Again the dear old home, the towering trees, The lawns, the garden-plots, the lake, that were My childhood's fairyland,--the dear ones there, Who tended me so lovingly,--the ease Of heart when, sporting at my mother's knees, I dreamed not of a crown, nor knew a care, The call at early morn that crown to wear! Ah me, the host of tender memories, Tender and solemn, that around me throng, Of all that then I was, and since have been, The many loved and lost, the One so long Missed from my side, and I, a lonely Queen! Yet in the love my people bear me, strong To front an Empire's cares with brow serene. Yet once again I had the honour of being permitted to express Her Majesty's sentiments in verse. It had long been my earnest hope that peace should reign in Her Majesty's realms while she lived. But this was not to be; and the South African war, with all the loss of life and waste of treasure which it involved, threw many a dark shadow over the last year of the Queen's life. But the shadows were not without breaks of brilliant sunshine. She was proud of the way in which her subjects rose to the difficulties of the time; she was proud of the response of the army and navy, which she loved, to the call upon their valour and endurance. She was proud, too, of the common feeling that bound the colonies to the mother-country, as but for this war they might not for years have been bound, and that they had sent their sons to share its perils and glories--a first step to the consolidation of her Empire. This was a suggestive theme, to glance at which I thought might please the Queen. I had for years been in the habit of writing a letter of congratulation to Her Majesty upon her birthday. Little weening that it was to be her last, I sent the following sonnet with my letter. It so pleased the Queen, that she gave her sanction to its being published in the _Times_, where accordingly it appeared. A BIRTHDAY MEDITATION. _Balmoral, 24th May 1900._ Am I not blest? I cry, as I retrace, Through gathering mists of not unwelcome tears, All I have seen and known through the long years Vouchsafed to me by Heaven's abounding grace; How evermore I have found strength to face Their cares, their griefs, their overshadowing fears, Nerved by the loving loyalty that cheers My heart in all its lonely pride of place. Oh, my dear land, whose sons, where'er they came, Of freedom and of right have sown the seed, Behold, _their_ sons in serried thousands claim A place beside thee, in thine hour of need, Thy peril theirs, thy fortune theirs, thy fame! Thinking of this, am I not blest indeed?