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 The Great Seal. were being made, the metropolis was thrown into consternation by the news that the Great Seal had been stolen; and many per sons imagined that for want of it all the functions of the executive government must be suspended. A charge was brought against the Whigs (the opposition of those days) that, to prevent the dissolution, they had burglariously broken into the Lord Chancellor's house and stolen the Great Seal.



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seal was ordered on the same day that the burglary occurred. Such expedition was used that by noon the following day the new Great Seal was finished in a rough fashion, and a special order in council was then made to authorize its use. Here it may be interesting to state that the engrav ing of the present splendid seal of Queen Victoria (see No. 1 of my last article and No. 23 of this) occupied Mr. Wyon for one year and nine months.

No. 20. Seal of George I.

Period of use 171 5 to 1728.

"The truth was, that, very early in the morn ing of the 24th March [1784], some thieves did break into Lord Thurlow's house in Great Ormond Street, which then bordered on the country. Coming from the fields, they had jumped over his garden wall, and, forcing two bars in the kitchen window, went up a stair to a room adjoin ing the study. Here they found the Great Seal . . . two silver-hilted swords . . . and a small sum of money. With the whole of this booty they absconded." The thieves were never traced, and a new

Diameter 5.8 inches.

Reverse.

The fourth seal of George III. also met with a strange adventure. "In the autumn of 181 2 the Seal was with Ix>rd Eldon at his country home at Encombe, when a fire broke out. On being awakened, Lord Eldon's first thought was the preservation of the Great Seal. He seized it, ran into the gar den, and hastily buried it under the mould of one of the flower-beds. When now he looked around him he saw what he afterwards described as 'a very pretty sight, for all the maids' had ' turned out of their beds and ' by the flickering