genets a diadem ornamented with fleurs de lis or strawberry leaves, between which were small globes raised, or points rather lower than the leaves; Richard III. or Henry VII. introduced the crosses; about the same time (on the coins of Henry VII.) the arches first appear; and the subsequent varieties of shape are in the elevation or depression of the arches. The maiden queen wore them remarkably high.

Blood's exploit with the new crown of Charles II. is told to all the young visitors at the Tower". It is only wonderful that, in

* The following is Hume's account of this memorable project:

"A little after [his attempt to carry off the Duke of Ormond], Blood formed a design of carrying off the crown and regalia from the Tower; a design to which he was prompted, as well by the surprising boldness of the enterprise, as by the views of profit. He was near succeeding; he had bound and wounded Edwards, the keeper of the Jewel Office, and had gotten out of the Tower with his prey; but was overtaken and seized, with some of his associates. One of them was known to have been concerned in the attempt upon Ormond; and Blood was immediately concluded to be the ring-leader. When questioned, he frankly avowed the enterprise, but refused to tell his accomplices. The fear of death,' he said, should never engage him either to deny a guilt, or

that age of plots, no political object or accusation was connected with it. The beautiful dialogue which our great dramatist puts into the mouth of Henry IV. and his son, who had taken the crown from his dying father's pillow, we could willingly transcribe entire :

"K. Henry.

O foolish youth!

Thou seek'st a greatness that will overwhelm thee.
Stay but a little; for my cloud of dignity

Is held from falling by so weak a wind,

That it will quickly drop; my day is dim.

Thou hast stolen THAT, which after some few hours
Were thine without offence; and at my death
Thou hast sealed up my expectation;

Thy life did manifest thou lovedst me not;
And thou wilt have me die assured of it.

betray a friend.' All these extraordinary circumstances made him the general subject of conversation; and the king was moved by an idle curiosity to see and speak with a person so noted for his courage and his crimes... Blood might now esteem himself secure of pardon, and he wanted not address to improve the opportunity.”— Charles eventually pardoned him, granted him an estate of £500. per annum, and encouraged his attendance about his person. "And while old Edwards, who had bravely ventured his life, and had been wounded in defending the crown and regalia, was forgotten and neglected, this man, who deserved only to be stared at and detested as a monster, became a kind of favourite."HUME'S England, CHARLES II.

"P. Henry. O pardon me, my Liege! but for my tears, (The moist impediments unto my speech,)

I had forestalled this clear and deep rebuke,
Ere you with grief had spoke, and I had heard
The course of it so far. There is your CROWN-
And He that wears the crown immortally

Long guard it yours!

Coming to look on you, thinking you dead,
(And dead almost, my Liege, to think you were,)
I spake unto the crown, as having sense,

And thus upbraided it.

'The care on thee depending

Hath fed upon the body of my father;

Therefore thou best of gold art worst of gold;
Other, less fine in carat, is more precious,

Preserving life, in medicine potable:

But thou, most fine, most honoured, most renowned, Hast eat thy bearer up!'"

It is the same prince who afterwards so well apostrophizes his own greatness :

"O, be sick, great Greatness!

And bid thy ceremony give thee cure.

Think'st thou the fiery fever will go out
With titles blown from adulation?

Will it give place to flexure and low bending?
Canst thou, when thou command'st the beggar's knee,
Command the health of it? No, thou proud dream,
That play'st so subtly with a king's repose,
I am a king that find thee; and I know,
'Tis not the balm, the sceptre, and the ball,
The sword, the mace, the crown imperial,
The intertissued robe of gold and pearl,
The farsed title running 'fore the king,
The throne he sits on, nor the tide of pomp

That beats upon the high shoar of this world;

No, not all these thrice gorgeous ceremonies,
Not all these, laid in bed majestical,

Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave."

No. 3. The Sceptre

Is a more ancient symbol of royalty than the crown. Homer speaks of "sceptred kings” σκηπτοῦχοι βασιλῆες; and the book of Genesis," of far elder memory," of a sceptre, as denoting a king or supreme governor. There is a very early form of delivering this ensign of authority preserved in the Saxon coronation services; and the coins and seals of succeeding reigns usually place it in the hand of our monarchs. Very anciently, too, our kings received at their coronations a sceptre for the right hand, surmounted by a cross; and for the left, sometimes called the verge, one that terminated in a globe, surmounted by a dove. The two great symbols of the Christian religion are thus professedly embraced; but the monarch never appears with two sceptres except on this occasion.

Gen. xlix. 10.

No. 4. The Ampulla, or Golden Eagle,

AND the "holy oil" which is poured from it, are connected, like the royal chair, with some of the miracles that no one now believes, and with some interesting historical facts.

Amongst the honours bestowed by the Virgin on St. Thomas à Becket, (according to a MS. in the Cotton Library,) he received from our Lady's own hands, at Sens, in France, a golden eagle, and a small phial of stone or glass, containing an unction, on whose virtues she largely expatiated. Being then in banishment, he was directed to give them in charge to a monk of Poictiers, who hid them in St. Gregory's church at that place, where they were discovered in the reign of Edward III., with a written account of the vision; and, being delivered to the Black Prince, were deposited safely in the Tower. Henry IV. is said to be the first prince anointed with these vessels.

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Holy oil" still retains its use, if not its virtue, in our coronations. The king was