What was it then to know of a pair of royal lovers--a great Queen and her chosen Prince--well mated! It softened all hearts, it made the old young again, with a renewing breath of late romance and tenderness. And, oh! how the young, who are old now, gloried in that ideal marriage! What tales they told of it, what wonderful fancies they had about it! How it knit the hearts of the Queen and her subjects together more strongly than anything else save common sorrow could do! for when it comes to that, sorrow is more universal than joy, sinks deeper, and in this world lasts longer.

Indeed, at this stage, as at every other, it was soon necessary to descend from heaven to earth; and for the royal couple, as for the meanest of the people, there were difficulties in connection with the arrangements, troubles that proved both perplexing and vexatious. It may be said here that the times were not very propitious for asking even the most just and reasonable Parliamentary grants. The usual recurring sufferings from insufficient harvests and from stagnation of trade were depressing the mind of the country. Parliament was called on to act on the occasion of the Queen's marriage, and the House was not only divided into two hostile parties, the hostility had been envenomed by recent _contretemps_, notably that which prevented Sir Robert Peel and the Tories from taking office and kept in the Whig Government. The unpalatable fruits of the embroilment had to be eaten and digested at the present crisis. Accordingly there were carping faultfinding, and resistance--even defeat--on every measure concerning the Prince brought before the Lords and Commons.

The accusation of disloyal retaliation was made against the Tories. On the other hand the Whigs in power showed such a defiant att.i.tude, in the absence of any attempt to conciliate their antagonists, even when the welfare of the Government's motions, and the interests and feelings of the Queen and the Prince demanded the first consideration, that Lord Melbourne's party were suspected of a crafty determination to let matters take their course for the express purpose of prejudicing Prince Albert against the Tories, and alienating him from them in the very beginning.

Lord Melbourne at least did not deserve this accusation. Whatever share he had in the injudicious att.i.tude of the Government, or in the blunders it committed, must be attributed to the sort of high-handed carelessness which distinguished the man. His singular fairness in the business is thus recorded by Baron Stockmar. "As I was leaving the Palace, I met Melbourne on the staircase. He took me aside and used the following remarkable and true words, strongly characteristic of his great impartiality: 'The Prince will doubtless be very much irritated against the Tories. But it is not the Tories alone whom the Prince has to thank for the curtailment of his appanage. It is the Tories, the Radicals, and _a good many of our own people_.' I pressed his hand in approbation of his remarkable frankness.

I said, 'There's an honest man! I hope you will yourself say that to the Prince.'" [Footnote: Lord Melbourne and Baron Stockmar were always on excellent terms. At the same time the English Prime Minister was not without a little jealousy of any suspicion of his Government being dictated to by King Leopold.]

Umbrage was taken by the Duke of Wellington at no mention being made of Prince Albert's Protestantism on the notification of the marriage. With regard to the income and position to be secured to the Prince, the nearest precedent which could be found to guide the discussion was that of Prince George of Denmark, husband to Queen Anne. It was halting in many respects, such as the fact that he had married the Princess long before she was Queen, nay, while her succession to the throne was problematical. Besides, his character and position in the country were only respectable for their harmlessness, and did not recommend him by way of example of any kind, either to Queen or people. Statesmen turned rather to the settlement and dignity accorded to Prince Leopold, when he married Princess Charlotte; but neither was that quite a case in point. The fittest reference, so far as income was concerned, seemed to be to the private purses allowed to the Queen Consorts of the reigning sovereigns of England. To the three last Queens--Caroline, Charlotte, and Adelaide, the sum of fifty thousand pounds a year had been granted. This also was the annuity settled on Prince Leopold. Therefore fifty thousand was the amount confidently asked by the Government.

After a good deal of wrangling and angry debate, in which, however, the Queen's name was studiously respected, she and the Prince had the mortification to learn that the country, by its representatives, had refused the usual allowance, and voted only thirty thousand a year to the Queen's husband.

The same ill-fortune attended an attempt to introduce into the bill for the naturalisation of the Prince, before the House of Lords, a clause which should secure his taking precedence of all save the Queen. The Duke of Suss.e.x opposed the clause, in the interest of the King of Hanover, and so many jealous objections were urged that it was judged better to let the provision drop than risk a defeat in the House of Lords similar to that in the House of Commons. The awkward alternative remained that Prince Albert's position, so far as it had to do with the Lord Chamberlain and the Heralds'

Office, was left undecided and ambiguous. It was only by the issue of letters patent on the Queen's part, at a later date, that any certainty on this point could be attained even in England.

The formation of the Prince's household, which one would think might have been left to his own good feeling and discretion, or at least to the Queen's judgment in acting for him, proved another bone of contention calling forth many applications and implied claims.

Baron Stockmar came to England in January, to see to this important element in the Prince's independence and comfort, as well as to the signing of the marriage contract. But in spite of the able representative, the Prince's written wishes, judicious and liberal-minded as might have been expected, and the Queen's desire to carry them out, at least one of the offices was filled up in a manner which caused Prince Albert anxiety and pain. The gentleman who had been private secretary to Lord Melbourne was appointed private secretary to the Prince, without regard to the circ.u.mstance that the step would appear compromising in Tory eyes--the very result which Prince Albert had striven to avoid, and that the official would be forced, as it were, on the Prince's intimacy without such previous acquaintance as might have justified confidence. It was only the sterling qualities of both Prince and secretary which obviated the natural consequences of such an ill-judged proceeding, and ended by producing the genuine liking and honest friendship which ought to have preceded the connection. The grudging, suspicions, selfish spirit thus manifested on all hands, was liable to wound the Queen in the tenderest point, and the disappointment came upon her with a shock, since she had been rashly a.s.sured by Lord Melbourne that there would be no difficulty either as regarded income or precedence. The indications were not encouraging to the stranger thus met on the threshold.

But his mission was to disarm adverse criticism, to shame want of confidence and pettiness of jealousy, to confer benefits totally irrespective of the spirit in which they might be taken. And even by the irritated party-men as well as by the body of the people, the Prince was to be well received for the Queen's sake, with his merits taken for granted, so far as that went, since the heart of the country was all right, though its Whig and Tory temper might be at fault.

On the 10th of January, 1840, a death instead of a marriage took place in the royal family, but it was that of an aged member long expatriated.

Princess Elizabeth, Landgravine of Hesse Homburg, died at Frankfort. It was twenty-two years since she had married and quitted England, shortly before the old Queen's death, a year before the birth of Queen Victoria. The Landgravine had returned once, a widow of sixty-four, and then had gone back to her adopted country. She had survived her husband eleven years, and her sister, resident like herself in Germany, the Princess Royal, Queen of Wurtemberg, twelve years. The Landgravine as Princess Elizabeth showed artistic talent. She was famous in her middle age for her great _embonpoint_; as she was also tall she waxed enormous. Baroness Bunsen, when Miss Waddington, saw Princess Elizabeth, while she was still unmarried, dressed for a Drawing-room, with five or six yellow feathers towering above her head, and refers to her huge dimensions then. It was alleged afterwards that it required a chain of her husband's faithful subjects in Homburg to encompa.s.s his consort. She accommodated herself wonderfully, though she was an elderly woman before she had ever been out of England, to the curious quaint mixture of State and homeliness in the little German town in which she was held in much respect and regard. The Landgravine was seventy years of age at the time of her death. After her widowhood she resided in Hanover, where her brother, King William, gave her a palace, and then at Frankfort, where she died. Out of her English income of ten thousand a year, it was said she spared six thousand for the needs of Hesse Homburg. Its castle and English garden still retain memories of the English princess who made her quiet home there and loved the place.

The marriage of the Queen was fixed for the 10th of February, and many eager, aspiring young couples throughout the country elected that it should be their wedding-day, also. They wished that the gala of their lives should fit in with hers, and that all future "happy returns of the day" might have a well-known date to go by, and a State celebration to do them honour.

Lord Torrington and Colonel--afterwards General--Grey set out for Gotha to escort the bridegroom to England. They carried with them the Order of the Garter, with which Prince Albert was invested by his father, himself a Knight of the Order, amidst much ceremony.

All the world knows that the Order of the Garter is the highest knightly order of England, dating back to the time of Edward III., and a.s.sociated by a gay and gallant tradition with the beautiful Countess of Salisbury.

The first Chapter of the Order was held in 1340, when twenty-five knights, headed by the King, walked in solemn procession to St. George's Chapel, founded for their use, and for the maintenance of poor knightly brethren to pray for the souls of the Knights-Companions--hence "the Poor Knights of Windsor." The first Knights-Companions dedicated their arms to G.o.d and St.

George, and held a high festival and tournament in commemoration of the act in presence of Queen Philippa and her ladies. The habit of the knights was always distinguished by its colour, blue. Various details were added at different times by different kings. Henry VIII. gave the collar and the greater and lesser medallions of St. George slaying the dragon. Charles II. introduced the blue riband. It is scarcely necessary to say that the full dress of the knights is very magnificent. "There are the blue velvet mantle, with its dignified sweep, the hood of crimson velvet, the heron and ostrich-plumed cap, the gold medallion, the blazing star, the gold-lettered garter, to all which may be added the accessories that rank and wealth have it in their power to display; as, for example, the diamonds worn by the Marquis of Westminster, at a recent installation, on his sword and badge alone were Worth the price of a small kingdom; or richer still her present Majesty's jewels, that seem to have been showered by some Eastern fairy over her habit of the Order, among, which the most beautiful and striking feature is, perhaps, the ruby cross in the centre of the dazzling star of St. George." [Footnote: Knight's "Old England."]

The whole court of Gotha was a.s.sembled to see Prince Albert get the Garter; a hundred and one guns were fired to commemorate the auspicious occasion.

The younger Perthes, under whom the Prince had studied at Bonn, wrote of the event, "The Grand-ducal papa bound the Garter round his boy's knee amidst the roar of a hundred and one cannon" (the attaching of the Garter, however, was done, not by Prince Albert's father, but by the Queen's brother, the Prince of Leiningen, another Knight of the Order). "The earnestness and gravity with which the Prince has obeyed this early call to take a European position, give him dignity and standing in spite of his youth, and increase the charm of his whole aspect."

The invest.i.ture was followed by a grand dinner, when the Duke proposed the Queen's health, which was drunk by all the company standing, accompanied by several distinct flourishes of trumpets, the band playing "G.o.d save the Queen," and the artillery outside firing a royal salute. Already the Prince had written to the Queen, when the marriage was officially declared at Coburg, that the day had affected him very much, so many emotions had filled his heart. Her health had been drunk at dinner "with a tempest of huzzas." The joy of the people had been so great that they had gone on firing in the streets, with guns and pistols, during the whole night, so that one might have imagined a battle was going on. This was a repet.i.tion of that earlier festival, only rendered more emphatic and with a touch of pathos added to it by the impending departure of Prince Albert, to lay hold of his high destiny. The leave-takings were earnest and prolonged, with many pretty slightly fantastic German ceremonies, and must have been hard upon a man whose affections were so tender and tenacious. Especially painful was the farewell to his mother's mother, the Dowager d.u.c.h.ess of Gotha, who had partly reared the princely lad. She was much attached to him, and naturally saw him go with little hope of their meeting again in this world.

The Prince was accompanied by his father and brother, with various friends in their train, who, after the celebration of the marriage, were to return to Germany. But Prince Albert carried with him--to remain in his near neighbourhood--two old allies, whose familiar faces would be doubly welcome in a foreign country. The one was his Swiss valet, Cart, a faithful, devoted servant, "the best of nurses," who, had waited on his master since the latter was a boy of seven years of age. The other was the beautiful greyhound, Eos, jet black with the exception of a narrow white streak on the nose and a white foot. Her master had got her as a puppy of six weeks old, when he was a boy in his fourteenth year, and had trained the loving, graceful creature in all imaginable canine, sagacity and cleverness. She had been the constant companion of his youth. She had already come to England with him, on the decisive visit of the previous autumn, and was known and dear to his royal mistress.

It was severe wintry weather when the great cavalcade, in eight travelling carriages, set out for England, and took its way across Germany, Belgium, and the north of France, to the coast The whole journey a.s.sumed much of the character of a festive procession. At each halting-place crowds turned out to do the princes honour. Every court and governing body welcomed them with demonstrations of respect and rejoicing. But at Aix-la-Chapelle, in a newspaper which he came across, Prince Albert read the debates and votes in the Houses of Parliament that cut down the ordinary annuity of the English sovereign's consort, and left unsettled the question of his position in the country. The first disappointment told in two ways. Young and sensitive--though he was also resolute and cheerful-minded--he had been a little nervous beforehand about the reception which might be accorded to him in England; he now received a painful impression that the marriage was not popular with the people. He had indulged in generous dreams of the a.s.sistance and encouragement which he would be able to bestow on men of letters and artists, when he suddenly found his resources curtailed to nearly half the amount he had been warranted in counting upon. However, at Brussels, the next halting-place, in writing to the Queen, and frankly admitting his mortification at the words and acts of the majority of the members of both English Houses of Parliament, he could add with perfect sincerity, "All I have time to say is, that while I possess your love they cannot make me unhappy."

And King Leopold was there with his sensible, calming counsel, while Baron Stockmar had been careful to have a letter awaiting the Prince, which explained the undercurrent of political, not personal, motives that had influenced the debates.

In fact, so far from being unpopular, the Prince, who was the Queen's choice, was really the most acceptable of all her suitors in the eyes of her people. The sole serious objection urged against him in those days was that of his youth, a fault which was not only daily lessening, but was speedily forgotten in the conviction of the manly and serious attention to duty on his part which he quickly inspired.

On the 5th of February the party arrived at Calais. Lord Clarence Paget had been sent over with the _Firebrand_ to await their arrival, but the usual difficulties of an adverse tide and an insufficient French harbour presented themselves, and the company had to sail on the morning of the 6th in one of the ordinary Dover packet-boats, under a strong gale from the south-east, with a heavy sea, which rendered the horrors of the Channel crossing, at the worst, what only those who have experienced them can realise.

The Prince, like most natives of inland Germany, had been little inured to sailing, and his const.i.tution rendered him specially liable to sea-sickness. As a lad of seventeen, facing the insidious and repulsive foe for the first time, he had expressed his own and his brother's dread of the unequal encounter. Now he was doomed to feel its ign.o.ble clutch to the last moment. "The Duke had gone below, and on either side of the cabin staircase lay the two princes in an almost helpless state."

It was in such unpropitious circ.u.mstances that Prince Albert had to rise, pull himself together, and bow his acknowledgements to the crowds on the pier ready to greet him. Who that has rebelled against the calm superiority of the comfortable; amused onlookers at the haggard, giddy sufferers reeling on sh.o.r.e from the disastrous crossing of a stormy ferry, cannot comprehend the ordeal!

The Prince surmounted it gallantly, antic.i.p.ating the time when, at the call of work or duty, he was known to rise to any effort, to shake off fatigue and indisposition as if he had been the most muscular of giants, and to make a brave fight to the last against deadly illness. He had his reward.

The raw inclement day, the disabling, discomfiting malady--which had appeared in themselves a bad beginning, an inhospitable introduction to his future life--the recent misgivings he had entertained, were all forgotten in the enthusiastic reception he received before he put foot on land. A kind heart responds readily to kindness, and the Prince felt, in spite of parliamentary votes, the people were glad to see him, with an overflowing gladness.

It had been fixed that the Prince should not arrive at Buckingham Palace till the 8th. Accordingly there was time for the much-needed rest and refreshment, and for a leisurely conclusion of the long journey. The travellers stayed that night at Dover, the next at Canterbury, the Prince beginning the long list of fatiguing ceremonials which he was to undergo in the days to come, by receiving addresses, holding a reception, and showing himself on the balcony, as well as by the quieter, more congenial interlude of attending afternoon service in Canterbury Cathedral with his brother.

The weather was still bad; pouring rain had set in, but it could not damp the spirit of the holiday-makers. As for the hero of the holiday, he was chafing, lover-like, at the formal delay which was all that interposed between him and a blissful reunion. He wrote to the Queen before starting for Canterbury, "Now I am once more in the same country with you. What a delightful thought for me. It will be hard for me to have to wait till to-morrow evening. Still, our long parting has flown by so quickly, and to-morrow's dawn will soon be here.... Our reception has been most satisfactory. There were thousands of people on the quays, and they saluted pus with loud and uninterrupted cheers.".

From Canterbury Prince Albert sent on his valet, Cart, with the greyhound Eos. "Little Dash," if Dash still lived, was to have a formidable rival, and the Queen speaks in her Journal of the pleasure which the sight of "dear Eos," the evening before the arrival of the Prince, gave her."

[Footnote: Early Years of the Prince Consort.] Words are not wanted to picture the bright little scene, the light interruption to "affairs of the State," always weighty, often hara.s.sing, the gay reaction, the hearty unceremonious recognition on both sides, the warm welcome to the gentle _avant courier._ This was not a great queen, but a gleeful girl at the height of her happiness, who stroked with white taper hand the sleek black head, looked eagerly into the fond eyes, perhaps went so far as to hug the humble friend, stretching up fleet shapely paws, wildly wagging a slender tail, uttering sharp little yelps of delight to greet her. What wealth of cherished a.s.sociations, of thrice happy realisation, the mere presence there, once more of "only a dog," brought to the mistress of the palace, the lady of the land!

On Sat.u.r.day, the 8th of the month, Prince Albert proceeded to London, being cordially greeted along the whole road by mult.i.tudes flocking from every town and village to see him and shout their approval. At half-past four, in the pale light of a February afternoon, the travellers arrived at Buckingham Palace, "and were received at the hall door by the Queen and the d.u.c.h.ess of Kent, attended by the whole household," to whom a worthy master had come. The fullness of satisfaction and perfect joy of the meeting to two in the company are sacred.

An hour after his arrival the oath of naturalisation was administered to the Prince, "and the day ended with a great State dinner. Sunday was a rest day. Divine service was performed by the Bishop of London in the Bow-room on the ground floor--the same room in which the Queen had met her a.s.sembled Council in the course of the previous November, and announced to them her intended marriage. Afterwards the Prince drove out and paid the visits required of him to the different members of the royal family. In spite of the season and weather, throngs of Londoners surrounded the Palace, and watched and cheered him as he went and came. That day the Queen and Prince exchanged their wedding gifts. She gave him the star and badge of the Garter and the Garter set in diamonds, and he gave her a sapphire and diamond brooch.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE MARRIAGE.

The 10th of February rose dark and foggy, with a lowering sky discharging at frequent intervals heavy showers. But to many a loyal heart far beyond the sound of Bow bells the date brought a thrill of glad consciousness which was quite independent of the weather. What mattered dreary skies or stinging sleet! This was the day on which the young Queen was to wed the lover of her youth, the man of her choice.

The marriage was to take place at noon, not in the evening, like former royal weddings, and the change was a great boon to the London public.

During the busy morning, Prince Albert found time for a small act, which was nevertheless full of manly reverence for age and weakness, of mindful, affectionate grat.i.tude for old and tender cares which had often made his childhood and youth happy. He wrote a few lines to the loving, venerable kinswoman who had performed the part of second mother to him, who had grieved so sorely over their parting.

"In less than three hours I shall stand before the altar with my dear bride. In these solemn moments I must once more ask your blessing, which I am well a.s.sured I shall receive, and which will be my safeguard and my future joy. I must end. G.o.d help me (or, rather, G.o.d be my stay!), your faithful Grandson." The Prince wrote a similar letter, showing how faithfully he recollected her on the crowning day of his life, to his good stepmother, the d.u.c.h.ess of Coburg.

Among the innumerable discussions on the merits or demerits of the Prince when he was first proposed as the husband for the Queen of England, there had not been wanting in a country where religion is generally granted to be a vital question, and where religious feuds, like other feuds, rage high, sundry probings as to the Prince's Christianity--what form he held, whether he might not be a Roman Catholic, whether he were a Christian at all, and might not rather be an infidel? Seeing that the Prince belonged to a Christian and to one of the most Protestant royal families in Europe, that he had been regularly trained in Christian and Lutheran doctrines, and had made a public profession of his belief in the same--a profession which his practice had in no way contradicted--these suppositions were, to say the least, uncalled for, and not remarkable for liberality or charity. It is easy to answer them substantially. The Prince, reserving his Protestant right of private judgment on all points of his belief, was a deeply religious man, as indicated throughout his career, at every stage, in every event of his life. It is hardly possible even for an irreligious man to conceive that Prince Albert could have been what he was without faith and discipline. His biographer has with reason quoted the "G.o.d be my stay!" in the light of the sincerity of the man, in a letter written in the flush of his joy and the very fruition of his desires, as one of the innumerable proofs that the Prince lived consciously and constantly under the all-seeing eye of an Almighty Father.

There were two main points from which out-of-door London could gaze its fill on the gala. The one was St. James's Park, from which the people could see the bride and bridegroom drive from Buckingham Palace to St. James's, where the marriage was to take place, according to old usage, and back again to Buckingham Palace for the wedding breakfast; the other was the Green Park, Const.i.tution Hill, Hyde Park, and Piccadilly, by which most of the guests were to arrive to the wedding. The last point also commanded the route which the young couple would take to Windsor.

It was said that, never since the allied sovereigns visited London in 1814 had such a concourse of human beings made the parks alive, as on this wet February morning, when a dismal solitude was changed to an animated scene, full of life and motion. _The Times_ described the ma.s.s of spectators wedged in at the back of Carlton Terrace and the foot of Const.i.tution Hill, and the mult.i.tude of chairs, tables, benches, even casks, pressed info. The service, and affording vantage-ground to those who could pay for the accommodation. The dripping trees were also rendered available, and had their branches so laden with human fruit, that brittle boughs gave way, while single specimens and small cl.u.s.ters of men and boys came rattling down on the heads and shoulders of confiding fellow-creatures; but such misadventures were without serious accident, and simply afforded additional entertainment to the self-invited, light-hearted wedding guests.

Parties of cavalry and infantry taking their places, with "orderlies dashing to and fro," lent colour and livelier action to the panorama. At the same time the military were not a very prominent feature in the picture, and the State element was also to some extent wanting. Some state was inevitable, but after all the marriage of the sovereign was not so much a public ceremonial as a private event in her life. As early as eight o'clock in the morning the comparatively limited number of invited guests began to contribute to the satisfaction of the great uninvited by driving up beneath the triumphal arch, and presenting their pink or white cards for inspection. A body of Foot Guards marched forwards, followed by a detachment of the Horse Guards Blue, with their band discoursing wedding music appropriate to the occasion, cheering the hearts of the cold, soaked crowd, and awaking an enthusiastic response from it. Then appeared various members of the n.o.bility, including the Duke of Norfolk, coming always to the front as Grand Marshal, wearing his robe and carrying his staff of office, when the rest of the world were in comparative undress, as more or less private individuals. But this gentleman summed up in his own person "all the blood of all the Howards," and recalled his ancestors great and small--the poet Earl of Surrey, those Norfolks to whom Mary Tudor and Mary Stuart were alike fatal, and that d.i.c.ky or d.i.c.kon of Norfolk who lent a humorous strain to the tragic tendency of the race.

The Ministers and Foreign Amba.s.sadors came singly or in groups. The Ministers, with one or two exceptions, wore the Windsor uniform, blue turned up with an oak-leaf edging in gold. Viscount Morpeth, Lord John Russell, the Marquis of Normanby, Lord Palmerston, Lord Holland, Lord Melbourne, were well-known figures. The good-natured Duke of Cambridge arrived with his family and suite in three royal carriages. He wore the Orders of the Garter, and the Bath, and carried his baton as Field-Marshal.

The Duke of Suss.e.x was in the uniform of Captain-General of the Artillery Company, and wore the Orders of the Garter, the Bath, and St. Andrew. He had on his black skull-cap as usual, and drove up in a single carriage. He had opposed the clause relating to Prince Albert's taking precedence of all, save the Queen, in the Naturalisation Bill. He was to make further objection to the husband's occupying his natural place by the side of his wife when the Queen opened and prorogued Parliament, and to the Prince's rights in the Regency Bill. All the same, by right of birth and years, the Duke of Suss.e.x was to give away his royal niece.

Before eleven o'clock, the Gentlemen and Ladies of the Household were in readiness at Buckingham Palace. The Ladies started first for St. James's.

The Gentlemen of the foreign suites--Prince Albert's, and his father's, and brother's--in their dark-blue and dark-green uniforms, mustered in the hall, and dispatched a detachment to receive the Prince on his arrival at the other palace. At a quarter to twelve notice was sent to Prince Albert in his private apartments, and he came forth "like a bridegroom," between his royal supporters, traversed the State-rooms, and descended the grand staircase, preceded by the Chamberlain and Vice-Chamberlain, Comptroller of the Household, equerries and ushers. He was received with eager clappings of hands and wavings of handkerchiefs. The Prince was dressed in the uniform of a British Field-Marshal, and wore only one decoration, that of the Garter, with the collar surmounted by two white rosettes, and his bride's gifts of the previous day, the George and Star set in diamonds, on his breast, and the diamond-embroidered Garter round his knee. His pale, handsome face, with its slight brown moustache, his slender yet manly figure would have become any dress. Indeed, his general appearance, full of "thoughtful grace and quiet dignity," impressed every honest observer most favourably. We can imagine Baron Stockmar watching keenly in the background to catch every furtive glance and remark, permitting himself to rub his hands and exclaim, with sober exultation, "He is liked!"

Prince Albert's father and brother, his dearest friends. .h.i.therto, walked beside him. The Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, with his fatherly heart swelling high, must have looked like one of the quaint stately figures out of old German prints in his long, military boots, the same as those of the Life Guards, and his dark-green uniform turned up with red. He, too, wore the collar and star of the Garter, and the star of his own Order of Coburg Gotha. On the other side of the bridegroom walked Prince Ernest. The wedding was next in importance to him to what it was to his brother, while to the elder playing the secondary part of the couple so long united in every act of their young lives, the marriage ceremony of his other self, which was to deal the decisive blow in the cleaving asunder of the old double existence, must have been full of very mingled feelings of joy and sorrow, pleasure and pain. Prince Ernest was a fine young man, in whose face, possibly a little stern in its repressed emotion, _The Times_ reporter imagined he saw more determination than could be found in the milder aspect of Prince Albert, not guessing how much strength of will and patient steadfastness might be bound up with gentle courtesy. Prince Ernest was in a gay light-blue and silver uniform, and carried his helmet in his hand.

When the group came down the stairs, some privileged company, including a few ladies, stationed behind the Yeoman Guard and about the entrance, clapped their hands and waved their congratulations, and as Prince Albert entered the carriage which was to take him and his father and brother to St. James's, he received for the first time all the honours paid to the Queen. Trumpets sounded, colours were lowered, and arms presented. A squadron of Life Guards attended the party, but as the carriage was closed its occupants were not generally recognised.

As soon as the Lord Chamberlain had returned from escorting the Prince, six royal carriages, each with two horses, were drawn up before the entrance to Buckingham Palace, and his Lordship informed the Queen that all was ready for her. Accordingly, her Majesty left her room leaning on the arm of Lord Uxbridge, the Lord Chamberlain. She was supported by her mother, the d.u.c.h.ess of Kent, and followed by a page of honour. The various officers of the Household--the Earl of Belfast, Vice-Chamberlain; the Earl of Albemarle, Master of the Horse; Lord Torrington, Comptroller and Treasurer, &c., walked in advance.

The Queen wore a bride's white satin and orange blossoms, a simple wreath of orange blossoms on her fair hair. Her magnificent veil of Honiton lace did not cover the pale face, but fell on each side of the bent head. Her ornaments were the diamond brooch which had been the gift of the bridegroom, diamond earrings and necklace, and the collar and insignia of the Garter. She looked well in her natural agitation, for, indeed, she was a true woman at such a moment. She was shy and a little shrinking as became a bride, and her eyes were swollen with recent tears--an ill.u.s.tration of the wise old Scotch proverb, "A greetin' (weeping) bride's a happy bride."

Here were no haughty indifference, no bold a.s.surance, no thoughtless, heartless gaiety,