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D

HISTORY

OF THE

REGENCY AND REIGN

ог

King George the Fourth.

BY WILLIAM COBBETT.

VOL. II.

LONDON:

PRINTED BY MILLS, JOWETT, AND MILLS:

BOLT-COURT;

PUBLISHED BY WILLIAM COBBETT, 11, BOLT-COURT,

FLEET-STREET.

1834.

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HISTORY

OF THE

REGENCY AND REIGN OF GEORGE IV.

CHAPTER V,

Return of Napoleon from Elba.-Flight of the Bourbons to Ghent.-Battle of Waterloo.Surrender of Napoleon, in 1815; His imprisonment at St. Helena; Consequences of these events; Peace with France of 1815.

221. We are now approaching that celebrated victory of WATERLOO, which has produced to England more real shame; more real and substantial disgrace; more debt; more distress, amongst the middle class, and more misery amongst the working class; greater inroads upon the ancient institutions, the laws, and liberties of the country; more injuries of all sorts, than the kingdom ever experienced from a hundred defeats, whether by land or by sea.

222. It is, therefore, of great consequence, that we trace this famous affair to its real cause, and that cause to its motive. We shall see, in good time, the many consequences of it; and amongst others, the nearly, or quite hundred millions of debt that it brought upon the people, in addition to the monstrous load, which they had before to bear we shall see it blinding and maddening a people heretofore considered the

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