Queen Victoria, her girlhood and womanhood Part 2

Greville says that she seemed rather bewildered at the mult.i.tude of men who came to kiss her hand and kneel to her, among them the conqueror of Napoleon-soldier of soldiers-the Duke!-but that she did not make any difference in her manner, or show any especial respect, or condescension in her countenance to any individual, not even to the Premier, Lord Melbourne, for whom she was known to have a great liking, and who was long her trusted friend and favorite Minister.

The Queen was also called upon to take an oath, which was for "the security of the Church of Scotland." This she has most faithfully kept; indeed, she has now and then been reproached by jealous champions of the English Establishment for undue graciousness towards the Kirk and its ministers.

For this grand but solemn ceremony at Kensington-rendered the more solemn by the fact that while it was going on the great bell of St. Paul's was tolling for the dead King,-the young Queen was dressed very simply, in mourning.

She seems to have thought of everything, for she sent for Lord Albemarle, and after reminding him that according to law and precedent she must be proclaimed the next morning at 10 o'clock, from a certain window of St. James' Palace, requested him to provide for her a suitable conveyance and escort. She then bowed gravely and graciously to the Princes, Archbishops and Cabinet Ministers, and left the room, as she had entered it-alone.

CHAPTER VIII.

The last day of Victoria's real girlhood-Proclaimed Queen from St. James' Palace-She holds her first Privy Council-Comments upon her deportment by eye-witnesses-Fruits of her mother's care and training.

It seems to me that the momentous day just described was the last of Victoria's real girlhood; that premature womanhood was thrust upon her with all the power, grandeur, and state of a Queen Regnant. I wonder if, weary and nervously exhausted as she must have been, she slept much, when at last she went to bed, probably no longer in her mother's room. I wonder if she did not think, with a sort of fearsome thrill that when the summer sun faded from her sight, it was only to travel all night, lighting her vast dominions and her uncounted millions of subjects; and that, like the splendor of that sun, had become her life-hers, the little maiden's, but just emerging from the shadow of seclusion, and from her mother's protecting care and wise authority, and stepping out into the world by herself!

The next day she went in state to St. James Palace, accompanied by great lords and ladies, and escorted by squadrons of the Life Guards and Blues, and was formally proclaimed from the window of the Presence Chamber, looking out on the court-yard. A Court chronicle states that Her Majesty wore a black silk dress and a little black chip bonnet, and that she looked paler than usual. Miss Martineau, speaking of the scene, says: "There stood the young creature, in simplest mourning, her sleek bands of brown hair as plain as her dress. The tears ran down her cheeks, as Lord Melbourne, standing by her side, presented her to the people as their Sovereign. ... In the upper part of the face she is really pretty, and with an ingenuous, sincere air which seems full of promise."

After the ceremony of proclamation was over, the "little Queen" remained for a few moments at the window, bowing and smiling through her tears at that friendly and enthusiastic crowd of her subjects, and listening to the National Anthem played for the first time for her, then retired, with her mother, who had not been "prominent" during the scene, but who had been observed "to watch her daughter with great anxiety."

At noon the Queen held a Privy Council, at which it was said, "She presided with as much ease as though she had been doing nothing else all her life." At 1 P.M. she returned to Kensington Palace, there to remain in retirement till after the funeral of King William.

It is certain that the behavior of this girl-queen on these first two days of her reign "confounded the doctors" of the Church and State. Greville, who never praises except when praise is wrung out of him, can hardly say enough of her grace and graciousness, calmness and self- possession. He says, also, that her "agreeable expression, with her youth, inspire an excessive interest in all who approach her, and which," he is condescending enough to add, "I can't help feeling myself." He quotes Peel as saying he was "amazed at her manner and behavior; at her apparent deep sense of her situation, her modesty, and at the same time her firmness. She appeared to be awed, but not daunted."

The Duke of Wellington paid a similar tribute to her courage.

Now, if these great men did not greatly idealize her, under the double glamour of gallantry and loyalty, Victoria was a most extraordinary young woman. A few days before the death of the King, Greville wrote: "What renders speculation so easy and events so uncertain is the absolute ignorance of everybody of the character, disposition, and capacity of the Princess. She has been kept in such jealous seclusion by her mother (never having slept out of her bedroom, nor been alone with anybody but herself and, the Baroness Lehzen), that not one of her acquaintance, none of the attendants at Kensington, not even the d.u.c.h.ess of Northumberland, her governess, can have any idea what she is, or what she promises to be." The first day of Victoria's accession he writes: "She appears to act with every sort of good taste and good feeling, as well as good sense, and nothing can be more favorable than the impression she has made, and nothing can promise better than her manner and conduct do... William IV. coming to the throne at the mature age of sixty-five, was so excited by the exaltation that he nearly went mad... The young Queen, who might well be either dazzled or confounded with the grandeur and novelty of her situation, seems neither the one nor the other, and behaves with a propriety and decorum beyond her years."

Doubtless nature was kind to Victoria in the elements of character, but she must have owed very much of this courage, calmness, modesty, simplicity, candor, and sterling good sense to the peculiar, systematic training, the precept and example of her mother, the much-criticised d.u.c.h.ess of Kent, so unpopular at the Court of the late King, and whom Mr. Greville had by no means delighted to honor. Ah, the good, brave d.u.c.h.ess had her reward for all her years of patient exile, all her loving labor and watchful care, and rich compensation for all criticisms, misrepresentations, and fault-finding, that June afternoon, the day of the Proclamation, when she rode from the Palace of St. James to Kensington with her daughter, who had behaved so well-her daughter and her Queen!

PART II.

WOMANHOOD AND QUEENHOOD.

CHAPTER IX.

The sovereignty of England and Hanover severed forever-Funeral of King William IV. at Windsor-The Queen and her household remove to Buckingham Palace-She dissolves Parliament-Glowing account of the scene by a contemporary Journal-Charles Sumner a spectator-His eulogy of the Queen's reading.

Ever since the accession to the throne of Great Britain of the House of Brunswick, the Kings of England had also been Kings of Hanover. To carry on the two branches of the royal business simultaneously must have been a little difficult, at least perplexing. It was like riding a "two-horse act," with a wide s.p.a.ce between the horses, and a wide difference in their size. But the Salic law prevailed in that little kingdom over there; so its Crown now gently devolved on the head of the male heir- apparent, the Duke of c.u.mberland, and the quaint old princ.i.p.ality parted company with England forever. That is what Her Majesty, Victoria, got, or rather lost, by being a woman. A day or two after her accession, King Ernest called at Kensington Palace to take leave of the Queen, and she dutifully kissed her uncle and brother-sovereign, and wished him G.o.d- speed and the Hanoverians joy.

There is no King and no kingdom of Hanover now. When Kaiser William was consolidating so many German princ.i.p.alities into his grand empire, gaily singing the refrain of the song of the old s.e.xton, "I gather them in! I gather them in!" he took Hanover, and it has remained under the wing of the great Prussian eagle ever since. It is said that the last King made a gallant resistance, riding into battle at the head of his troops, although he was blind-too blind, perhaps, to see his own weakness. When his throne was taken out from under him, he still clung to the royal t.i.tle, but his son is known only as the Duke of c.u.mberland. This Prince, like other small German Princes, made a great outcry against the Kaiser's confiscations, but the inexorable old man still went on piecing an imperial table-cover out of pocket-handkerchiefs.

The young Queen's new Household was considered a very magnificent and unexceptionable one-princ.i.p.ally for the rank and character and personal attractions of the ladies in attendance, chief among whom, for beauty and stateliness, was the famous d.u.c.h.ess of Sutherland-certainly one of the most superb women in England, or anywhere else, even at an age when most women are "falling off," and when she herself was a grandmother.

The funeral of King William took place at Windsor in due time, and with all due pomp and ceremony. After lying in state in the splendid Waterloo chamber, under a gorgeous purple pall, several crowns, and other royal insignia, he was borne to St. George's Chapel, followed by Prelates, Peers, and all the Ministers of State, and a solemn funeral service was performed. But what spoke better for him than all these things was the quiet weeping of a good woman up in the Royal Closet, half hidden by the sombre curtains, who looked and listened to the last, and saw her husband let down into the Royal Vault, where, in the darkness, his-their baby- girl awaited him, that Princess with the short life and the long name- poor little Elizabeth Georgina Adelando, whom the childless Queen once hoped to hear hailed "Elizabeth Second of England."

In midsummer the Queen, the d.u.c.h.ess of Kent, and their grand Household moved from Kensington to Buckingham Palace, then new, and an elegant and luxurious royal residence internally, but externally neither beautiful nor imposing. But with the exception of Windsor Castle, none of the English Royal Palaces can be pointed to as models of architectural beauty, or even sumptuous appointments. The palaces of some of our Railway Kings more than rival them in some respects, while those of many of the English n.o.bility are richer in art-treasures and grander in appearance. Kensington Palace was not beautiful, but it was picturesque and historic, which was more than could be said of any of the Georgian structures; there was about it an odor of old royalty, of poetry and romance. The literature and the beauty of Queen Anne's reign were especially a.s.sociated with it. Queen Victoria was, when she left it, at an age when memories count for little, and doubtless the flitting "out of the old house into the new" was effected merrily enough; but long afterwards her orphaned and widowed heart must often have gone back tenderly and yearningly to the scene of many tranquilly happy years with her mother, and of that first little season of companionship with her cousin Albert.

Hardly had she got unpacked and settled in her new home when she had to go through a great parade and ceremony. She went in state to dissolve Parliament. The weather was fine and the whole route from Buckingham Palace to the Parliament House was lined with people, shouting and cheering as the magnificent procession and that brilliant young figure pa.s.sed slowly along. A London journal of the time gave the following glowing account of her as she appeared in the House of Lords: "At 20 minutes to 3 precisely, Her Majesty, preceded by the heralds and attended by the great officers of state, entered the House-all the Peers and Peeresses, who had risen at the flourish of the trumpets, remaining standing. Her Majesty was attired in a splendid white satin robe, with the ribbon of the Garter crossing her shoulder and a magnificent tiara of diamonds on her head, and wore a necklace and a stomacher of large and costly brilliants. Having ascended the throne, the royal mantle of crimson velvet was placed on Her Majesty's shoulders by the Lords in waiting." And this was the same little girl who, six years before, had bought her own straw hat and carried it home in her hand! I wonder if her own mother did not at that moment have difficulty in believing that radiant and royal creature was indeed her little Victoria!

The account continues: "Her Majesty, on taking her seat, appeared to be deeply moved at the novel and important position in which she was placed, the eyes of the a.s.sembled n.o.bility, both male and female, being riveted on her person." I would have wagered a good deal that it was the 'female' eyes that she felt most piercingly. Then it goes on: "Her emotion was plainly discernible in the heavings of her bosom, and the brilliancy of her diamond stomacher, which sparkled out like the sun on the swell of the ocean as the billows rise and fall." So disconcerted was she, it seems, by all this silent, intense observation, that she forgot, nicely seated as she was, that all those Peers and Peeresses were standing, till she was reminded of it by Lord Melbourne, who stood close at her side. Then she graciously inclined her head, and said in rather a low tone, 'My Lords, be seated!' and they sat, and eke their wives and daughters.

"She had regained her self-possession when she came to read her speech, and her voice also, for it was heard all over the great chamber." And it is added: "Her demeanor was characterized by much grace and modest self- possession."

Among the spectators of this rare royal pageant was an American, and a stiff republican, a young man from Boston, called Charles Sumner. He was a scholar, and scholar-like, undazzled by diamonds, admired most Her Majesty's reading. In a letter to a friend he wrote: "I was astonished and delighted. Her voice is sweet and finely modulated, and she p.r.o.nounced every word distinctly, and with a just regard to its meaning. I think I never heard anything better read in my life than her speech, and I could but respond to Lord Fitz-William's remark to me when the ceremony was over, 'How beautifully she performs!'" How strange it now seems to think of that slight girl of eighteen coming in upon that great a.s.sembly of legislators, many of them gray and bald, and pompous and portly, and gravely telling them that they might go home!

CHAPTER X.

Comments upon the young Queen by a contemporaneous writer in Blackwood-A new Throne erected for her in Buckingham Palace-A touching Anecdote related by the Duke of Wellington-The Queen insists on paying her Father's Debts-The romantic and pa.s.sionate interest she evoked-Her mad lover-Attempts upon her life-She takes possession of Windsor Castle.

A writer in Blackwood, speaking of the Queen about this time, said: "She is 'winning golden opinions from all sorts of people' by her affability, the grace of her manners, and her prettiness. She is excessively like the Brunswicks and not like the Coburgs. So much the more in her favor. The memory of George III. is not yet pa.s.sed away, and the people are glad to see his calm, honest, and English physiognomy renewed in his granddaughter."

Her Majesty's likeness to the obstinate but conscientious old king, whose honest face is fast fading quite away from old English half-crowns and golden guineas, has grown with her years.

The same writer, speaking of her personal appearance, says: "She is low of stature, but well formed; her hair the darkest shade of flaxen, and her eyes large and light-blue." A friend who saw her frequently at the time of her accession, said to me the other day: "It is a great mistake to suppose that the Queen owed all the charming portraits which were drawn of her at this time, to the fortunate accident of her birth and destiny. She was really a very lovely girl, with a fine, delicate, rose- bloom complexion, large blue eyes, a fair, broad brow, and an expression of peculiar candor and innocence."

A few days later there was a sensation in Buckingham Palace, at the setting up in the Throne-room of a very magnificent new piece of furniture-a throne of the latest English fashion, but gorgeous enough to have served for the Queen of Sheba, Zen.o.bia, Cleopatra, or Semiramis. It was all crimson velvet and silk, with any amount of gold embroideries, gold lace, gold fringe, ropes, and ta.s.sels. The gay young Queen tried it, and said it would do; that she had never sat on a more comfortable throne in all her life.

Two stories of the young Queen have touched me especially-one was related by the Duke of Wellington. A court-martial death sentence was presented by him to her, to be signed. She shrank from the dreadful task, and with tears in her eyes, asked: "Have you nothing to say in behalf of this man?"

"Nothing; he has deserted three times," replied the Iron Duke.

"O, your Grace, think again!"

"Well, your Majesty, he certainly is a bad soldier, but there was somebody who spoke as to his good character. He may be a good fellow in civil life."

"O, thank you!" exclaimed the Queen, as she dashed off the word, "Pardoned," on the awful parchment, and wrote beneath it her beautiful signature.

This was not her last act of the kind, and at length Parliament so arranged matters that this fatal signing business could be done by royal commission, ostensibly to "relieve Her Majesty of a painful duty," but really because they could not trust her soft heart. She might have sudden caprices of commiseration which would interfere with stern military discipline, and the honest trade of Mr. Marwood.

The other incident was told by Lord Melbourne. Soon after her accession, in all the dizzy whirl of the new life of splendor and excitement, the young Queen, in an interview with her Prime Minister, said: "I want to pay all that remain of my father's debts. I must do it. I consider it a sacred duty." This was, of course, done-the Queen also sending valuable pieces of plate to the largest creditors, as a token of her grat.i.tude. Lord Melbourne said that the childlike directness and earnestness of that good daughter's manner when she thus expressed her royal will and pleasure, brought the tears to his eyes. It seems to me it was almost mission enough for any young woman, to move the hearts of hard old soldiers like Wellington, and blase statesmen like Melbourne- mighty dealers in death and diplomacy, and to bring something like a second youth of romance and chivalrous feeling into worn and worldly hearts everywhere.

I suppose it is impossible for young people of this day, especially Americans, to realize the intense, enthusiastic interest felt forty-six years ago by all cla.s.ses, and in nearly all countries, in the young English Queen. The old wondered and shook their heads over the mighty responsibility imposed upon her-the young dreamed of her. She almost made real to young girls the wildest romances of fairy lore. She called out such chivalrous feelings in young men that they longed to champion her on some field of battle, or in some perilous knightly adventure. She stirred the hearts and inspired the imaginations of orators and poets.- The great O'Connell, when there was some wild talk of deposing "the all but infant Queen," and putting the Duke of c.u.mberland in her place, said in his trumpet-like tones, which gave dignity to brogue: "If necessary, I can get 500,000 brave Irishmen to defend the life, the honor, and the person of the beloved young lady by whom England's throne is now filled." Ah, the difference between then and now. "Brave Irishmen" of this day, men who know not O'Connell, are more disposed to blow up the English Queen's palaces, throne and all.

Charles d.i.c.kens, who was then full of romance and fancy, was, it is said, possessed by such unresting, wondering thoughts of the fair maiden sovereign, and her magnificent destiny, that for a time his more prosaic friends regarded his enthusiasm as a sort of monomania. Other imaginative young men with heads less "level" (to use an American expression) than that of the great novelist, actually went mad-"clean daft"-the n.o.ble pa.s.sion of loving loyalty ending in an infatuation as absurd as it was unhappy. Before the Queen left Kensington Palace she was much annoyed by the persistent attentions of a provincial admirer, a respectable gentleman, who labored under the hallucination that it was his destiny and his duty to espouse the Queen. He may have felt a preference for private life and rural pleasures, but as a loyal patriot he was ready to make the sacrifice. He drove in a stylish phaeton every morning to the Palace to inquire after Her Majesty's health; and on several days he bribed the men who had charge of the gardens to allow him to a.s.sist them in weeding about the piece of water opposite her apartments, in the fond hope of seeing her at the windows, and of her seeing him. Every evening, however, he put on the gentleman of fortune and phaetons, and followed the Queen and the d.u.c.h.ess in their airings. Drove they fast or drove they slow, he was just behind them. On their last drive before removing from Kensington, they alighted in the Harrow Road for a little walk, and were dismayed at seeing this Mr. -- spring from his phaeton, and come eagerly forward. The d.u.c.h.ess sent a page to meet him and beg of him not to annoy Her Majesty by accosting her; but the page was "no let" to him- a whole volume of remonstrance would not have availed. He pressed on, and the august ladies were obliged to re-enter their carriage, and return to Kensington. When on the next morning they removed from the old home, Mr. -- was at the gate in his phaeton, and drove before them to Buckingham Palace, and was there to give them a gracious welcome. He haunted Pimlico for a time, but his friends finally got possession of him and suppressed him, and so ended his "love's young dream."

It is likely that the merry young Queen laughed at the absurd demonstrations and amatory effusions of her demented admirers; but when, after her marriage, and her appearing always in public with the handsomest Prince in Christendom at her side, such monomaniacs grew desperate and took to shooting, the matter became serious. Then no more gentlemen in phaetons menaced her peace; her demented followers were poor wretches-so poor that sometimes, after investing in pistols, they had not a six-pence left for ammunition. One, a distraught Fenian, pointed at her a broken, harmless weapon, charged with a sc.r.a.p of red rag. Another, a humpbacked lad, named Bean, loaded his with paper and a few bits of an old clay pipe. Bean escaped for a time, and it is said that for several days there were "hard lines" for all the poor humpbacks of London. Scores of them were arrested. No unfortunate thus deformed, could appear in the streets without danger of a policeman smiting him on the shoulders, right in the tender spot, with a rough, "You are my prisoner." Life became a double burden to the poor fellows till Bean was caught. But to return to the young Queen, in her happy, untroubled days.

In August she took possession of Windsor Castle, amid great rejoicing.

The d.u.c.h.ess, her mother, came also; this time not to be reproached or insulted. They soon had company-a lot of Kings and Queens, among them "Uncle Leopold" and his second wife, a daughter of Louis Philippe of France.

The royal young house-keeper seems keenly to have enjoyed showing to her visitors her new home, her little country place up the Thames. She conducted them everywhere,

"Up-stairs, down-stairs, and in my lady's chamber,"

peeping into china and silver closets, spicy store-rooms, and huge linen chests smelling of lavender.

Soon after came a triumphal progress to Brighton, during which the royal carriage pa.s.sed under an endless succession of triumphal arches, and between ranks on ranks of schoolchildren, strewing roses and singing paeans. At Brighton there was an immense sacrifice of the then fashionable and costly flower, the dahlia, no fewer than twenty thousand being used for decorative purposes. But a sadder because a vain sacrifice on this occasion, was of flowers of rhetoric. An address, the result of much cla.s.sical research and throes of poetic labor, and marked by the most effusive loyalty, was to have been presented to Her Majesty at the gates of the Pavilion, but by some mistake she pa.s.sed in without waiting for it.

About this time the Lunatic Asylums began to fill up. Within one week two mad men were arrested, proved insane, and shut up for threatening the life of the Queen and the d.u.c.h.ess of Kent. So Victoria's life was not all arched over with dahlia-garlands, and strewn with roses, nor were her subjects all Sunday-school scholars.

CHAPTER XI.

Banquet in Guildhall-Victoria's first Christmas at Windsor Castle as Queen-Mrs. Newton Crosland's reminiscences-Coolness of Actors and Quakers amid the general enthusiasm-Issue of the first gold Sovereigns bearing Victoria's head.