At this Christmas time the Queen's two eldest sons were at home and full of strange stories of strange lands. Soon after, the Prince of Wales went to Cambridge and Prince Alfred joined his ship. Before that cruise was over a deeper, darker sea rolled between the sailor lad and his father. On February 9, 1861, Prince Albert wrote Baron Stockmar: "To-morrow our marriage will be twenty-one years old. How many storms have swept over it, and still it continues green and fresh." The anniversary occurring on Sunday was very quietly observed, chiefly by the performance in the evening of some fine sacred music, the appropriateness of which was scarcely realized at the time. In a very sweet letter to the Duchess of Kent, such a letter as few married men write to their mothers-in-law, the Prince says: ... "To-day our marriage comes of age, according to law. We have faithfully kept our pledge for better and for worse,' and have only to thank God that He has vouchsafed so much happiness to us. May He have us in His keeping for the days to come! You have, I trust, found good and loving children in us, and we have experienced nothing but love and kindness from you." This dear "Mama-aunt" had been in delicate health for some time, and once or twice seriously ill, but she seemed better, her physicians were encouraging and all were hopeful till the 12th of March, when the Queen and Prince were suddenly summoned from London to Frogmore by the news of a very alarming relapse. They went at once with all speed, yet the Queen says "the way seemed so long." When they readied the house, the Queen writes: "Albert went up first, and when he returned with tears in his eyes, I saw what awaited me. ... With a trembling heart I went up the staircase and entered the bedroom, and here on a sofa, supported by cushions, sat leaning back my beloved Mama, breathing rather heavily, but in her silk dressing-gown, with her cap on, looking quite herself. ... I knelt before her, kissed her dear hand and placed it next my cheek; but though she opened her eyes she did not, I think, know me. She brushed my hand off, and the dreadful reality was before me that for the first time, she did not know the child she had ever received with such tender smiles."