other alien. A queen dowager does not lose her regal dignity by marrying a subject; whereas dowager peeresses forfeit their peerage when they marry commoners; the rule being, that rank which is gained by marriage is lost by marriage. Of this we have a precedent in the case of Catherine queen dowager of Henry V., who married Owen Tudor, a private gentleman, and yet by the name of Catherine queen of England maintained an action against the bishop of Carlisle. And again, the queen dowager of Navarre marrying with Edmond earl of Lancaster, brother to king Edward I., maintained an action of dower (after the death of her second husband) by the name of queen of Navarre.3

The prince of Wales and his wife, the princess of Wales, are distinguished by the law from the rest of the royal family, because he is the heir-apparent to the crown. By the stat. 25 Edward III. to compass or conspire his death, or violate her chastity, are high treason; because he is the next in succession to the crown, and from her the direct line of succession is to proceed. The heirapparent to the crown is usually created prince of Wales and earl of Chester; but he is, immediately on his birth, duke of Cornwall. This is a very peculiar species of inheritance created by act of parliament, whereof there is no other instance. The duchy of Cornwall is in the queen until she has male issue; and on the birth of an heirapparent, he will immediately become duke of Cornwall by inheritance; but to hold the dukedom only so long as

1 Co. Litt. 31 b.; and note 9. Hale.

2 Co. Litt. 16 b. "... if she gaineth it by marriage, she loseth it if she marry under the degree of nobility. But if a duchess by marriage marry a baron, she remaineth a duchess, because her husband is noble, et sic de cæteris."

3 12 Inst. 50.

he does not inherit the crown, and have a son and heir; for as soon as the father becomes king, the law vests the duchy of Cornwall in his heir apparent.

The queen's eldest daughter is the next member of the royal family specially distinguished by the law. She is styled the princess royal; and, by the statute 25 Ed. III., to violate her chastity is high treason.

The rest of the royal family, Blackstone says, may be considered in two different lights, according to the different senses in which the term the royal family is used. The larger sense includes all those who by any possibility may inherit the crown. The more confined sense includes only those who are within a certain degree of propinquity to the reigning prince, and to whom, therefore, the law pays an extraordinary regard and respect; but, after that degree is past, they fall into the rank of ordinary subjects, and are seldom considered any farther, unless called to the succession on failure of the nearer lines.1

The heir or heiress presumptive to the throne has by law no rank or precedence as such, because that species of heirship is at any time liable to be diverted by the birth of an heir apparent; and the law will take no notice of the greater or less probability, or even the possibility, of such an event taking place. It was, however, resolved by the judges, that the approbation of the marriage of the presumptive heir to the throne, being a minor, belongs of right to the sovereign.2

On the marriage of the princess Charlotte, only daughter and heiress presumptive to the Prince of Wales, afterwards king George IV., with prince Leopold of Saxe Coburg, it was enacted by statute 56 Geo. III. c. xiii., whereby that prince was naturalised, that it should be 1 Blackst. Com. b. i. c. iv. p. 226.

lawful for the king to give him such precedence to rank before the archbishop of Canterbury, the lord chancellor, and all other great officers, and the dukes (other than and except the dukes of the blood royal), and all other peers of the realm, as his majesty should deem fit. The prince accordingly had precedence given to him to rank after the duke of Gloucester. Thus parliament took notice of the fact, that, on the demise of king Geo. III., the princess Charlotte would be heiress presumptive to the throne.

The younger sons and daughters of the sovereign are entitled to a peculiar place in the House of Lords; for it is enacted by the stat. 31 Hen. VIII. c. x. that no person except the king's children shall presume to sit or have place at the side of the cloth of estate in the parliamentchamber. It was also decided by the House of Lords, to whom the settlement of the place and precedence of Edward duke of York, second son of Frederick prince of Wales, and grandson of George II., was referred by the king, that under the description of the king's children his grandsons are included; and that the duke of York ought to have place next to the duke of Cumberland, the king's youngest son, and might have a seat on the left hand of the cloth of estate.1

But when, by the decease of king George II., those royal personages ceased to be the children, and became the brother and uncle, of the reigning sovereign, they, as Blackstone informs us, left their seats on the side of the cloth of estate; so that when the duke of Gloucester, second brother of king George III., took his seat in the house of peers, he was placed on the upper end of the earls' bench (on which the dukes usually sit), next to his royal highness the duke of York.2

1 Lords' Journ. 24 April, 1760.

2 Ib. 10 Jan. 1756.

In 1718, upon a question referred to all the judges by king George I., it was resolved, by the opinion of ten against the other two, that the education and care of the king's grandchildren, while minors, did belong of right to his majesty as king of this realm, even during their father's lifetime. But the judges were unanimously of opinion that the care and approbation of their marriages, when grown up, belonged to the king their grandfather.

The judges have more recently concurred in the opinion, that this care and approbation extends also to the heir presumptive to the throne; though to what other branches of the royal family the same did extend, they did not find precisely determined. The most frequent instances of the crown's interposition go no further than nephews and nieces;2 but examples are not wanting of its reaching to more distant collaterals.3 And the stat. 6 Henry VI. prohibits the marriage of a queen dowager without the king's consent. And now, by the stat. 12 Geo. III. c. ii., commonly called the Royal Marriage Act, no descendant of the body of king George II. (other than the issue of princesses married into foreign families) is

1 Fortesc. Aland. 401, 440. Hargr. St. Trials, vol. xi. p. 295. 2 Blackstone cites, for brothers and sisters, under king Ed. III. 4 Rymer, 392, 403, 411, 501, 508, 512, 549, 683 under Hen. V. 9 Rym. 710, 711, 741 under Ed. IV. 11 Rym. 564, 565, 590, 601: under Hen. VIII. 13 Rym. 249, 423: under Ed. VI. 7 St. Trials, 3, 8. For nephews and nieces, under Hen. III. 1 Rym. 852: under Ed. I. 2 Rym. 489: under Ed. III. 5 Rym. 561: under Rich. II. 7 Rym. 264 under Rich. III. 12 Rym. 232, 244: under Hen. VIII. 15 Rym. 26, 31.

3 To great-nieces, under Ed. II. 3 Rym. 575, 644. To first cousins, under Ed. III. 5 Rym. 177. To second cousins and third cousins, under Ed. III. 5 Rym. 729: under Rich. II. 7 Rym. 225: under Hen. VI. 12 Rym. 322: under Hen. VII. 12 Rym. 529: under queen Eliz. Camden, Ann. A.D. 1562. To fourth cousins, under Hen. VII. 12 Rym. 329. To the blood royal in general, under Rich. II. 7 Rym. 787.

capable of contracting matrimony without the previous consent of the queen, signified under the great seal; and any marriage contracted without such consent is void. Provided that such of the said descendants as are above the age of twenty-five may, after a twelvemonth's notice given to the queen's privy council, contract and solemnise marriage without the consent of the crown, unless both houses of parliament shall, before the expiration of the said year, expressly declare their disapprobation of such intended marriage. And all persons solemnising, assisting, or being present at any such prohibited marriage, shall incur the penalties of the statute of premunire.