Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen — Volume 2Tytler, Sarah
History
Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen — Volume 2
Tytler, Sarah
Victoria, Queen of Great Britain, 1819-1901
Then the pall-bearers--eight generals in mourning
coaches. At length the huge funeral car, heavily wrought and
emblazoned and inscribed with the names of the Duke's battles, drawn
by twelve horses, with five officers on horseback, bearing the
banneroles of the lineage of the deceased, riding on either side. On
the car was placed the coffin, and on the coffin rested the hat and
sword of the dead commander.... Every emotion, save that of solemn
awe, was hushed. The massive structure moved on its course with a
steady pressure, and produced a heavy dull sound, as it ground its
path over the road.... But the car, apart from its vast size, passed
unnoticed, for on its highest stage rested a red velvet coffin, which
contained all that was mortal of England's greatest son. It seemed
that a thousand memories of his great and long career were awakened at
the sight of that narrow tenement of so great a man.... The voice
which had cried "Up, Guards, and at them!" at the critical moment on
the afternoon of that rainy Sunday at Waterloo, thirty-seven years
before, was silent for ever. The sagacious and skilled brain which had
planned so well the defence of London from the threatened outbreak of
the Chartists, would plan no more for Queen and country. No longer
would the shouting crowd press round him on every gala, and strangers
watch patiently near the Horse Guards for one of the sights of London--
the eagle face of the conqueror of him who conquered Europe.
"No more in soldier fashion would he greet,
With lifted hand, the gazer in the street."
Wellington was making his way from the Horse Guards for the last time,
attended by such a mighty multitude as seldom waits on the steps of
Kings, hardly ever with such mute reverence as they gave him that day.
The "good grey head" of "the last Great Englishman" was about to be
laid in the dust, and his best epitaph was Tennyson's line--
"One that sought but duty's iron crown."
Behind the car came the chief mourner, accompanied by his younger
brother, with cousins and relatives to the last degree of kindred, and
friends filling a long train of mourning coaches. Then followed what
moved the people more than all the splendour, because it came like a
touch of homely nature appealing to all, in a familiar part of the
life that was gone, the late Duke's horse, led by John Mears, his aged
groom. The horse might have been "Copenhagen," which had borne the
Duke in the thick of his greatest battle, and died long since at
Strathfieldsaye, so eagerly did the crowds gaze on it. More carriages
and troops closed the march.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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