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Containing Anecdotes of George IV., his present Majesty,

Queen Adelaide, &c. &c.

A MEMOIR

OF

THE LIFE

OF

GEORGE THE FOURTH.

CHAPTER I.

THE BRUNSWICK LINE.

THE origin of the Brunswick Family is lost in the fabulous ages of the north. The first occurrence of the name has been dimly traced by the German antiquaries to the invasion of the Roman empire under Attila, in the middle of the fifth century. Among the tribes which that almost universal chieftain poured down upon Italy, the Scyrri (Hirri or Heruli) are found, whose king, Eddico, was sent as one of Attila's ambassadors to the court of Theodosius. The native country of the Scyrri was, like that of the principal invaders, in the North of Europe; and they are supposed, on Pliny's authority, to have possessed the marshes of Swedish Pomerania, and some of the islands near the mouth of the Baltic.

B

On the sudden death of Attila and the dismemberment of his conquests, the Scyrri seized upon a large tract bordering on the Danube. But the possession was either too tempting or too carelessly held, to be relinquished without a struggle by the fierce chieftains, who, in returning from Italy, had seen the fertility of Pomerania. The Scyrri were involved in a furious war, which seems to have spread from the Adriatic to the Euxine. The calamities of Rome were mercilessly revenged by the wounds inflicted in this mutual havoc of her conquerors; and in one of those battles, in which extermination or victory were the only alternatives, the tribe of the Pomeranian Scyrri were totally cut off, with Eddico, their king, at their head, and GUELPH, his son, or brother, whose name is then first heard in history.

But the fortunes of the Scyrri were destined to be rapidly revived by one of the most singular and fortunate conquerors of a time remarkable for striking changes of fortune. A remnant of the tribe, unable or unwilling to follow their king in the Roman invasion, had, by remaining in Pomerania, escaped the general extinction. Odoacer, the son of the fallen king, put himself at their head, and marched from the Baltic to revenge the slaughter of his countrymen. Like many of the northern chieftains, he had been educated, probably as a hostage, in the Roman

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