THE QUEEN CONSORT

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXI, Issue 4301, 9 March 1901, Page 5 (Supplement)

THE QUEEN CONSORT

HOME LIFE AND INCIDENTS. The birthplace of Queen Alexandra was the Gule Palace, Copenhagen. Though called a palace, it is really nothing more than u- substantial and coinmr.dTous townhouse. It is _ No. 18, Amaliegado, a street which is in the most aristocratic quarter of Copenhagen, and which intersects the Anialiehoi’g Square, where stand the four royal palaces. The houses in the immediate vicinity of the palace arc let out in flats to wealthy families, while the basements are used for small shops, whore cigajrs, wine-bottles,■ -and cabbages and fruit are freely displayed. Her father made his home at the barracks in Copenhagen. At the age of 22 he contracted a love-match with the pretty Princess Louisa of HesseCasscl, daughter of the Langdraf william, and niece of King Christian VIII.,

and of the Duchess of Cambridge, the aunt of Queen. Victoria. The young couple were married in Copenhagen, June, 1842, and started housekeeping on an extremely modest income in the Gule Palace. Here a year later a son, the present Crown Prince Frederick of Denmark, was born, and on December 1, 1844, his birth was followed by that of Alexandra. The four remaining children were George (King of Greece), Dagmar (Dowager Empress of Russia), Thyra (Duchess of Cumberland), and Yaldemar (married to Princess Marie of Orleans).

Queen Alexandra and her five brothers and sisters were educated largely by their parents, their mother being an accomplished musician and linguist, ard very her pencil and brush, while her father was a well-read and studious man. Funds at Gule Palace did not permit of resident tutors and governesses, but teachers in various subjects attended for a few hours daily to give tho ' children special instruction ; and for the rest, Prince and Priu- 1 cess Christian imparted it themselves. Queen Alexandra, who was the acknowledged beauty of the family, was not of a studious nature, and was much fonder of the innocent little vanities of childhood than of lesson-books. Speaking of her childhood, the Princess told an intimate friend:—“We were made to.learn when we were children; our told us that it was -necessary.” She inherited her mother’s musical talent, and also showed decided skill, in needlework, not only in the artistic embroidery for which Danish ladies are particularly celebrated, but in dressmaldng and millinery.

The Princess - , Christian had the faculty for turning her hand to any useful employment, and she trained her young daughters to make _ their own day-dresses and to trim their own hats —a very necessary ecomony if pretty dothes were to be bad at all, a matter to which Princess Alexandra was by

no means indifferent. The sisters were also required as children to take scrupulous care of their clothes, and the Princess has herself attributed the ease with w'hich she can retain an upright, sitting posture at. long public ceremonials to having been trained as a child not to lean back in her chair, for fear of creasing her frock.

The staff of servants at the Palace was small, and the young princesses were required to do dusting and various little household tasks, as well as being industrious with their needles. Although it was their mother’s ambition to make big marriages for them, she trained them in domestic matters as thoroughly as if they were only destined to be the wives of private gentlemen. i

Into the cottages of the simple Danish peasants the Princess and her sisters went freely as girls, and there are those who still speak of the beautiful face and lithe, fairylike form of. ‘‘Alexandra” as she ran about in the unrestrained freedoiK of childhood. As she grew older she took a delight in visiting the sick and infirm, and was frequently to be met in. the village on deeds of charity intent. This aptitude for making herself at home in the cottages of the lowly she took into the land of her adoption. A story is related by one who had known Queen Alexandra in her girlhood, which throws a strong light upon her character and disposition. At one of those little al fresco tea-parties which the young princesses were fond of arranging with their girl friends in the beautiful woods of Bernstorff, the conversation of the maidens, when tea was over and they were sitting under the trees, fell upon the thing they would wish for most. They were talking together, half seriously, half jestingly, as girls will, with the frank candour which friendship gives, of their hopes and desires. “I should like—” exclaimed the Princess Dagmar, who

iVas ever the most vivacious of the three, “I should like to have all the best things which the world can give, so that I could do much good.” “I,” declared the youthful Princess Thyra, “should like to be' very clever and wise and good.” “And 1,” said Queen Alexandra, thoughtfully, “should like best to be loved.”

It was at Laeken, King Leopold’s summer retreat, that the real courtship of the Priricess and the Prince of; Wales took place, both being there on a visit. Before matters reached this happy stage the Prince had had his interest in the young Princess of Alexandra of Denmark aroused to the greatest pitch by reports of her beauty. According to one of the frieqds of her girlhood the Princess’s portrait came under the notice of the Prince of Wales in the following manner. He was one day in the society of some young men of his own age with whom he was on terms of sucii intimacy as to discussion of private matters of a delicate nature 'possible. The talk drifted on to the charms of various beauties, and one of the number drew forth from his pocket the portrait of his fiancee, which we may suppose, he intended proudly to display. It happened, however, that he handed to the Prince by mistake a photograph which had chano* ed to come into his possession. It was of a lovely girl, dressed in the simplest manner.

“Who is this rustic beauty?” asked the Prince.

“The eldest daughter of Prince Christian of Denmark,'’ was the reply. Their first meeting, which some say was slightly arranged, and others accidental, took place in the Cathedral at Worms. The Princess was in her seventeenth year, and was taking a foreign tour, during summer, with her parents. One of the places visited was the cathedral at Worms, where' the visitors were interested in studying the frescoes. The Prince of Wales was also

taking an improving foreign tour, and he, too, sauntered into the cathedral to study the frescoes, hut encountered there an object of much greater interest. A few months later matters were brought to a crisis, when the young couple met again at the King of Belgium’s country scat at Laekeu. The Queen once told an intimate friend that her trosseau cost twice her father’s income for. a whole year. It was further handsomely supplemented by Queen Victoria after she arrived in England, and one is not surprised to know that the first letters sent homo bv the Princess, after her marriage, were full of descriptions of her new dresses. The Court hairdresser years ago studied the character of the head and face of the Princess of Wales, and designed a coiffure for her which she has never varied until recently; then she merely arranged her fringe lower down on her forehead than she has ever worn it before. The general style, however, she preserves intact, and wears her hair as she has for man}' years. Her daughters, who have faces the same shape as hers, dress their coiffures similarly. To never changing the style of arrang-

ing her hair the Princess of Wales owes in"no small degree her air of youthful-

The Queen is fond of photography, and uses chiefly a hand camera. As a sitter, Mr Russell, the photographer, says she is most natural, and for delightful personality it would he difficult to find anyone to eclipse her, consequently photographing at Sandringham is exceptionally pleasant work. There is such perfect naturalness, and one might almost say homeliness, about the Queen and her daughters. They take the liveliest interest in the portraits —the grouping and general arrangements—and they chat so easily that one is more than sorry when it is over. Tlie most popular photograph ever done is the well-known photograph

of the Princess of Wales in her Mus. Doe. robes, of which no fewer than eighty thousand copies have been sold.

The Queen is very fond of animals and birds. Her great pet is the Borzoi Alex, a Russian wolfhound. Queen Alexandra had a very, favourite white cat, who was her constant companion for many years, always _ going with its Royal mistress on visits to country and enjoying all the privileges of a pet at Sandringham and '■Marlborough House. Since its death jthere has been no other pet so much en evidence so far as the feline tribe is concerned. One of her great cares is a white cockatoo, said to be over a hundred years old. To do good tortbe poor has been the Queen’s watchword through life; and that object, especially since her marriage, she has placed before all others. It was chiefly due to her that the Alexandra restaurant, amongst her many other noble works, came into existence. It is a scheme for supplying good, wholesome food to the poor at the 1 lowest possible cost. The day will not be readily forgotten when the Prince and Princess of Wales paid . their visit to the Alexandra Restaurant. It was known that the establishment would be visited one (day during the week, but before they' c(3uld be received, the Prince and Princess had-purchased tickets at the women’s pay-box for “three dinners at -ltd each.” The ordinary three courses were served. The Princess had an “extra” of fried sole to test the frying. The P'rincess of Wales afterwards made an inspection of other parts of the restaurant which were' open.