From that time forth she never again spoke on this, or any other subject of an intimate or personal nature, with her Royal spouse. Cold as an iceberg, pure as a diamond, she accepted both wifehood and motherhood as martyrdom, with an evident contempt for its humiliation, and without one touch of love for either husband or children. She bore three sons, of whom the eldest, and heir to the throne was, at the time this history begins, just twenty. The passing of the years had left scarcely a trace upon her beauty, save to increase it from the sparkling luminance of a star to the glory of a full-orbed moon of loveliness,--and she had easily won a triumph over all the other women around her, in the power she possessed to command and retain the admiration of men. She was one of those brilliant creatures who, like the Egyptian Cleopatra, never grow old,--for she was utterly exempt from the wasting of the nerves through emotion. Her eyes were always bright and clear; her skin dazzling in its whiteness, save where the equably flowing blood flushed it with tenderest rose,--her figure remained svelte, lithe and graceful in all its outlines. Finely strung, yet strong as steel in her temperament, all thoughts, feelings and events seemed to sweep over her without affecting or disturbing her mind’s calm equipoise. She lived her life with extreme simplicity, regularity, and directness, thus driving to despair all would-be scandal-mongers; and though many gifted and famous men fell madly in love with their great princess, and often, in the extremity of a passion which amounted to disloyalty, slew themselves for her sake, she remained unmoved and pitiless.