The part of a Prince Consort is a very difficult one to play. In the case of Queen Anne's husband, Prince George of Denmark, nature solved the difficulty by not encumbering his Royal Highness with any brains. But Prince Albert had brains, and it was morally impossible that he should not exercise a power not contemplated by the Constitution. He did so almost from the first, with the full knowledge and approbation of the Ministers, who had no doubt the sense to see what could not be avoided had better be recognised and kept under control. But in 1851 the Court quarrelled with Palmerston, who was dismissed from office, very properly, for having, in direct violation of a recent order of the Queen, communicated to the French Ambassador his approval of the coup d'etat, without the knowledge of Her Majesty or the Cabinet. In 1854 came the rupture with Russia, which led to the Crimean war. Palmerston, in correspondence with his friend the French Emperor, was working for a war, with a separate French alliance. Prince Albert, in conjunction with Aberdeen, was trying to keep the Four Powers together, and by their combined action to avert a war. Palmerston and his partizans appealed through the press to the people, among whom the war feeling was growing strong, against the unconstitutional influence of the Prince Consort and his foreign advisers. Thereupon arose a storm of insane suspicion and fury which almost recalled the fever of the Popish Plot. Thousands of Londoners collected round the Tower to see the Prince's entry into the State Prison, and dispersed only upon being told that the Queen had said that if her husband was sent to prison she would go with him. Reports were circulated of a pamphlet drawn up under Palmerston's eye, and containing the most damning proofs of the Prince's guilt, the publication of which it was said the Prince had managed to prevent, but of which six copies were still in existence. The pamphlet was at last printed _in extenso_ in the _Times_, and the bottled lightning proved to be ditchwater. Of course Stockmar, the "spy," the "agent of Leopold," did not escape denunciation, and though it was proved he had been at Coburg all the time, people persisted in believing he was concealed about the Court, coming out only at night. The outcry was led by the _Morning Post_, Lord Palmerston's personal organ, and the _Morning Advertiser_, the bellicose and truly British journal of the Licensed Victuallers; but these were supported by the Conservative press, and by some Radical papers. A debate in Parliament broke the waterspout as quickly as it had been formed. The people had complained with transports of rage that the Prince Consort exercised an influence unrecognised by the Constitution in affairs of State. They were officially assured that he _did_; and they at once declared themselves perfectly satisfied.