On the whole, however, the nation extended a hearty welcome to the young King and on his accession he was undoubtedly popular. At least, English was his native tongue, and this was the more agreeable because George II had spoken it with a very broad German accent, Frederick, Prince of Wales, on his arrival in England, knew but a few words of the language, and George I had not understood it at all. "My father 'brushed up his old Latin!' to use a phrase of Queen Elizabeth, in order to converse with the first Hanoverian sovereign," Horace Walpole has told us, "and ruled both kings in spite of their mistresses." Now, for the first time for six and forty years, England boasted a sovereign whose interests were not centred in Hanover, a young man, not a middle-aged reprobate surrounded with women of sullied reputations: further, the dynasty was more firmly established, and the Jacobite faction had dwindled in power from a serious menace to an empty threat. George I had been confronted with the Old Pretender, his successor had had to contend against the Young Pretender; but George III, who had nothing to fear from the Stuarts and their adherents, could increase his popularity by showing some favour to the Tories, who during the previous reigns, owing to the suspicions that they were attached to the Stuart interest, had been tabooed. So little fear, indeed, had the reigning dynasty for the representative of that which preceded it, that though it was known Charles Edward was in London at the time of the coronation, the government made no attempt to secure his person. It is even recorded how that Prince, in answer to an inquiry how he dared venture to show himself in London, stated that he was very safe; and, indeed, this was the case, for his day had passed, the Hanoverian dynasty had firmly established itself, and the once magic name of Stuart now made no impression upon the nation. "Let sleeping dogs lie," was in this case apparently the rule by which the King and his advisers guided their conduct.[143] [143] Nicholls: _Literary Anecdotes of the Eighteenth Century_; and other works. It is generally believed that the Stuart Prince was present at the coronation either incognito as Mr. Brown among the spectators on the floor of the hall, or disguised in woman's attire in the gallery. Indeed, more than one person claims to have seen him, and Lord Marshal told David Hume how a friend of his, recognizing the Pretender, spoke to him: "Your Royal Highness is the last of all mortals I should have expected to see here." "It was curiosity that led me," replied the visitor, who had come from Flanders to see the coronation; "but I assure you that the person who is the object of all this pomp and magnificence is the man I envy the least."