Assuming the Prince.
--The long voyage of the fleet which took home the
Prince caused much uneasiness in
England.
The Prince's birthday was celebrated without him. On that day a young gentleman of respectable appearance and address presented himself at the gate of
Castle Hill.
The sentinels stopped him, telling him it was the entrance only for the royal family, on which the stranger said"‘I am the
Prince of
Wales."’ The sentinels thinking from his gentlemanly manners that this was the truth, presented arms and permitted him to pass.
In this way he passed several sentinels; but in one of the interior passages of the castle he was met by one of the servants, who inquired his business.
‘"I am the
Prince of
Wales,"’ he said, ‘"and am going to see my mother, the
Queen."’ The servant said he would accompany him, and calling the superintendent, they discovered the stranger to be an insane youth, of some twenty years of age, named
Harding, who had been recently discharged from a private lunatic asylum as cured.