Admirable and reverend as was this abiding sorrow, contemporary observers felt that its outward manifestations were not always harmonious. The Mausoleum at Frogmore is not a "poem in stone," and the Monument of Gilt opposite the Albert Hall has supplied the frivolous with an appropriate pun. Landseer, who, when once he forsook his stags and deerhounds, was surely the most debased painter of a hideous age, attained his worst in a picture of the Slopes at Windsor _circa_ 1862. Under an inky sky, in the forefront of a sunless landscape, stands a black pony, and on its back is a lady dressed in the deepest weeds, with a black riding-skirt and a black bonnet. A retainer in subfusc kilt holds the pony's head, a dingy terrier looks on with melancholy eyes, and, in the distant background, two darkly-clad princesses shiver on a garden-seat. The only spot of colour in the scene is a red despatch-box, and the whole forms the highest tribute of English art to a national disaster and a Queenly sorrow. Black, and intensely black, were all the trappings of courtly woe--black crape, black gloves, black feathers, black jewellery. The State-robes were worn no longer; the State-coach stood unused in the coach-house. The footmen wore black bands round their arms. It was only by slow degrees, and on occasions of high and rare solemnity, that white lace and modest plumes and diamonds and decorations were permitted to enliven the firmament of courtly woe. But we of the twentieth century live in an age of æsthetic revival, and, though perhaps we do not mourn so heartily, we certainly mourn more prettily. One lady at least there is who knows how to combine the sincerity of sorrow with its becoming manifestation; and Queen Alexandra in mourning garb is as delightful a vision as was Queen Alexandra in her clothing of wrought gold, when she knelt before the altar of Westminster Abbey and bowed her head to receive her diamond crown.