In one of the recently published letters of Princess Alice to the Queen, the former recalled after an interval of eight years the words which her father had spoken to her on the death of her grandmother, when he brought the daughter to the mother and said, "Comfort mamma," a simple injunction which sounded like a solemn charge in the sad months to come. The melancholy tidings of the loss were conveyed by the Queen's hand to the Duchess's elder daughter, the Princess of Hohenlohe; to the Duchess's brother, the King of the Belgians--the last survivor of his family--and to her eldest grand-daughter, the Crown Princess of Prussia. The moment the Princess Royal heard of the death she started for England, and arrived there two days afterwards. The unaffected tribute of respect paid by the whole country, led by the Houses of Parliament, to the virtues of the late Duchess, was very welcome to the mourners. The Duchess of Kent by her will bequeathed her property to the Queen, and appointed the Prince Consort her sole executor. "He was so tender and kind," wrote the Queen, "so pained to have to ask me distressing questions, but spared me so much. Everything done so quickly and feelingly." The funeral took place on the 25th of March, in the vault beneath St. George's Chapel, Windsor. The Prince Consort acted as chief mourner, and was supported by two of the grandchildren of the late Duchess, the Prince of Wales and the Prince of Leiningen. The pallbearers were six ladies; among whom was Lady Augusta Bruce. Neither the Queen nor her daughters were present. They remained, in the Queen's words, "to pray at home together, and to dwell on the happiness and peace of her who was gone." On the evening of the funeral the Queen and the Prince dined alone; afterwards he read aloud to her letters written by her mother to a German friend, giving an account of the illness and death of the Duke of Kent more than forty years before. The Queen continued the allowances which the Duchess of Kent had made to her elder daughter, the Princess Hohenlohe, and to two of the duchess's grandsons, Prince Victor Hohenlohe and Prince Edward Leiningen. Her Majesty pensioned the Duchess's servants, and appointed Lady Augusta Bruce, who had been like a daughter to the dead Princess, resident bedchamber woman to the Queen.