Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen — Volume 1Tytler, Sarah
History
Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen — Volume 1
Tytler, Sarah
Victoria, Queen of Great Britain, 1819-1901
guns told when the Queen had set forth, and there was renewed animation.
The Gold Sticks flitted about, there was tuning in the orchestra, and the
foreign ambassadors and their suites arrived in quick succession. Prince
Esterhazy crossing a bar of sunshine was the most prodigious rainbow of
all. He was covered with diamonds and pearls, and as he dangled his hat it
cast a dancing radiance all round.
"At half-past eleven the guns told that the Queen had arrived, but as there
was much to be done in the robing-room, there was a long pause before she
appeared."
A little after twelve the grand procession of the day entered the choir.
The Prebendaries and Dean of Westminster and Officers-at-Arms, the
Comptroller, Treasurer, Vice-Chamberlain, and Lord Steward of her Majesty's
Household, the Lord Privy Seal, the Lord President, the Lord Chancellor of
Ireland, came first. When these gentlemen were peers their coronets were
carried by pages. The Treasurer bore the crimson bag with the medals; the
Vice-Chancellor was attended by an officer from the Jewel Office,
conveying, on a cushion, the ruby ring and the sword for the offering. Then
followed the Archbishops of Canterbury, York, and Armagh, with the Lord
Chancellor, each archbishop in his rochet, with his cap in his hand; the
princesses of the blood royal, all in "robes of estate" of purple velvet
and wearing circlets of gold; the Duchess of Cambridge, her train borne by
Lady Caroline Campbell and a gentleman of her household, her coronet by
Viscount Villiers; the Duchess of Kent, her train borne by Lady Flora
Hastings, and her coronet by Viscount Morpeth; the Duchess of Gloucester,
her train borne by Lady Caroline Legge, and her coronet by Viscount Evelyn.
(The royal generation next that of George III. was fast dwindling away when
these three ladies represented the six daughters and the wives of six of
the sons of the old King and Queen. But there were other survivors, though
they were not present to-day. The Queen-dowager; Princess Augusta, an aged
woman of seventy; Princess Elizabeth, Landgravine of Hesse-Homburg, nearly
as old, and absent in Germany; the Queen as well as the King of Hanover,
who had figured formerly as Duke and Duchess of Cumberland; and Princess
Sophia, who was ten years younger than Princess Augusta, and resident in
England, but who was an invalid.) The regalia came next, St. Edward's
staff, borne by the Duke of Roxburgh, the golden spurs borne by Lord Byron,
the sceptre with the cross borne by the Duke of Cleveland, the third sword
borne by the Marquis of Westminster, Curtana borne by the Duke of
Devonshire, the second sword borne by the Duke of Sutherland, each
nobleman's coronet carried by a page, Black Rod and Deputy-Garter walking
before Lord Willoughby d'Eresby, Lord Great Chamberlain of England, with
page and coronet.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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