THE ENGLISH COURT.

West Coast Times, Issue 596, 22 August 1867, Page 3

THE ENGLISH COURT.

It was rumored that the Czar would extend his journey to London; but this untoward incident has interfered. The Sultan is coming, however, and he is to be feasted in the city as well as entertained at Court. But it has been impos sible to avoid contrasting these splendid hospitalities of our neighbors with the niggardliness with which our own Court is accustomed to entertain foreign visitors, not affording them even the shelter of a palace, but consigning them to the more convenient charge of some hotel, wellappointed it may be, but still not quite the place which England would choose for her guests. It is also felt that the absence of the Queen prevents our returning in a suitable way those hospitalities which members of the Royal Family have received in other countries. While the highest respect is entertained for the personal virtues of the Sovereign, there has gradually grown up and spread a feeling of great dissatisfaction at the manner in which she is performing her royal functions. It is truly remarked that if no other Queen ever did so much to make the English people in love with royalty, no other has shown them so eon-

sisteatly how to do without it. The henapparent cannot take the place of the Sovereign ; and every year that the latter remains in retirement, detracts so much from the prestige of her constitutional position. To permanently abdicate the leadership of society is one step towards putting aside the privileges of Koyalty. Five years is too long a time to nurse a morbid sorrow ; and excepting there be actual physical disability, there can be no ■ valid reason why the Court should not throw open its palaces and assume again its royal state. The public, indeed, begin to enquire what is done with the money voted for regal and national purposes. When the rumor circulated, the other day, that the Queen was about to found a convalescent hospital, as a magnificent memorial to the late Prince, and a great public benefaction, the announcement was hailed with unfeigned pleasure as worthy of her ; but when it turned out that Her Majesty had only granted her patronage, and that a private individual was the generous founder, there was general disappointment. Some such act of liberality would have regained for the Queen the popularity which she is losing by hiding herself so much from her subjects.