Princess Beatrice took no part in the conversation. She looked smiling and very intelligent. The Queen was very simply dressed in black, with her white widow's cap and veil, no ornaments, but a gold chain and pearls around her neck, and a medallion with a portrait of a man in uniform, whom I supposed to be Prince Albert. I think the interview lasted about fifteen minutes. Then the Queen arose, shook hands, and said she hoped my husband and I would like the life in England. Princess Beatrice shook hands--I backed myself out, and it was over. I was very much impressed with the Queen's personality. She is short, stout, and her face rather red, but there is a great air of dignity and self-possession, and a beautiful smile which lights up her whole face. I never could find out any minor details in dress, as to taking off veil, gloves, etc., but I did as I had done with other Royalties and took off veil and gloves, which I hope was right. Lady Harcourt and Ponsonby were waiting for me in the corridor, and seemed to think my audience had been longer than usual--were also surprised that the Queen made me sit down. It seems she sometimes receives standing all the time, at a first formal presentation. As we had some little time before starting for the station, Ponsonby showed us part of the Castle. The great halls, St. George's and Waterloo, are very fine, and it was interesting to see the great pictures which one has always seen reproduced in engravings--the Queen's Marriage, Coronation, Reception of King Louis Philippe, Baptism of the Prince of Wales, etc. One room was beautiful, filled with Van Dycks. We went back to the station in the same carriage, and Lady Harcourt and I talked hard all the way home. It was certainly a very simple affair; as little etiquette as possible, but the Castle was fine. The old gray fortress and its towers and crenellated walls, the home of the sovereign who lives there with little pomp and few guards--guarded by her people, in the same Castle, and the same surroundings as when she began her long reign, a mere girl. When one thinks of all the changes she has seen in other countries--kingdoms and dynasties disappearing--one can realise what a long wise rule hers has been. It is such a contrast to my last Royal Audience at Moscow, which now seems a confused memory of Court officials, uniforms, gold-laced coats, jewelled canes (I can see one of the Chamberlains who had an enormous sapphire at the end of his staff), princes, peasants, Cossacks, costumes of every description, court carriages, Russian carriages, the famous attelage of three horses, every language under the sun, and all jostling and crowding each other in the courts of the Kremlin--with its wonderful churches and domes of every possible colour from pink to green--only soldiers, soldiers everywhere, and the people kept at a distance--very unlike what I have just seen here. Sunday, December 16, 1883.