After losing the battle of Pultava, Charles the Twelfth, of Sweden, lay for three years at Bender, in (what was then) Turkey, sunk in torpor, and "lost to life and use and name and fame.'' Then, one day, he suddenly woke up, his kingly strength came back to him, and he rode, with hardly an attendant, across snow-covered Europe to the gates of Stralsund. For five years Grey remained in seclusion at Kawau, waiting, or rather kept, as we can now perceive, for an appropriate summons to action. It came at last. The fighting spirit of the old warrior answered the call, and he went forth to battle. As if in tardy recognition of his claims as the creator of the Provincial system, he was elected Superintendent of the province of Auckland. His tenure of the office was not a success. His autocratic habits were incompatible with the position of an elective Lieutenant-Governor, and public men who were well acquainted with the facts positively asserted that he would not have been re-elected, had the occasion arisen. But it was destined never to arise. He had entered the Legislature and was now deeply involved in the conduct of political measures of prime importance.