Untitled

West Coast Times, Issue 649, 23 October 1867, Page 4

The Eably Yeabs of the Pbince ConSoet. — {Continued from Page 3.J

to keep the Prince -waiting for probably three or four years, at the risk of ruining all his prospects for life, or until she might feel inclined to marry! And the Prince has since told her that he came over in 1839 with the intention of telling her, that if she could not then make up her mind, she must understand that he could not now wait for a decision, as he had done at a former period when this marriage was first talked about. The only excuse the Queen can make for herself is in the fact that the sudden change from the secluded life at Kensington to the independence of her i position as Queen regnant, at the age of eighteen, put all ideas of marriage out of her mind, which she now most bitterly repents. A worse school for a young girl, or one more detrimental to all natural feelings and affections, cannot well be imagined than the position of a Queen at eighteen, without experience, and without a husband to guide and support her. This the Queen can state from painful experience, and she thanks God that none of her dear daughters are exposed to such danger." In October-, 1839, tlie visit to England was paid which -decided the fate of the young Prince's life. Prince Albert was accompanied by his brother, and both were charged with a letter from the King of the Belgians to the Queen, in which he recommended them to her kindness. "They are good and honest creatures, deserving your kindness, and not pedantic but really sensible and trustworthy. I have told them that your great wish is that they should be quite unbefangen (quite at their ease) m ith you. lam sure that if you have anything to recommend to them, they will be most happy to learn it from you." The volume then proceeds to describe the reception given by the Queen to the Princes, and the way of life at Windsor during their stay. They arrived on the 10th October, and on the 14th the Queen to)d Lord Melbourne that she had made up her mind to the marriage. The courtier statesman expressed his great satisfaction. An intimation was given to the Prince that the Queen wished to speak to him next day. On that day, the 15th, the Prince had been out hunting with his brother, but returned at twelve, and half an hour afterwards obeyed the Queen's summons to her room, where he found her alone. After a few minutes' conversation on other subjects, the Queen told him why she had sent for him ; " and we can well understand," writes General Grey, " any little hesitation and delicacy she may have felt in doing so, for the Queen's position making it imperative that any proposal of marriage should come first from her, must necessarily appear a painful one to those who, deriving their ideas on this subject from the practice of private life, are wont to look upon it as the privilege and happiness of a woman to have her hand sought in marriage, instead of having to offer it herself." The Queen herself says that the Prince received her offer " without any hesitation, and with the warmest demonstrations of kindness and affection.' 5 The Queen told him to fetch his brother Ernest, which he did. In a letter to the King of the Belgians, which is given, the Queen announces what had occurred, stating that she loved the Prince more than she could say, and that he seemed to have great tact — " a very necessary thing in his position." The King, in reply, said that when he learned this decision he had almost the feeling of old Simeon — " Now lettest Theu thy servant depart in peace." Prom Prince Albert's own letters we learn something more of this interesting interview. In a letter to his grandmother he writes : " The Queen sent for me alone to her room a few days ago, and declared to me in a genuine outburst of love and affection (Euguss von Herzlichkeit and Liebe) that I had gained her whole heart, and would make her intensely happy (überglucklich) if I would make her the sacrifice of sharing her life with her, for she said she looked on it as a sacrifice ; the only thing which troubled her was that she did not think she was worthy of me. The joyous openness of manner in which she told me this quite enchanted me, and I was qvite carried away by it. She is really most good and amiable, and I am quite sure Heaven has not given me into evil hands, and that we shall be happy together. Since that moment Victoria does whaterer she fancies I should wish or like, and we talk together a great deal about our future life, which she promises me to make a happy as possible." In another letter to a college friend he says: — "You know how matters stand when I last saw you here. After that the sky was darkened more and more. The Queen declared to my uncle of Belgium that she wished the affair to be considered as broken off, and that for four years she could think of no marriage. I went, therefore, with the quiet but firm resolution to declare on my part that I also, tired of the delay, withdrew entirely from the affair. It was not, however, thus ordained by Providence ; for on the second day after arrival the most friendly demonstrations were directed towards me, and two days later I was secretly called to & private audience, in which the Queen offered me her hand and heart. The strictest secrecy was required. Ernest alone knew of it, and it was only at our departure that I could communicate my engagement to my mother." Many interesting passages from the Queen's journal are then given, relating to the announcement of the marriage to the Privy Council and the Parliament, and the preliminary arrangements. After the Prince returned to Germany the Queen corresponded constantly with him. The Queen seems to have been indignant at the time with the proceedings in Parliament relative to the grant which was ultimately voted to the Prince ; but the Prince himself, ib is said, soon understood the nature of our political parties, and that " the proceedings in Parliament were only the result of high party feeling, and were by no means to be taken as marks of personal disrespect or want of kind feeling towards himself. After the marriage, which took place on the 10th February, 1840, the separation from his father, who returned on the 28th, was deeply felt by the Prince. "He said to me," the Queen records in her journal, " that I had never known a father, and could not therefore feel what he did. His childhood had been very happy. Ernest (the hereditary Prince, who remained for some time in England after his brother's marriage) he said iras now the only one remaining here of all his earliest ties and recollections ; but that if I continued to love him as I did now, I could make up for it all. He never cried he said, in general, but Alyenaleben and Kolowrath (they accompanied the Duke to England, and now left with him) had cried so much that he was quite overcome. Oh, how I did feel for my dearest, precuros, husband at this moment. Father, > oikwv.friimdi, o«trj~ alibi k» ltft

and all forme. God grant that I may be the happy person, the most happy person, to make this dearest, blessed being happy and contented ! What is in my power to make him happy I will do." The remaining chapters treat of the formation of the household, the • settlement of precedence, and a general description of the mode of life which was led, with its well-regulated division of duties and amusements. The editor states that there were not wanting some who would have gladly kept Princa Albertprematurely estrauged from allpublic business, and "notonlyso.butwho would have denied him even in the domestic circle that authority which in xmvate families properly belongs to the husband, and without which it may be added there cannot be true comfort, or happiness in domestic life." The Prince himself early saw the necessity of his asserting and claiming that authority. "In my home life," he writes to Prince Lowenstein, in May, 1840, " I am very happy and contented ; but the difficulty in filling my place with the proper dignity is that I am only the husband, and not the master in the house." Pursuing this delicate topic, General Grey remarks: — "Fortunately, however, for the country, and still more fortunately for the happiness of the Royal couple themselves, tilings did'not long- remain in this condition. Thanks to the firmness, but, at the same time, gentleness with which the Prince insisted on filling his proper position as head of the family, thanks also to the clear judgment and right feeling of the Queen, as well as to her singularly honest and straightforward nature ; but thanks, more than all, to the mutual love and perfect confidence which bound the Queen and Prince to each other, it was impossible to keep up any separation or difference of interests or duties between them. To those who would urge upon the Queen that, as Sovereign, she must be the head of the house and family, as well of the , State, and that her husband was after all but one of her subjects, her Majesty would reply, that she had solemnly engaged at the altar to " obey" as well as to " love and honour ;" and this sacred obligation she could consent neither to limit nor refine away." From the first, the Queen acting on the advice of Lord Melbourne, communicated all foreign despatches to the Prince. He described his own object as having always been to sink his individual existence in that of the Queen, and so unreservedly did she throw herself on his support that when suddenly bereaved of it, ncr Majesty pathetically said " that it would now be in fact the beginning of a new reign." It is stated in the work that the Queen up to the period of her marriage had indulged in strong feelings of political partisanship, her sympathies being with the Whigs, but under Prince Albert's influence this feeling was gradually extinguished. The Prince on his marriage determined to stand clear from all political parties. Lord Melbourne, it is asserted, pressed the Queen to take the same course. He told the Prince that " he thought that the time was come when her Majesty should have a general amnesty for the Tories ;" and on another occasion, in speaking of the Tories, against whom the Queen was very irate, Lord Melbourne said, " You should now hold out the olive branch a little."

The Prince disliked the dirt and smoke, and still more the late hours of London, and the Queen records of herself that she soon began to share his love of the country. In an entry in her journal, written in 1840, she says :—": — " I told Albert that formerly I was too happy to go to London and wretched to leave it ; and now, since the blessed hour of my marriage, and still more since the summer, I dislike and am unhappy to leave the country, and could be content and happy never to go to town. This pleased him. The solid pleasures of a peaceful, quiet, yet merry life in the country, with my inestimable husband and friend, my all in all, are far more durable than the amusements of London, though we don't despise or dislike these sometimes."

As years went on, this ""preference for the country on the part of the Queen grew stronger and stronger, " till residence in Londou became positively distasteful to her." Her Majesty says in a note that it was also injurious to her health, as she suffered much from the extreme weight and thickness of the atmosphere, which gave her the headache. Residence in London was, in fact, " only made endurable by having her beloved husband at her side to share with her and support her in the irksome duties of court receptions and state ceremonials." The Prince, however, was always anxious that the Queen should spend as much of her time as she could in London, though the sacrifice to him was so great. General Grey commenting on the beauty of the domestic life of the Royal family and the freedom of Prince Albert from the vices of former generations of the Royal Royal family, observes :—": — " Above all, he has set an example for his children from which they may be sure they can deviate without falling in public estimation, and running the risk of undoing the work which he has been so instrumental in accomplishing." When the Princess Royal was born, ' for a moment only," the Queen says, " was he disappointed at its being a daughter and not a son. During the time the Queen was laid up his care and devotion," the Queen records, " were quite beyond expression." He was content to sit by her in a darkened room, to read to her or write for her. A memorandum by her Majesty says :—": — " No one but himself ever lifted her from her bed to her sofa, and he always helped to wheel her on her bed or sofa into the next room. For this purpose he woukl come instantly when sent for, from any part of the house. As years went on, and he became overwhelmed with work (for his attentions were the same in all the Queen's subsequent confinements) this was often done at much inconvenience to himself, but he ever came with a sweet • smile on his face." "In short," the Queen adds, " hi scare of her was like that of a mother, nor could there be a kinder, wiser, or more judicious nurse," The volume closes with the first year of her Majesty's married life. The next will probably commence with an account of the Princess Royal's christening, in the beginning of 1841. The edition is a favorable specimen of English | rinting.' Type, paper, and binding are good. Two engravings by William Holl— of Prince Albert, at the age of four, and Prince Albert at the age of twenty — are beautifully executed.