the counsels of European politics. On the 29th of May, 1819, less than two years after the death of Princess Charlotte, the Princess Victoria, daughter of the Duke of Kent, was born at London. Some months later the old King George III. died (January 28th 1820); blind and insane during the last ten years of his life. Patient and quiet in his madness, he preserved in the hearts of his people a respectful and melancholy popularity which showed itself at the time of his death. Honest and obstinate, seriously and sincerely religious, observant of his duties both as man and as king, as he understood them, he had often served and often hindered the policy and the government of his country; he had always loved it, and had always believed himself obligated to consecrate to it his life and his strength, to the prejudice of his tastes or personal desires. During these ten years, in the long silence of his sad isolation, he had exhausted all anger and extinguished all hatred. The nation remembered only his simple and honest virtues, his immovable courage and his patriotic disinterestedness. No illusion regarding the abilities and faults of his successor was possible. [Image] George IV. {445} For ten years already George IV. had satisfactorily occupied the throne, when he was officially proclaimed king on the 31st of January, 1820. The fruits of evil are bitter even for those who plant them. Unhappily married, as he deserved to be, after the disorderly life he had led, the new monarch had for a long time cherished towards his wife an aversion amounting to hatred. He addressed to her the gravest reproaches. Upon his accession to the throne, the princess was upon the continent. Orders were given to erase her name from the liturgy of the established church, and to omit the public prayers for the Queen, as her husband had decided never to recognize her. The natural courage of the princess and the indignation of the woman, wounded in her honor, brought Queen Caroline immediately back to England, proudly resolved to submit her cause to public opinion.