Afterwards the Queen had the pain of seeing her married children, with their unfailing family affection, inevitably ranged on different sides in the war. Princess Alice trembled before the fear of a widowhood like her mother's as the sound of the firing of the Prussian army, which lay between the wife at home and the husband in the field, was heard in Darmstadt. The quiet little town fell into the hands of the enemy, and was at once poverty and pestilence stricken, small-pox and cholera having broken out in the hospitals, where the Princess was labouring devotedly to succour the wounded. In such circumstances, while the standard of her husband's regiment lay hidden in her room, Princess Louis's third daughter was both. Happily peace was soon proclaimed. In honour of it the baby, Princess Irene, whose godfathers were the officers and men of her father's regiment, received her name. This year Hanover ceased to be an independent state, and became annexed to Prussia. Dr. Norman Macleod has a bright little picture of an evening at Balmoral in 1866. "The Queen sat down to spin at a nice Scotch wheel while I read Robert Burns to her, 'Tam o' Shanter,' and 'A man's a man for a' that'--her favourite." Her Majesty sent her miniature with an autograph letter to the American citizen, Mr. Peabody, in acknowledgment of his magnificent gift of model lodging-houses to the Working people of London. In 1867 the Queen again opened Parliament in person, her speech being read by the Lord Chancellor. The grievous accident of the breaking of the ice in Regent's Park, when it was covered with skaters and spectators, took place on the 15th of January. "The Early Tears of the Prince Consort," the first instalment of his "Life," brought out under the direction of General Grey, with much of the information supplied by the Queen, was published, and afforded a nobler memorial to the Prince than any work in stone or metal. On the 20th of May her Majesty laid the foundation of the Albert Hall. She was accompanied by the Princesses Louise and Beatrice, Prince Leopold, and Prince Christian, and received by the Lord Steward, the Lord Chamberlain, and the Queen's elder sons. The latter presented her with a bouquet, which she took, kissing her sons. In reply to the Prince of Wales's speech her Majesty spoke in accents singularly inaudible for her. She mentioned the struggle she had undergone before she had brought herself to take part in that day's proceedings, but said she had been sustained by the thought that she was thus promoting her husband's designs. In June and July the Queen of Prussia and the Sultan of Turkey came in turn to England. The latter was with her Majesty in her yacht at a great naval review held in most tempestuous weather off Spithead. In the end of July the Empress of the French paid a short private visit to her Majesty at Osborne.