monarch by their representations of an impending plot, and thrust into his hands, for signature, the orders for seizing the Queen, Struensee, and Brandt. Upon seeing the name of Matilda upon the order, love and reason for a moment took possession of the King's mind, and he threw the paper from him, but, upon being ardently pressed, he signed it, put his head upon his pillow, pulled the bed-cloaths over him, and in a short time forgot what he had done. Köller proceeded to Struensee's room, and being a powerful man, seized the latter by the throat, and with some assistance sent him and Brandt in a close carriage, strongly guarded, to the citadel. Ranzau and colonel Eickstädt opened the door of the Queen's chamber, and awoke her from profound sleep to unexpected horror. These savage intruders are said, upon her resisting, to have struck her. The indecency and indignity of the scene can scarcely be imagined. After the Queen had hurried on her cloaths, she was forced into a carriage, attended by a squadron of dragoons, and sent off to the fortress of Cronberg. Upon her arrival, she was supported to her bed-chamber, a cold, damp, stone room. Upon observing the bed, she exclaimed, "Take me away! "take me away! rest is not for the miserable; there is no rest for "me." After some violent convulsions of nature, tears came to her relief: "Thank God," said the wretched Queen, " for this "blessing! my enemies cannot rob me of it." Upon hearing the voice of her infant, the Princess Louisa, who had been sent after her in another carriage, she pressed her to her bosom, kissed her with the most impassioned affection, and bathed her with tears. "Ah! art thou here?" said she, " poor unfortunate innocent; this "is indeed some balm to thy wretched mother." In the capital a scene of terror, tumult, and forced festivity followed: at twelve o'clock the next day, Juliana and her son paraded the King in his state coach, arrayed in his regalia, through the principal streets, but only here and there a solitary shout of joy was heard. For three days the imprisoned Queen refused to take any food, and

"Three times she crossed the shade of sleepless night."

It is said that the King never once enquired for her, and now became the sole property of the infamous Juliana, who guarded her treasure with the eye of a basilisk. The court of Great Britain

rhade a mild but firm communication upon the subject of the personal safety of the Queen. Nine commissioners were appointed to examine the prisoners: the following were the principal charges against Struensee:

1. A horrid design against the life of his sacred Majesty.

2. An attempt to oblige the King to resign the crown.

3. A criminal connection with the Queen.

4. The improper manner in which he had educated the Prince Royal.

5. The great power and decisive influence he had acquired in the government of the state.

6. The manner in which he used this power and influence in the administration of affairs.

Amongst the charges preferred against the count Brandt was the following ridiculous one :

"While the King was playing in his usual manner with count "Brandt, the count bit his Majesty's finger."

Four commissioners proceeded to examine the Queen, who, with the wretched Constance, might have exclaimed

Here I and Sorrow sit.

Here is my throne: let kings come bow to it.

Her answers were pointed, luminous, and dignified: she denied most solemnly any criminal intercourse with Struensee. S a counsellor of state, abruptly informed the Queen, that Struensee had already signed a confession in the highest degree disgraceful to the honour and dignity of her Majesty. " Impossible!" exclaimed the astonished Queen, "Struensee never could make such 66 a confession: and if he did, I here call heaven to witness, that "what he said was false." The artful S played off a master

piece of subtilty, which would have done honour to a demon : "Well then," said he, " as your Majesty has protested against "the truth of his confession, he deserves to die for having so trai"torously defiled the sacred character of the Queen of Denmark.” This remark struck the wretched Princess senseless in her chair. After a terrible conflict between honour and humanity, pale and trembling, in a faultering voice she said, “And if I confess what "Struensee has said to be true, may he hope for mercy?" which

words she pronounced with the most affecting voice, and with all the captivations of youth, beauty, and majesty, in distress: S nodded, as if to assure her of Struensee's safety upon those terms, and immediately drew up her confession to that effect, and presented it to her to sign; upon this, her frame became agitated with the most violent emotions; she took up the pen and began to write her name, and proceeded as far as Carol-, when, observing the malicious joy which sparkled in the eyes of S, she became convinced that the whole was a base stratagem, and, throwing away the pen, exclaimed, "I am deceived, Struensee never "accused me. I know him too well; he never could have been "guilty of so great a crime." She endeavoured to rise, but her strength failed her; she sunk down, fainted, and fell back into her chair. In this state, the barbarous and audacious S put the pen between her fingers, which he held and guided, and before the unfortunate Princess could recover, the letters -ina Matilda were added. The commissioners immediately departed, and left her alone: upon her recovering and finding them gone, she conjectured the full horror of her situation.

To afford some colouring to the mock trial which followed, the advocate Uhldal was appointed her defender: his speech on behalf of the Queen was in the highest degree able, pathetic, and convincing. Uhldal discharged such duties as in a few years afterwards devolved upon the eloquent Malsherbes, and with equal effect: the illustrious clients of both were prejudged: it was the show of justice, not to investigate, but to give a spurious eclat to their fate. How opposite was this tribunal to that which Sheridan, in a blaze of eloquence, apostrophized upon the trial of Warren Hastings, esq.! "From such a base caricature of justice," exclaimed the orator, "I turn my eyes with horror. I turn them "here to this dignified and high tribunal, where the Majesty of real "Justice sits enthroned. Here I perceive her in her proper robes "of truth and mercy, chaste and simple, accessible and patient, "awful without severity, inquisitive without meanness; her love"liest attribute appears in stooping to raise the oppressed, and to " bind up the wounds of the afflicted."

The grand tribunal divorced the Queen, and separated her for ever from the King, and proposed to blemish the birth of the Princess Louisa, by their decree, and reduce the little innocent

to that orphanage " which springs not from the grave, that falls "not from the hand of Providence, or the stroke of death;" but the cruel design was never executed. Uhldal also exerted all the powers of his eloquence for the two unfortunate counts. Humanity revolts at their sentence, which the unhappy King, it is said, signed with thoughtless gaiety. They had been confined from the seventeenth of January, and, on the twenty-eighth of March, at eleven o'clock, were drawn out to execution in two separate carriages, in a field near the east gate of the town: Brandt ascended the scaffold first, and displayed the most undaunted intrepidity. After his sentence was read, and his coat of arms torn, he calmly prayed a few minutes, and then spoke with great mildness to the people. Upon the executioner endeavouring to assist him in taking off his pelisse, he said, "Stand off! do not presume to touch me! he then stretched out his hand, which, without shrinking from the blow, was struck off, and almost at the same moment his head was severed from his body. Struensee, during this bloody scene, stood at the bottom of the scaffold in trembling agony, and became so faint when his friend's blood gushed through the boards, and trickled down the steps, that he was obliged to be supported as he ascended them here his courage wholly forsook him; he several times drew back his hand, which was dreadfully maimed before it was cut off, and at length he was obliged to be held down before the executioner could perform his last office. Copenhagen was unpeopled on the day of this savage sacrifice; but, although the feelings of the vast crowd which surrounded the scaffold had been artfully wrought upon by Juliana and her partizans, they beheld the scene of butchery with horror, and retired to their homes in sullen silence. Nothing but the spirited conduct of our then ambassador, Sir Robert Keith, prevented the Queen from being immolated at the same time.

On the 27th of May, a squadron of two British frigates and a cutter, under the command of the gallant captain Macbride, cast anchor off Helsingfors, and on the 30th every thing was finally arranged for the removal of the Queen: upon the barge being announced, she clasped her infant daughter to her breast, and shed upon her a shower of tears. The Queen then sunk into an apparent stupor; upon recovering, she prepared to tear herself away, but the voice, the smiles, and endearing motions of the

babe chained her to the spot; at last, summoning up all her resolution, she once more took it to her arms, and, in all the ardour and agony of distracted love, imprinted upon its lips the farewel kiss, and returning it to the attendant, exclaimed, “ Away! away! I now possess nothing here," and was supported to the barge in a state of agony which baffles description. Upon the Queen approaching the frigate, the squadron saluted her as the sister of his Britannic Majesty, and when she came on board, captain Macbride hoisted the Danish colours, and insisted upon the fortress of Cronberg saluting her as Queen of Denmark, which saJute was returned with two guns less. The squadron then set sail for Stade, in the Hanoverian dominions, but, owing to contrary winds, was detained within sight of the castle the whole day, and in the early part of the following morning its spires were still faintly visible, and, until they completely faded in the mist of distance, the Queen sat upon the deck, her eyes rivetted upon them, and her hands clasped in silent agony. Shall we follow the wretched Matilda a little farther? The path is solitary, very short, and at the end of it is her tomb. Upon her landing at Stade she proceeded to a little remote hunting-seat, upon the borders of the Elbe, where she remained a few months, until the castle of Zell, destined for her future residence, was prepared for her she removed to it in the autumn. Here her little court was remarked for its elegance and accomplishments, for its bounty to the peasantry, and the cheerful serenity which reigned throughout. The Queen spent much of her time alone; and, having obtained the portraits of her children from Denmark, she placed them in a retired apartment, and frequently addressed them in the most affecting manner, as if present.

So passed away the time of this beautiful and accomplished exile, until the eleventh of May, 1775, when a rapid inflammatory fever put a period to her afflictions in the twenty-fourth year of her age. Her coffin is next to that of the dukes of Zell. Farewel poor Queen!

"Ah! while we sigh we sink, and are what we deplore."