[Illustration:  CARD CASE.]

* * * * *

THE PRINCE OF WALES.

(By the Observer’s Own Correspondent.)

Knowing the anxiety that will be felt on this subject, though we doubt if the future King can be called a subject at all, we have collected the following exclusive particulars:—­

THE PRINCE’S TITLE.

His Royal Highness will for the present go by the title of “Poppet,” affectionately conferred upon him by Mrs. Lilly at the moment of his birth.  Poppet is a title of very great antiquity, and has from time immemorial been used as a mark of endearment towards a newly-born child in all genteel families.  Lovey-Dovey has been spoken of; but it is not likely that His Royal Highness will assume the style and dignity of Lovey-Dovey for a considerable period.

THE PRINCE’S INCOME.

Considerable mistakes have been fallen into by some of our contemporaries on this important subject.  What may be the present wishes of His Royal Highness it is impossible for any one to ascertain, for he is able to articulate nothing on this point with his little pipe; but the piper, we know, must be eventually paid.  He becomes immediately entitled to all the loose halfpence in his mother’s reticule, and sixpence a-week will be at once payable out of his father’s estates at Saxe Gotha.  The whole of the revenues attached to the Duchy of Cornwall are also his by the mere fact of his birth:  but there is a difficulty as to his giving a receipt for the money, if it should be paid to him.  It is believed, that on the meeting of Parliament a Bill will pass for granting peg-top money to His Royal Highness, and a lollipop allowance will be among the earliest estimates.

THE PRINCE’S MILITARY RANK.

The Prince of Wales is by birth at the head of all the Infantry in the kingdom, and is Colonel in his own right of a regiment of tin soldiers.

THE PRINCE’S WARDROBE.

The Prince falls at once into all the long frocks that are required, and has an estate tail in six dozen napkins.

THE PRINCE’S EDUCATION.

This important matter will be confined at present to teaching His Royal Highness how to take his pap without spilling it.  A professor from the pap-al states will, it is expected, be entrusted with this branch of the royal economy.

THE PRINCE’S WET-NURSE.

Our contemporaries are wrong in stating that the individual to whom the post of wet-nurse has been assigned is nothing but a housemaid.  We have full authority to state that she is no maid at all, but a respectable married woman.

THE PRINCE’S HONOURS.

His Royal Highness has not yet been created a Knight of the Garter, though Sir James Clark insisted on his being admitted to the Bath, against which ceremony the infant Prince entered a vociferous protest.