idiot labourer while the King was inspecting the progress of some repairs at Kensington, having asked his Majesty for something to drink, the King, although offended, was yet ashamed to refuse the fellow, and put his hand into the usual receptacle of his cash; but, to his surprise and confusion, found it empty.  “I have no money,” said he, angrily.  “Nor I either,” quoth the labourer; “and for my part, I can’t think what has become of it all.”

Few men were more deeply impressed with the value of money, although he occasionally startled those about him, by being unexpectedly liberal, as in the cases of his donation to the university of Cambridge, and his submitting to the extortion of the Dutch innkeeper.  One evening while passing by a closet in which wood was kept for the use of the bed-chamber, he dropped some guineas, one of which having rolled under the door, he said to the page in waiting, “We must get out this guinea:  let us remove the fuel.”  In a short time, with the attendant’s aid, he found the guinea, which, however, he gave to his fellow-labourer, as a reward for the exertions of the latter, in helping him to take the wood out of the closet, observing, “I do not like any thing to be lost, but I wish every man to receive the value of his work.”

Of the hastiness of George the Second’s temper, several examples have been given:  but it was never, perhaps, more ludicrously displayed than in his first interview with Dr. Ward.  The King having been afflicted for some time with a violent pain in his thumb, for which his regular medical attendants could afford him no relief, he sought the assistance of Ward, whose famous pills and drops were then in great estimation.  The doctor, being aware of the King’s complaint, went to the palace, at the time commanded, with, it is said, a specific concealed in the hollow of his hand.  On being admitted to his Majesty’s presence, he, of course, proceeded to examine the royal thumb; which he suddenly wrenched with such violence, that the King called him a cursed rascal, and condescended to kick his shins.  He soon found, however, that the doctor, had as it were, magically relieved his thumb from pain:  and so grateful did he feel to Ward, whom he now termed his Esculapius, that he prevailed on him to accept a handsome carriage and horses, and shortly afterwards, presented his nephew, who subsequently became a general, with an ensigncy in the guards.—­From the Georgian Era.

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NOTES OF A READER.

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THE HUNCHBACK.

A Play, by James Sheridan Knowles.

It would be rather mal-apropos to write the Beauties of the Hunchback, but such a term is elliptically applicable to the following passages from Mr. Knowles’s clever and original play:—­

INSIGNIFICANT ENEMIES.