interest; by the land-tax at three shillings in the pound; a
lottery and annuities, at the rate of three per cent, per annum, to be
charged on the sinking-fund redeemable by parliament. The annual measure
called the mutiny bill, was not passed without dispute and altercation;
some alterations were proposed, but not adopted; and the sentences of
court-martials still subjected to one revision.

{GEORGE II. 1727-1760}

DEATH AND CHARACTER OF THE PRINCE OF WALES.

In the midst of these deliberations, the kingdom was alarmed with an
event which overwhelmed the people with grief and consternation. His
royal highness the prince of Wales, in consequence of a cold caught in
his garden at Kew, was seized with a pleuritic disorder; and, after a
short illness, expired on the twentieth day of March, to the unspeakable
affliction of his royal consort, and the unfeigned sorrow of all who
wished well to their country. This excellent prince, who now died in
the forty-fifth year of his age, was possessed of every amiable quality
which could engage the affection of the people; a tender and obliging
husband, a fond parent, a kind master; liberal, generous, candid, and
humane; a munificent patron of the arts, an unwearied friend to merit;
well disposed to assert the rights of mankind in general, and warmly
attached to the interest of Great Britain. The nation could not but be
afflicted at seeing a prince of such expectations ravished from their
hopes; and their grief was the better founded, as the king had already
attained to an advanced age, and the heir-apparent, George, now prince
of Wales, was a minor.

SETTLEMENT OF A REGENCY IN CASE OF A MINOR SOVEREIGN.

His majesty, foreseeing all the inconveniencies which might arise from a
minority, deliberated with his council on this subject, and resolved
to obtain a parliamentary sanction for the measures judged necessary to
secure the succession. With this view he sent a message to both houses
on the twenty-sixth day of April, importing, that nothing could conduce
so much to the preservation of the protestant succession in his royal
family, as proper provisions for the tuition of the person of his
successor, and for the regular administration of the government, in case
the successor should be of tender years; his majesty therefore earnestly
recommended this weighty affair to the deliberation of parliament; and
proposed, that when the imperial crown of these realms should descen