We may never know how the royal cousins met--whether the frank, kind, unconscious Princess came down under the wing of the Duchess as far as their entrance into the Clock Court; whether there was a little dimness of agitation and laughing confusion, in spite of the partial secrecy, in two pairs of blue eyes which then encountered each other for the first time; whether the courtly company ascended in well-arranged file, or in a little friendly disorder. It was fortunate that there were more doors and halls and staircases than one, for it goes without saying that nobody could have had time and attention to spare for the wonderfully elaborate staircase, the representation in _chiaroscuro_ of horses and warlike weapons, the frieze with heads of unicorns and masks of lions. It must have been on another day that young heads looked up in jest or earnest at Hercules, Diana, Apollo, and Minerva, and stopped to pick out the heterogeneous figures in the colonnade--"ladies, yeomen of the guard, pages, a quaker, two Turks, a Highlander, and Peter the Wild Boy," which testified to the liberal imagination of Kent, who executed not only the architecture, but the painting, in the reign of George I. The guests remained at Kensington for a month, the only drawback to their pleasure being a little attack of bilious fever, from which Prince Albert suffered for a few days. There is a published letter to his stepmother in which the Prince tells his doings in the most unaffected, kindly fashion. There were the King's levee, "long and fatiguing, but very interesting;" the dinner at Court, and the "beautiful concert" which followed, at which the guests had to stand till two o'clock; the King's birthday, with the Drawing-room at St. James's Palace, where three thousand eight hundred people passed before the King and Queen, and another great dinner and concert in the evening. There was also the "brilliant ball" at Kensington Palace, at which the gentlemen were in uniform and the ladies in fancy dresses. Duke William of Brunswick, the Prince of Orange and his sons, and the Duke of Wellington, were among the guests, and the Princes of Coburg helped to keep up the ball till four o'clock. They spent a day with the Duke of Northumberland at Sion House, they went to Claremont, and they were so constantly engaged that they had to make the most of their time in order to see at least some of the sights of London. To one of the sights the Queen referred afterwards. The Duke of Coburg and the two Princes accompanied the Duchess of Kent and the Princess to the wonderful gathering of the children of the different charity schools in St. Paul's Cathedral, where Prince Albert listened intently to the sermon. We hardly need to be told that he was full of interest in everything, paid the greatest attention to all he saw, and was constantly occupied. Among his pleasant occupations were the two favourite pursuits--which the cousins shared--music and drawing.