regent could never succeed to the throne: her interests were identified with those of the future sovereign, to whom she was united by the tenderest ties; and she could have no object but to uphold, in good faith, the authority of the infant queen. Her Royal Highness would, therefore, be left to administer the Government of the country, by means of the responsible Ministers of the Crown, and to act upon their advice alone.

Another question of great constitutional delicacy was also wisely dealt with. No precedent was to be found, since the Norman Conquest, of any provision having been made for the exercise of the royal prerogatives, between the demise of the Crown, and the birth of a posthumous child. The law upon this important question was not settled: but reasoning from the analogy of the law of real property, as well as according to the dictates of common sense, it was clear that an unborn child could not be seised of the Crown. There could be no abeyance or vacancy of the Crown. The king never dies. The Crown must, therefore, devolve at once upon the heir presumptive; and be resigned, if a child should be born, entitled to inherit it. If Parliament interposed, and appointed a regent to administer the Government until the birth of a posthumous child, such a regent would not be governing in the name and on behalf of the sovereign, but would be a Parliamentary sovereign, created for the occasion, under the title of regent. And, in the meantime, if no child should be born, the heir presumptive would have been unlawfully deprived of her right to the throne. Upon these sound principles the regency was now to be established. If the king should die during the minority of the Princess Victoria, she was to be proclaimed queen, subject to the rights of any issue of his Majesty, which might afterwards be born of his consort. The Duchess of Kent would at once assume the regency in the name of the infant queen, and on her behalf; and should a posthumous child be born, her Majesty Queen Adelaide would forthwith assume the regency, on behalf of her own child. These principles were accepted by statesmen and lawyers of every party; and the Regency Bill, which had been prepared by the Government of the Duke of Wellington, was adopted and passed by the Government of Lord Grey. It was a wise

1 Act 1 Will. IV, c. 2; Hans. Deb., 3rd Ser., i. 499, 764, 954, etc.

provision for contingencies which fortunately never arose. When King William IV. died, in 1837, after a short but eventful reign, her most gracious Majesty had, less than a month before, completed her eighteenth year; and ascended the throne, surrounded by happy auguries, which have since been fully accomplished.

1840.

On the accession of her Majesty, the King of Hanover be- First Regency came heir presumptive to the throne; and as he would prob- Victoria. Act of Queen ably be resident abroad, it was thought necessary to provide that, in the event of her Majesty's decease, while her successor was out of the realm, the administration of the Government should be carried on in his name by lords justices, until his arrival. But the queen's marriage, in 1840, required provision to be made for another contingency, which, though more Second Reprobable, has happily not arisen. Following the precedent of gency Act, 1831, Parliament now provided, that in the event of any child of her Majesty succeeding to the throne before the age of eighteen, Prince Albert, as the surviving parent, should be regent, without any council of regency, or any limitation upon the exercise of the royal prerogatives-except an incapacity to assent to any bill for altering the succession to the throne, or affecting the uniformity of worship in the Church of England, or the rights of the Church of Scotland. And, founded upon these principles, the bill was passed with the approval of all parties."

1

2

17 Will. IV. and i Vict. c. 72.

2 २ and Vict. c. 52; Hans. Deb., 3rd Ser., lv. 754, 850, 1074.

sions of the

CHAPTER IV.

Ancient revenues of the Crown-Civil list of William and Mary-Civil list of Queen Anne, of George I. and George II. Civil list, expenditure, and debts of George III.-Civil list of the regency, and of the reigns of George IV., William IV., and Her Majesty-Duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall-Private property of the Crown-Provision for the royal family-Management of the land revenues on behalf of the public-Civil list pensions - Prerogatives of the Crown in relation to the royal family.

Vast posses- THE history of the land revenues of the Crown presents as vicissitudes and varied fortunes as are to be found in many early times. the domestic annals of any family in the kingdom.

Crown in

Extensive forfeitures.

Grants and alienations.

The entire lands of the realm were originally held of the Crown, by various feudal tenures; and the royal revenues were derived from fines, fees, first-fruits and tenths, and other profits arising from these lands, and from the rents of the ancient demesnes of the Crown. To support the barbarous magnificence of his household-his numerous retainers and rude hospitality-was nearly the sole expense of the king; for, as feudal superior, he commanded the services of his tenants in the field, who fought by his side with an array of men and horses, equipped and maintained at their own expense.

By means of escheats and forfeitures, there was a danger of the Crown becoming the absolute proprietor of all the lands of the realm. But vast as were the king's possessions they were not vast enough to satisfy the rapacity of his followers; and in every succeeding reign the grants and alienations of Crown lands exceeded the escheats and forfeitures. The estates of the Crown were further diminished by wrongful appropriations and encroachments. Repenting their liberality kings frequently resumed their former grants; and alienations improvidently made were unjustly and violently revoked. Yet such had been the waste of the once ample revenues of the

Crown, that Henry III. complained that they had become too scanty to furnish his royal table; and the needy monarch was reduced to the necessity of giving tallies for the supply of beeves and grain for his household. An extensive assumption of grants, however, and the forfeiture of the estates of rebel barons, retrieved his fallen fortunes. Such was the liberality of Edward II. that an ordinance was passed by Parliament prohibiting the alienation of Crown lands, which was repealed, however, by a Parliament at York, in the fifteenth year of his reign. But the profusion of this king was supplied by prodigious forfeitures.

Richard II., again, was not less profuse in his grants, nor less prodigal in his confiscations. The Wars of the Roses were so fruitful of forfeitures, that a large proportion of the land of the realm became the property of the Crown. Had it been retained, there would have been no monarch in Europe so absolute as that of England: but the spoils of one faction were eagerly grasped by the other, and the Crown gained little by the lands which it won upon the field of battle, or wrested from their owners on the scaffold. In the reign of Henry V. the estates of the Crown were considerably augmented by the appropriation of the alien Priories-110 in number. Yet the income of Henry VI. was reduced so low as £5000 a year, and in his reign several general resumptions of grants were authorised by Parliament in order to supply his necessities.

land revenues

by Henry VII.

The rapacity of Henry VII. was needed to retrieve the Increase of revenues of the Crown; and his exactions and thrift repaired the waste of former reigns. His acquisitions, however, were and VIII. as nothing compared with the wholesale plunder of the monasteries, and other religious and charitable foundations, by Henry VIII., which has been valued at upwards of £30,000,000 sterling. Yet such were the magnificence and prodigality of this king, that at his death, his treasury was found to be entirely empty. The Crown was as poor as ever, but the great nobles, who were enriched by grants of the Church lands-more provident than their royal master-held them fast for their descendants. In the seventh year of the reign of James I. the entire land revenues of the Crown and Duchy of Lancaster amounted to no more than £66,870 a year, while the king's debts exceeded

1 St. John on the Land Revenues of the Crown, 68.

Destruction of land re

wealth.

Their

recovery and subsequent

waste.

a million.1 During his reign he sold lands to the extent of £775,000, and left debts of about an equal amount.

But more evil days were at hand for the land revenues. venues during Charles I., unable to obtain supplies from Parliament, and the Common- gaining little from his illegal exactions, was forced to sell and mortgage the property of the Crown. The Parliament, after his death, completed the spoliation, of which he had set them the example, and sold nearly all the royal estates, in order to pay the arrears due to the Parliamentary forces and discharge the debts of the new Government. At the Restoration, these latter sales were declared void; and many of the estates of the Crown were recovered. But they were recovered, to be again squandered and dispersed. In three years Charles II. had reduced the income of the Crown lands from £217,900 to £100,000 a year. In the first year of his reign he surrendered the court of wards and liveries, and the military tenures, in exchange for a settlement of certain duties of excise; being the first instance of a surrender by the Crown of its interest in any part of the hereditary revenues. During this reign a large proportion of the fee-farm rents belonging to the Crown was sold by Act of Parliament, and further grants of these rents were made during the reigns of William III. and Queen Anne. The liberality of William III. to his followers provoked remonstrances from Parliament. He was even obliged to recall an enormous grant to the Earl of Portland, which conveyed to that nobleman four-fifths of the county of Denbigh, with a reserved rent of 6s. 8d. payable to the Crown, but he compensated the Earl with other lands and manors."

So jealous were the Commons at this period of the continual diminution of the hereditary revenues of the Crown that several bills were brought in to resume all grants made by Charles II., James II., and William, and to prevent further alienations of Crown lands. At the end of William's reign,

8

7

1 St. John on the Land Revenues of the Crown, 79.

2 Scobell, part ii. 51, 106, 227, etc.

4 22 Car. II. c. 6; 22 and 23 Car. II. c. 24.

5

3 12 Car. II. c. 24.

1695 Parl. Hist., v. 978; Com. Journ., xi. 391, 395, 409.

6 Com. Journ., xi. 608.

7 In 1697, 1699, 1700, 1702, and 1703; Com. Journ., xii. 90; ibid., xiii. 208,

350; ibid., xiv. 95, 269, 305, etc.; Macaulay's Hist., v. 32.

8 In 1697 and 1699, Com. Journ., xii. 90; ibid., xiii. 62,