In the king’s speech, on opening the Session in January, 1729, there was no reference to the Pretender. The king, however, attributed certain delays at the Courts of Vienna and Madrid to ‘hopes given from hence of creating discontents and division’ among his subjects; but if this hope encouraged these foreign Courts, ‘I am persuaded,’ said the king, ‘that your known affection for me, and a just regard for your own honour, and the interest and security of the nation, will determine you effectually to discourage the unnatural and injurious practices of some few who suggest the means of distressing their country, and afterwards clamour at the inconveniences which they themselves have occasioned.’ In the usual reply, the Lords lamented that the lenity of the constitution was daily abused, and that the basest and meanest of mankind ‘escape the infamous punishment due by the laws of the land to such crimes.’ The Commons, after some debate, employed terms equally strong. ◆[Sidenote: _THE PRINCE OF WALES AT CHURCH._]◆ The Heir Apparent used the opportunity to illustrate his fidelity to the Protestant succession. Prince Frederick, to convince all good people of his Protestant orthodoxy, went a round of the London churches. He was accompanied by a group of young lords and gentlemen of good character, and, at this time, his reputation did not suffer by his being judged according to the company he kept. On the occasion of his dissipated church-going, the prince and his noble followers took the Sacrament in public: the doors of the church, whichever it might be, were set wide open, and the church itself was packed by a mob of street Whigs and Tories, who made their own comments on the spectacle, which was not so edifying and impressive as it was intended to be. Fog’s Jacobite paper hinted that a family not a hundred miles from St. James’s was split up with petty domestic quarrelling. The family, indeed, dined together twice a week in public; but people were reminded that outward appearances were exceedingly deceptive,――and sacramental partakings (it was said) proved nothing. [Sidenote: _THE MORALS AND MANNERS OF THE TIME._]