During the Queen’s autumnal holiday at Balmoral the Prince and Princess Louis of Hesse again visited her. Later in the year it was announced that the Princess Helena was to be married to the Prince Christian of Sleswig-Holstein, second son of the Duke of Augustenburg. “Many thanks,” writes the Princess Louis to the Queen on the 8th of December, “for your letter received yesterday with the account of Lenchen’s _verlobung_ [betrothal]. I am so glad she is happy, and I hope every blessing will rest on them both that one can possibly desire.” It was arranged that the Queen should lend Frogmore to her daughter, so that she and her husband might be able to live in England. But the shadow of death was again brooding over the Royal Household. In the same letter in which the Princess Louis refers to her sister’s betrothal she writes, “I had a letter from Marie Brabant two days ago, where she says dear uncle’s [King Leopold] state is hopeless; but yesterday she telegraphed that he was rather better. What a loss it would be if he were to be taken from us, for his very name and existence, though he takes no active part in politics, are of weight and value.”[238] In England the news of King Leopold’s illness was received with some concern. The Queen had promised to open the next Session of Parliament in person, and it was feared that the death of his Majesty might interfere with a project in which her subjects of all classes were deeply interested. On the 11th of December King Leopold died, and on that day the Princess Louis of Hesse, ever ready to sympathise with her mother’s sorrows, wrote to the Queen, “Alas! alas! beloved Uncle Leopold is no more! How much for you, for us, for all, goes with him to the grave! One tie more of those dear old times is rent! I do feel for you so much, for dear uncle was indeed a father to you. Now you are head of all the family--it seems incredible, and that dear papa should not be by your side. The regret for dear Uncle Leopold is universal--he stood so high in the eyes of all parties; his life was a history in itself--and now that book is closed.” In another letter the Princess says, “The more I realise that we shall never see beloved Uncle Leopold again the sadder I grow. He had, apart from all his excellent qualities, such a charm as I believe we shall seldom find again.”