These were the last events in the long and memorable reign of George the Second--a reign that had produced as great statesmen, orators, and heroes as dignify the annals of whatever country. His thirteen first years were stamped with every blessing of peace, but unanimity--if disagreement is an evil to a free country, to which jealousy is perhaps essential. A Rebellion and two wars called forth all our resources: the disgrace that attended the Councils and prosecution of the first war served but to illustrate the abilities of the nation, which, reviving from its ignominy and calamities, carried the glory of our arms and measures to a height unknown in our story. The Prince himself was neither accessary to the one or the other. His greatest merit was bearing either fortune with calmness. Triumphant as Elizabeth and Anne, he neither presumed on the zeal of his subjects like the first, nor was so like the last as to concur in or behold an ignominious peace, that tarnished such conspicuous victories, and squandered such irrecoverable advantages. Full of years and glory, he died without a pang, and without a reverse. He left his family firmly established on a long-disputed Throne, and was taken away in the moment that approaching extinction of sight and hearing made loss of life the only blessing that remained desirable. On the 25th of October he rose as usual at six, and drank his chocolate; for all his actions were invariably methodic. A quarter after seven he went into a little closet. His German _valet de chambre_ in waiting, heard a noise, and running in, found the King dead on the floor. In falling, he had cut his face against the corner of a bureau. He was laid on a bed and blooded, but not a drop followed: the ventricle of his heart had burst. Princess Amelie was called, and told the King wanted her. She went immediately, and thought him in a fit. Being deaf herself, she saw nothing in the chamber that indicated his being dead; and putting her face close to his, to hear if he spoke to her, she then first perceived he was lifeless.