priving him of those dominions also. "Command my vassals," cried Henry," to assemble at Brunswick on Christmas-day; they will find me at their head." Though the time was short and the distance great, and all the passes guarded, the young Duke, with only three attendants, having disguised his person, darted swiftly and secretly through the hostile country; and, appearing on the fifth day in the camp at Brunswick, forced his Imperial adversary to retreat. To the successor of Conrad, the Emperor Frederic Barbarossa, Henry was united by the bonds of mutual kindness and obligation; and it was chiefly by his influence that the territories of Bavaria were restored to their ancient possessor. At a public assembly in the plains of Ratisbon, the Margrave of Austria resigned, into the hands of the Emperor, the seven symbols of the Bavarian duchy, which were immediately delivered to Henry the Lion, who restored two of them to the Margrave, in right of three counties, which were then enfranchised from the dominion of Bavaria. When the Emperor was engaged in war against the rebels of Lombardy, he summoned the Duke of Saxony and Bavaria to attend him; but Henry, displeased at the Emperor's refusal to grant him the City of Goslar, which would have given him the command of the silver-mines of the Hartz, disobeyed the summons. The Emperor, unable to contend with the league of Lombardy, again solicited the assistance of the Duke, who, it is said, smiled at the Imperial distress. An interview took place between them at Chiavenna, near the Lake of Como. Henry was still inexorable; and the Emperor, after every other argument had failed, threw himself at his feet. The vassal raised his sovereign from the ground, when one of the attendants whispered in his 66 ear, Suffer, dread Sir, the Imperial crown to lie at your feet; speedily it must be placed on your head." Even this degradation failed to accomplish the Imperial wishes. The Empress, indignant at the scene, bitterly desired the Duke to remember what had passed; and added," God will remember it one day." From this hour, the prosperity of Henry was viewed with jealousy, and he was even accused by the Emperor of an indirect conspiracy against his life and honour. In 1168, the Duke, having been divorced from his former wife, solicited and obtained the hand of the Princess Royal of England, and the marriage was celebrated at Minden. In 1172, Henry determined on making a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and he left the Duchess regent of his dominions in his absence. The vicissitudes, which marked the remainder of the life of Henry the Lion, were various and many, but he continued, to his death, to hold the first rank amongst the princes of Germany.

The following anecdote, relating to Henry, surnamed the Younger, the only son of Henry the Bad, of Brunswick-Wolfen

buttel, is given, by Dr. Halliday, from the old chronicle.* "The Duke had married the Lady Mary, sister of Ulrick, Duke of Wirtemberg, who, amongst other ladies that waited on her, had one Eve Trotting, a young lady of extraordinary beauty and noble family. The Duke began to be desperately smitten with her, and at length prevailing, had some children by her; but that the intrigue might not be discovered, and that he might still enjoy her company, he put a stratagem into her head, that she should pretend to return home to her parents, and he furnished her with a waggon and horses, and all things necessary for her journey but when people thought she was really returned home, she was conducted another way to a castle of his, whereof the governor was instructed by him what to do, and had a woman or two, in whom he most confided, to assist him in the plot. Some days after Eve came there, she took to her bed, pretending to be very sick. Now the Duke had before prepared an image to be made of wood, representing the head, neck, and breast of a dead body; the other parts of the body were done and shaped in linen, which the women stuffed with dust or earth, so that it might seem to be solid, and then fitted the wooden head and bust to it, which was likewise covered over with the linen cloth. Being thus ordered, and wrapped in a shroud, it was laid on the floor, and presently one of the women ran to the governor's parlour-door, crying out that Eve was dead; whereupon he presently ordered a coffin to be made to put the body in; and to scare people from approaching the corpse, it was given out that she died of the plague; and juniper-berries, and other odoriferous things, were burnt to perfume the room. Afterwards the corpse was carried, in funeral pomp, to the Grey-friars' church, where it was honourably buried; the Franciscans performing all the usual ceremonies, and praying for the soul of the deceased, as they did for a whole year after, and in their sermons exhorted the people to do the like. There was also, by the Duke's order, a funeral office performed for her in the chapel of the castle in which it was said she died, priests being invited thither from the neighbourhood: the same was done in the castle of Wolfenbuttel. His wife, the Duchess, was present at this office, with her women and maids all in mourning. Many priests were invited to it, who had afterwards a dinner, and every one of them a piece of money in gratuity, according to the ancient custom observed amongst the papists.

"In the mean time, Eve, whose death was lamented by so many, was in the castle of Stauffenburg, where she was still visited by the Duke, who, since that time, had seven children by

Vide History of the House of Brunswick. Printed by J. Pemberton, opposite St. Dunstan's church, 1716. p. 104.

her. He also persuaded the Duchess to write to Eve's parents and relations, to acquaint them with her death.

"But when afterwards a rumour was raised that she was still alive, and kept in Stauffenburg, the Duchess's jealousy put her upon making a strict enquiry of the servants about the truth thereof; but the Duke gave orders that none of them should come near her that could give her any information. However, her suspicion stuck to her as long as she lived, which put her upon writing many letters to him to lament her misfortune."

In that celebrated and disastrous war, which ensued on the election of the Palatine to the throne of Bohemia, a prince of the house of Guelph performed a conspicuous and gallant part. The Queen of Bohemia and the Duke Christian of Luneburg were near relatives, being the children of two sisters, the daughters of the King of Denmark. Christian, therefore, warmly espoused the cause of the Elector Palatine, and supported him with all the resources of the Duchy of Brunswick. Having collected an army in Lower Saxony, he attacked Westphalia, and took the town of Paderborne; where he coined the costly ornaments of the cathedral into money, on which the motto was "God's friend, and the enemy of priests. When the King of Bohemia was compelled to lay down his arms, the Duke of Brunswick entered into the service of the States General of Holland; and while he was crossing the Duchy of Luxemburg, to join the army of the Prince of Orange, he encountered the Spanish army under Gonsalvis de Cordova, by whom he was defeated with great loss. He became personally acquainted with his cousin in Holland; and was so enamoured of her beauty, that he wore her glove in his hat, and bore on his colours the motto, "Aller für Gott und sie." This prince was rewarded by James I. with the order of the garter, for the gallantry of his conduct, and his zeal in the cause of the Palatine.

In the year 1680, the eldest son of Ernest-Augustus, Duke of Hanover, visited England, when he is said to have paid his addresses to the Princess Anne, and to have met with a refusal. He visited Oxford, and was made a Doctor of Laws, an account of which ceremony is recorded by Anthony Wood in his "Fasti," as follows:

"This person, who was now commonly called Prince of Hanover, and had come to Whitehall on the 16th November, going before purposely to pay his respects to the Lady Anne, daughter of James, Duke of York, was, the day before he was created, received in the university with solemnity at his coming thereunto; and being lodged in Christ-church, he, with his retinue, were conducted the next day by the Bishop, Dr. Fell, to the public schools; and, being habited in scarlet in the apodyterium, was thence conducted by three of the beadles, with the King's Professor of Laws, to the theatre, where the convocation was then held; and coming

near the Vice-chancellor's seat, the professor presented him, (the prince being then bare); which being done, the Vice-chancellor then standing bare, as the doctors and masters did, he created him doctor of laws.

"This being done, the prince went up to his chair of state, provided for him on the right hand of the chancellor's seat; and when three of his retinue were created doctors, the orator complimented him in the name of the university. He left Oxford next day, at which time was presented to him, in the name thereof, "Historia et Antiquitatis Universitatis Oxoniensis,' with the cuts thereto belonging."

Ernest Augustus, the last Elector of Hanover before George the First, was a prince much attached to the cultivation of the arts. He adorned his capital with several magnificent buildings, and indeed it is to his munificence that Hanover is indebted for all the remains of splendour of which she can boast. He improved and enlarged the castle, which had been built for his uncle and brother in the city, and he built the palace of Hernhausen in the suburbs, a palace which was the residence of the Princess Sophia, and which, by the representations of the Duke of Clarence, has been lately repaired, and now forms a magnificent building. The court of Ernest Augustus was one of the most celebrated in Europe, and is said to have rivalled that of Louis XIV. in politeness and vice. This prince died in the year 1698. He had never been allowed to take his seat in the college of electors, on account of the opposition which had been raised to his assuming that dignity; but his title was acknowledged by the potentates of Europe, and he enjoyed the precedence due to his rank.

At the commencement of the war with France, occasioned by the Spanish succession, Hanover became the firm ally of Great Britain, and the Elector, in conjunction with his uncle and fatherin-law, the old Duke of Celle, furnished a subsidiary body of ten thousand men to the army under Marlborough. Prince Maximilian, the Elector's brother, commanded the Hanoverian troops, and greatly distinguished himself by his gallantry and conduct.

The cabals, which preceded the accession of the Elector of Hanover to the throne of England, do not furnish any circumstances of peculiar interest. It is well known, that the Elector was not on good terms, either with his mother or his son, and that he viewed with indifference the splendid prospects, which the latter had secured for him. The name of the Princess was inserted in the Liturgy, and her grandson was created Duke of Cambridge, and invested with the Order of the Garter. The residence of the Electoral Prince in these dominions was earnestly desired by the friends of the Protestant succession, and a writ, summoning him to parliament by his new title, was transmitted to Hanover. The affair, however, gave great offence to the Queen, who could not

endure the idea of having a prince of the house she so much detested, so near her person. She accordingly dispatched, by Lord Paget, a letter to the aged Electress, and another to the Electoral Prince, in which she strongly deprecated the idea of the latter visiting England, as dangerous both to the peace of the kingdom and to the succession of the Hanoverian family. These letters made a most powerful, and indeed a fatal impression on the Electress. They were delivered on Wednesday the 6th of June 1714; and although she continued her usual occupations, and conversed on indifferent subjects, she complained the following day of being unwell, and took to her bed. On Friday she was able to dress and dine with the Elector, and took her accustomed walk during the evening in the orangery, but, being overtaken by a shower of rain, she quickened her pace in order to gain a shelter. To an observation from her attendant that she was walking too fast, she replied, "I believe I do." She fell as she was uttering these words, which were her last, and soon afterwards expired. She died in the 84th year of her age.

The Electress Sophia was the youngest daughter of the Elector Palatine, afterwards King of Bohemia, and Elizabeth Stuart, daughter of James I. Her father died when she was an infant, and her early years were passed in distress and exile. Though many of her family were strict Catholics, she was educated in the principles of Protestantism, to which she always remained firmly attached. At the age of 28 she married Ernest Augustus Duke of Brunswick Luneburg. Her person was beautiful, and her understanding manly. A contemporary writer relates that at the age of seventy-three she possessed all the beauty and vigour of youth, stepped as firm and erect as any young lady, and had not a wrinkle on her face, or one tooth out of her head; she read without spectacles, and was constantly employed. The chairs of the presence-chamber were all embroidered with her own hands, as well as the ornaments of the altar in the electoral chapel. She was much attached to the exercise of walking, usually spending two or three hours in sauntering round the pleasure-grounds at Hernhausen. She was a great patroness of the arts and learning, of which her encouragement of the celebrated Leibnitz may be mentioned as a proof. Her knowledge of languages was considerable, and she had paid great attention to the English. She also made our laws and constitution her study, as soon as it became probable she might succeed to the throne of these kingdoms. Her intellect was highly cultivated, and her wit sprightly; and it is said that nothing could exceed the brilliancy and beauty of her conversation but her letters. Her religious sontiments were firm and elevated, without being superstitious. With the accession of George the First the history of the House of Hanover properly

terminates.