On the 7th of August, 1783, the princess Amelia, daughter to his late
majesty, was born; and on the 2d of November, 1810, she died at
Windsor. Her constitution was delicate, and subject to frequent and
severe indisposition. On her death-bed she anxiously desired to present
his majesty with a token of her filial duty and affection; himself was
suffering under an infirmity, the most appalling and humiliating in our
nature, and in that state he approached her death-bed. She placed on his
finger a ring containing a small lock of her hair, set beneath a crystal
tablet, enclosed by a few sparks of diamonds, and uttered with her dying
breath “Remember me!” The words sunk deep into the paternal heart, and
are supposed to have increased a malady in the king, which suspended his
exercise of the royal functions, and ended in the extinction of man’s
noblest faculty.
The princess Amelia’s character has hitherto lain in the oblivion of
silent merit. The editor of these sheets is enabled to disclose
sentiments emanating from her, under circumstances peculiarly affecting.
Dignity of station and absence of stain upon her reputation, commanded
towards her the respect and sympathy which accident of birth, and
abstinence from evil, always command in the public mind: but there are
higher claims upon it.
Homage, by rule and precedent prescribed,
To royal daughters from the courtier-ring
Amelia had; and, when she ceased to live,
The herald wrote her death beneath her birth;
And set out arms for scutcheons on her pall;
And saw her buried in official state;
And newspapers and magazines doled out
The common praise of common courtesy;
She was “most” good, “most” virtuous, and--so forth.
Thus, ere the Chamberlain’s gazetted order
To mourn, so many days, and then half-mourn,
Had half expired, Amelia was forgotten!
Unknown by one distinguish’d act, her fate,
The certain fate of undistinguished rank,
Seems only to have been, and died; no more.
Yet shall this little book send down her name,
By her own hand inscribed, as in an album,
With reverence to our posterity.
It will revive her in the minds of those
Who scarce remember that she was; and will
Enkindle kind affection to her memory,
For worth we knew not in her when she lived;
While some who living, shared her heart, perchance,
May read her sentences with wetted eyes,
And say, “She, being dead, yet speaketh.”
The princess Amelia relieved the indigent friends of three infant
females from care, as to their wants, by fostering them at her own
expense. She caused them to be educated, and placed them out to
businesses, by learning which they might acquire the means of gaining
their subsistence in comfort and respectability. They occasionally
visited her, and to one of them she was peculiarly attached; her royal
highness placed her with Mrs. Bingley, her dressmaker, in Piccadilly. In
this situation
----“long she flourish’d,
Grew sweet to sense and lovely to the eye,
Until at length the cruel spoiler came,
Pluck’d this fair flow’r and rifled all its sweetness,
Then flung it like a loathsome weed away.”
The seduction of this young female deeply afflicted the princess’s
feelings; and she addressed a letter to her, written throughout by her
own hand, which marks her reverence for virtue, and her pity for one who
diverged from its prescriptions. It is in the possession of the editor,
and because it has never been published, he places it to note the
anniversary of her royal highness’s birth in the _Every-Day Book_. It is
a public memorial of her worth; the only record of her high principles
and affectionate disposition.
(COPY.)
The accounts I have received of you, My poor Mary from Mrs. Bingley,
have given me the greatest concern, and have surprised me as well as
hurt me; as I had hoped you were worthy of the kindness you
experienced from Mrs. Bingley, and were not undeserving of all that
had been done for you.
Much as you have erred, I am willing to hope, My poor Girl, that those
religious principles you possessed are still firm, and that they will,
with the goodness of God, show you your faults, and make you to
repent, and return to what I hoped you were--a good and virtuous
Girl. You may depend on my never forsaking you as long as I can be
your friend. Nothing but your conduct not being what it ought to be,
can make me give you up. Forget you, I never _could_. Believe me,
nothing shall be wanting, on my part, to restore you to what you were;
but you must be _honest_, open, and true. Make Mrs. K----, who is so
sincerely your wellwisher, your friend. Conceal nothing from her, and
believe me, much as it may cost _you_, at the moment, to speak out,
you will find relief afterwards, and I trust it may enable us to make
you end your days happily.
To Mrs. Bingley, and all with her, you never can sufficiently feel
grateful. Her conduct has been that of the kindest mother and friend,
and, I trust, such friends you will ever try to preserve; for, if with
propriety they can continue their kindness to you, it will be an
everlasting blessing for you: but, after all that has happened, My
dear Mary, I cannot consent to leaving you there. Though I trust, from
all I hear, your conduct now is proper, and will continue so, yet, for
the sake of the other young people, it must be _wrong_, and if you
possess that feeling, and repent, as I hope you do, you cannot but
think I am right. I trust you feel all your errors, and with the
assistance of God you will live to make amends; yet your conduct must
be made an example of. The misfortune of _turning out of the right
path_, cannot be too strongly impressed on the minds of all young
people.--Alas! you now know it from experience. All I say I feel
doubly, from wishing you well.
Be open and true, and whatever can be done, to make you happy, will.
Truth is one of the most necessary Virtues, and whoever _deviates_
from that, runs from one error into another--not to say Vice. I have
heard you accused Mrs. Bingley of harshness; that I conceive to be
_utterly impossible_; but I attribute your saying so to a mind in the
greatest affliction, and not knowing what you were about. I pity you
from my heart, but you have brought this on yourself, and you must now
pray to God, for his assistance, to enable you to return to the right
path.
Why should you fear Me? I do not deserve it, and your feeling the
_force_ of your own _faults_ can only occasion it; for I feel I am,
and wish to be, a friend to three young people I have the charge of,
and to make them fit to gain their own bread, and assist their
families. For you I have felt particularly, being an orphan, and I
_had_ never had cause to regret the charge I had. Your poor parents
have been saved a heavy blow. Conceive what their affliction must have
been, had they lived to know of your conduct. I trust my poor Mary may
yet live to renew all our feelings of regard for her, and that I
shall have the comfort to hear many good accounts of your conduct and
health. Unless your mind is at ease you cannot enjoy health.
Be assured I shall be happy to find I have reason, always, to
subscribe my self,
[Illustration: _Your friend_
_Amelia_]
So wrote one of the daughters of England. We hail her a child of the
nation by her affiance to virtue, the creator of our moral grandeur, and
the preserver of our national dignity. Private virtue is the stability
of states.
In the princess Amelia’s letter there is a natural union of powerful
sense and exquisite sensibility; it has an easy, common-place air, but a
mind that examines the grounds, and searches into the reasons of things,
will discover the “root of the matter.” Comment upon it is abstained
from, that it may be read and studied.
The crime of seduction is fashionable, because hitherto fashion has been
criminal with impunity. The selfish destroyer of female innocence, can
prevail on some wives and mothers by varnish of manner, and forcefulness
of wealth, to the degradation of sanctioning his entertainments by their
presence. Like the fabled upas-tree of Java, he lives a deadly poison to
wither and destroy all within his shadow. Uneasiness from a lash of
small cords in a feeble hand, he retaliates by a horsewhip: monstrous
sensualists must be punished by scourges of flame from vigorous arms,
and be hunted by hue and cry, till they find sanctuary in some remote
hiding-place for blood-guiltiness.
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