After sending Prince Albert Victor home with Countess de Grey, the Royal couple travelled back _via_ Germany and Belgium, visiting on the way Prince and Princess Louis of Hesse at Darmstadt, and making a short stay at Brussels. Then they came home for the rest of the autumn to Sandringham, where Queen Alexandra spent her twentieth birthday. The year 1865 proved an eventful one to both King Edward and his wife. King Edward paid his first State visit to Ireland, opening the International Exhibition of Dublin on 9th May, and a little less than a month later Prince George of Wales was born at Marlborough House. Although there have at various times been more or less serious fires in Royal residences, Sandringham, for instance, having been almost destroyed by a conflagration within the last few years, the King has only once been really in a fire, and this was just a month after his second son’s birth. The fire began in the floor then styled the nursery floor, and after Queen Alexandra had been moved to another part of the house with her two children, King Edward set to work with the utmost energy to check the flames. It need hardly be said that very soon the whole of London seemed to be congregated in Pall Mall and St. James’s Park. At first it could not be made out where the fire was coming from, and the King helped to rip up the whole of the nursery floor before the mischief could be traced, and while doing so he nearly had a bad accident, for he fell some distance through the rafters. At last, however, the fire was got under, and it was found that comparatively little harm had been done. Then for the first time it occurred to some one to ask if Marlborough House was insured. Strangely enough this very important precaution had not been taken. Now, however, both Marlborough House and Sandringham are insured to their full value. King Edward from childhood has always shown the keenest interest in firemen and fires. During many years of his life he used to be informed whenever a really big blaze was signalled, and he has attended _incognito_ most of the great London fires during the last thirty years. [Illustration: KING EDWARD, QUEEN ALEXANDRA, AND PRINCE ALBERT VICTOR _Photograph in 1864 by Vernon Heath, published by McQueen_]