waiting for her's. The rest of the Royal Family followed them as fast as their coaches could be brought up; the Lord Mayor, with the Sword of State carried before him, the Sheriffs and Gentlemen of the Committee, conducting them to the Hall gate. Their Majesties did not reach St. James's till two. In going under the gateway, one of the glasses of their coach was broke by the roof of a sentry-box, but happily no mischief followed. "His Majesty and the Queen were pleased to do singular honour to Sir Samuel Fludyer, Lord Mayor, at their departure, as well as to the Lady Mayoress. "The rest of the company did not separate till after three, and the whole was concluded with the utmost regularity and decorum. "The Queen's easy, elegant, and condescending behaviour, made an impression on the whole company, and the joy on seeing our young and beloved Sovereign so completely happy in his Royal Consort, might easily be read in every countenance. "Upon the whole, it must be confessed that this entertainment at Guildhall, as well for the magnificence and profusion that attended it, as for the regularity and decorum with which it was conducted, did great honour to the metropolis. Champaigne, Burgundy, and other valuable wines, were to be had every where, and nothing was so scarce as water. Even the Ladies in the galleries had an excellent collation provided for them, to go to as they pleased, in a separate apartment. His Majesty himself was pleased to declare, that to be elegantly entertained, he must come into the City. The Foreign Ministers in general expressed their wonder; and one of them said, in French, that this entertainment was only fit for one King to give to another. "The houses were illuminated in all the streets, both in the City and Westminster, leading to St. James's: and some of them were adorned with curious transparent devices of the initial letters of their Majesties' names, and of lamps so disposed as to represent a crown, particularly Mr. Adams's, his Majesties' Optician; but, all manner of dangerous and noisy fire-works were strictly forbidden. "You will hardly believe, that the crowd in some places was very near as great at the return of the Royal Family as at their coming. "Mr. Pitt, too, was attended with the same acclamations all along, quite to his own house. BILL OF FARE, As served up at the Royal Table in Guildhall, on Lord Mayor's-day, by Messrs. Horton and Birch. KING AND QUEEN.-Each four services and removes. First Service. Consisting of tureens, fish, venison, &c. nine dishes. Second Service.-A fine roast, Ortolans, quails, knotts, ruffs, pea-chicks, &c. nine dishes. Third Service. Consisting of vegetable and made dishes, green pease, green morelles, green truffles, cardoons, &c. eleven dishes. Fourth Service. - Curious ornaments in pasty, jellies, blancmanges, cakes, &c. nine dishes. Eight of the Royal Family.-Four on the right hand of the King, and four on the left.-Each four services before them, as follow: First Service. Consisting of Venison, turtle, soups, fish of every sort, viz. Dories, mullets, turbots, bets, tench, soles, &c. seven dishes. Second Service.-Ortolans, teals, quails, ruffs, snipes, partridges, pheasants, &c. seven dishes. Third Service.-Vegetables and made dishes, green peas, artichokes, ducks, tongues, fat livers, &c. nine dishes. Fourth Service.-Curious ornaments in cakes, both savoury and sweet, jellies and blanc-manges, in variety of shapes, figures, and colours-nine dishes. On the table between each service was placed near 100 cold ornamentals, and a grand silver epergne, filled with various kinds of shell fish of different colours. Hot and cold dishes 414.-The dessert not included. M DESCRIPTION OF THE REGALIA, ROYAL ROBES, CORONETS, DRESSES OF AND OTHER CEREMONIAL CORONATION HABITS. THE present Regalia of England is not of any very remote antiquity, for, in the Wars of King Charles the First's reign, the former Crowns, &c. were either lost, sold, or destroyed; and on these accounts, for the Coronation of his Son, those which are now used, were first manufactured. The Regalia, collectively speaking, consists of five Crowns, as many Sceptres, four Swords, two Rings, one golden Orb, one pair of golden Spurs, various splendid Robes, and a golden Vessel and Spoon for the Anointing;-all which it is intended in this place particularly to describe. The first and principal Diadem, denominated St. Edward's Crown, with which his Majesty is invested, is so called in commemoration of the ancient one, which was kept in Westminster Abbey till the beginning of the great Rebellion, when, with the rest of the Regalia, it was sacriligiously taken away. It is a very rich Imperial Crown of gold, embellished with pearls and precious stones of various kinds, as diamonds, rubies, emeralds, and sapphires, with a mound of gold on the top of it, encircled with a band of the same, embellished also with precious stones; and upon the mound a cross* * All the Crosses which decorate the English Crowns are of that kind which are termed in heraldry Pattée; i.e. narrow in the centre, and expanding at the four ends. Guillim derives the word from the Latin, Patula, which signifies broad, open, or expanded. The word Mound is an heraldic expression for a globe, and is derived from the French, Monde, the world. |