to the loyal and well-behaved Commons that if the King’s health was not equal to all that you thought fit, you would rather he abdicated.  When one thinks of all that noble hearts bled and suffered and held their peace for—­to prop up the throne of Stuart—­of all the vices that have been forgiven, the weaknesses that have been covered, the injustice that has been endured from Kings—­when one thinks—­if she thinks!—­of all that has been suffered from successive mistresses and favourites of royalty a thousand times more easily than she can be forgiven for (grant it!) a weak and selfish grief for a noble husband—­it is enough to make one wonder if nations are not like dogs—­better for beating.  If the Queen could cut off a few more heads, and subscribed to a few less charities, if she were a little less virtuous, and a little more tyrannical, if she borrowed her subjects’ plate and repudiated her debts, instead of reducing her household expenses, and regulating court mournings by the interests of trade, I am very much afraid we should be a more loyal people!  If we had a slender-limbed Stuart who insisted upon travelling with his temporary favourite when the lives and livelihoods of the best blood of Britain were being staked for his throne whilst he amused himself, I suppose we should wear white favours, and believe in the divine right of Kings.  It must be impossible for her to forget that the Prince, whom death has proved to be worthy of the praise most people now accord him, was far from popular in his lifetime, and the pet gibe and sport of Punch.  I suppose when she is dead or abdicated we shall discover that England has had few better sovereigns—­and one can only hope that the reflection may not be additionally stimulated by the recurrence of her successor to some of the more popular—­if not beneficial—­peculiarities of former reigns.  It is true that then we might kick royalty overboard altogether, but, judging by the United States, I don’t know that we should benefit even on the points where one might most expect to do so.  In truth, I believe that the virtue of loyalty is extinct and must be—­except under one or two conditions.  Either more royal prerogative than we have—­or in the substitution of a loyal affection that shall in each member of the commonwealth cover and be silent over the weak points which the publicity of the present day exposes to vulgar criticism—­for the spirit which used to give the blood and possessions which are not exacted of us.  This is why the Queen’s books do not trouble my feelings about her.  She is no great writer certainly, and has perhaps made a mistake in thinking that they would do good.  I think they will do good with a certain class, perhaps they lower her in the eyes of others.  I do think myself that the virtues she (and even her books incidentally) display are so great, and her weaknesses comparatively so small, that one’s loyalty must be little indeed if one cannot honour her.  “Them’s my sentiments.”  I am ashamed to have bored you with them at such length.