While the Knights are supposed to be preparing to pass to the hall, the scene takes us to the front of the castle, where crowds of liege and loyal people are assembled. First Citizen, “very like a whale indeed,” sings a comic song, which, as a specimen of the homage offered to monarch and consort, more than fourscore years ago, is worth transcribing--for both its imagery and syntax:-- “Oh, the glorious installation! Happy nation! You shall see the King and Queen: Such a scene! Valor he, sir; Virtue she, sir; Which our hearts will ever win. Sweet her face is, With such graces Show what goodness dwells within. “Oh, the glorious installation! Happy nation! You shall see the noble knights: Charming sights! Feathers wagging, Velvet dragging, Trailing, sailing, on the ground; Loud in talking, Proud in walking, Nodding, ogling, smirking round.” The banquet over, and more comic business, as dreary as the song above quoted, being concluded, King Edward walks forth into the garden for refreshment--and there the Genius of England takes him by the hand. Edward, we are sorry to say, knows so little of this Genius, that he boldly asks him, “What art thou, stranger?” We should, only with reluctance, trouble our readers with all this unrecognised Genius says in reply to the royal inquirer, but one passage may be transcribed to show what the popular spirit was thought to be in the last century. “Know that those actions which are great and good, Receive a nobler sanction from the free And universal voices from all mankind, Which is the voice of Heaven, than from the highest, The most illustrious act of royal power.” This maxim of the Genius of England further shows that the individual in question not only passed off prose for blank verse, but stole the phrase of “Vox populi vox Dei,” and tried to render it unrecognisable by indefinite extension. That the sentiment is not very much to the taste of the Monarch may be conjectured from the fact that he sulkily lets it pass without any comment, and very naturally falls asleep of being talked-at by so heavily-pinioned a Genius. The latter avails himself of the opportunity to exhibit to the slumbering Monarch a vision of the future of England, down to the era of George and Charlotte. The spectacle soothes him still less than the speech, though oppressive ecstacy may be sweet, and Edward springs into wakefulness, and loudly exclaiming that “This is too much for human strength to bear,” the loquacious Genius flies at him again with some remarkable figures of speech, to which the worn-out Edward answers nothing. The Genius, unwilling to attribute his taciturnity to rudeness, finds a satisfactory solution in the conclusion that “Astonishment seals up his lips.”