The success of such an excursion led to a longer expedition, which meant a night spent on the way at what was little better than a village inn. Such a step was only possible when entire secrecy, and even a certain amount of disguise, were maintained. Indeed, the little innocent mystery, with all the amusement it brought, was part of the pleasure. The company consisted of the Queen and the Prince, Lady Churchill and General Grey, with two keepers for attendants. Their destination, reached by driving, riding, and walking through the shiel of the Geldie, Glen Geldie, Glen Fishie, &c, was Grantown, where the party spent the night, and were waited on, in all unconsciousness, by a woman in ringlets in the evening and in curl-papers in the morning. But before Grantown was left, when the truth was known, the same benighted chambermaid was seen waving a flag from the window of the dining and drawing-room in one, which had been lately so honoured, while the landlady on the threshold made a vigorous use of her pocket- handkerchief, to the edification and delight of an excited crowd in the street. The Court returned to Osborne, and on the 22nd of September the Queen, the Prince, and Princess Alice, with the suite, sailed from Gravesend for Antwerp _en route_ for Coburg, where the Princess Royal was to meet them with her husband and the child-prince, whom his grandparents had not yet seen. The King of the Belgians, his sons and daughter-in-law met the travellers with the melancholy intelligence that the Prince's stepmother, the Duchess-Dowager of Coburg, who had been ill for some time, but was looking forward to this visit, lay in extremity. At Verviers a telegram announced that she had died at five o'clock that morning--a great shock to those who were hastening to see her and receive her welcome once more. Royal kindred met and greeted the party at each halting-place, as by Aix-la-Chapelle, Frankfort, where they slept, the valley of the Maine and the Thuringen railway, the travellers approached Coburg. Naturally the Queen grew agitated at the thought of the arrival, so different from what she had expected and experienced on her last visit, fifteen years before. At the station were the Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Prince Frederick William of Prussia, in deep mourning. Everything was quiet and private. At the door of the palace, in painful contrast to the gala faces and dresses of her earlier reception, stood the Grand Duchess and the Princess Royal in the deepest German mourning, with long black veils, the point hanging over the forehead. Around were the ladies and gentlemen of the suites. "A tender embrace, and then we walked up the staircase," wrote the Queen; "I could hardly speak, I felt so moved, and quite trembled." Her room was that which had formerly belonged to the Duchess of Kent when she was a young Coburg princess. One of its windows looked up a picturesque narrow street with red roofs and high gables, leading to the market-place.