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
Garter-King-at-Arms proclaimed the style and title of the deceased.
When he referred to her Majesty with the usual prayer, "Whom God bless
and preserve with long life, health, and happiness," for the first
time in her reign the word "happiness" was omitted and that of
"honour" substituted, and the full significance of the change went to
the hearts of the listeners with a woeful reminder of what had come
and gone. The Prince of Wales advanced first to take his last look
into the vault, stood for a moment with clasped hands and burst into
tears. In the end Prince Arthur was the more composed of the two
fatherless brothers.
As the company retired, the "Dead March in Saul" was pealed forth.
The whole ceremony was modelled on the precedent of other royal
funerals, but surely rarely was mourning so keen or sorrow so deep.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
THE FIRST MONTHS OF WIDOWHOOD--MARRIAGE OF THE PRINCE OF WALES, ETC.,
ETC.
The Princess of Hohenlohe arrived in England on the 20th of December,
and immediately joined the Queen at Osborne before the funeral of the
Prince. The old King of the Belgians came to Osborne on the 29th of
December--one can imagine his meeting with the widowed Queen.
On the 10th of January, 1862, occurred the terrible Hartley Colliery
accident, by which upwards of two hundred miners perished. The Queen's
grief for the Prince was not a month old when she telegraphed from
Osborne her "tenderest sympathy for the poor widows and mothers."
The Prince of Wales left Osborne on the 6th of February in strict
privacy to accomplish the tour in the East projected for him by his
father. The Prince was accompanied by Dean Stanley, General Bruce, &c.
In the Queen's solitude at Osborne Princess Alice continued to be the
great medium of communication between her Majesty and her Ministers.
(_Times_.)
The opening of the second great Exhibition in the month of May must
have been full of painful associations. At the State ceremony on the
first day the royal carriages with mourning liveries were empty, but
for the Crown Prince of Prussia, Prince Oscar of Sweden, and the
Duchess of Cambridge with her daughters. Tennyson's ode was sung. It
contained the pathetic lines--
"O silent father of our kings to be,
Mourned in this golden hour of jubilee,
For this, for all we weep our thanks to thee."
It was decided that the Queen's birthday should be spent at Balmoral,
a practice which became habitual. Dr. Norman Macleod was summoned
north to give what consolation he could to his sorrowing Queen. He has
left an account of one of their interviews. "May 14th. After dinner I
was summoned unexpectedly to the Queen's room; she was alone. She met
me, and, with an unutterable expression which filled my eyes with
tears, at once began to speak about the Prince.... She spoke of his
excellences, his love, his cheerfulness, how he was everything to her;
how all now on earth seemed dead to her...."
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