Books: Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen V.1.

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The Duchess of Kent and the Duchess of Sutherland drove in the carriage
with her Majesty "at a slow pace," for the royal bride, even on her
bridal-day, owed herself to her subjects, while a strong escort of
Household cavalry prevented the pressure of the shouting throng from
becoming overpowering.

On the arrival of the Queen at St. James's Palace she proceeded to her
closet behind the Throne-room, where she remained, attended by her maids of
honour and train-bearers, until the Lord Chamberlain announced that all was
ready for the procession to the chapel.

Old St. James's had been the scene of many a royal wedding. Besides that of
Queen Mary, daughter of James II. and Anne Hyde, who was married to William
of Orange at eleven o'clock at night in her bedchamber, Anne and George of
Denmark were married, in more ordinary fashion, in the chapel. Following
their example, the daughters of George II. and Queen Caroline--another
Anne, the third English princess who was given to a Prince of Orange, and
who was so ready to consent to the contract that she declared she would
have him though he were a baboon, and her sister Mary, who was united to
the Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, were both married here; so was their
brother, Frederick, Prince of Wales, to Princess Augusta of Saxe-Coburg.
Prince Albert was the third of the Coburg line who wedded with the royal
house of England. Already there were two strains of Saxe-Coburg blood in
the veins of the sovereign of these realms. The last, and probably the most
disastrous, marriage which had been celebrated in St. James's was that of
George Frederick, Prince of Wales, and Caroline of Brunswick.

The portions of the palace in use for the marriage included the Presence
Chamber, Queen Anne's Drawing-room, the Guard-room, the Grand Staircase,
with the Colonnade, the Chapel Royal, and the Throne-room. On the Queen's
marriage-day, rooms, staircase, and colonnade were lined with larger and
smaller galleries for the accommodation of privileged spectators. The seats
had crimson cushions with gold-coloured fringe, warming up the cold light
and shade of a February day, while the white and gay-coloured dresses of
the ladies and the number of wedding favours contributed to the gaiety of
the scene. A Queen's wedding favours were not greatly different from those
of humbler persons, and consisted of the stereotyped white riband, silver
lace, and orange blossoms, except where loyalty indulged in immense
bouquets of riband, and "massive silver bullion, having in the centre what
might almost be termed branches of orange blossoms." The most eccentrically
disposed favours seem to have been those of the mace-bearers, whose white
"knots" were employed to tie up on the wearers' shoulders the large gold
chains worn with the black dress of the officials. The uniformity of the
gathering was broken by "burly Yeomen of the Guard, with their massive
halberts, slim Gentlemen-at-Arms with their lighter 'partisans,'....
elderly pages of State, almost infantile pages of honour, officers of the
Lord Chamberlain's Office, officers of the Woods and Forests, embroidered
heralds and shielded cuirassiers, robed prelates, stoled priests, and
surpliced singing-boys."

Among the guests, though not in the procession, loudly cheered as on other
occasions, was the Duke of Wellington, who had seen the bride christened.
People thought they noticed him bending under his load of years, tottering
to the last step of all, but the old soldier was still to grace many a
peaceful ceremony. In his company, far removed this day from the smoke of
cannon and the din of battle, walked more than one gallant brother-in-arms,
the Marquis of Anglesey, Lord Hill, &c.

The chapel was also made sumptuous for the occasion. Its carved and painted
roof was picked out anew. The space within the chancel was lined and hung
with crimson velvet, the communion-table covered with magnificent gold
plate.

The Queen's procession began with drums and trumpets, and continued with
pursuivants, heralds, pages, equeries, and the different officers of the
Household till it reached the members of the Royal Family. These ranged
from the farthest removed in relationship, Princess Sophia of Gloucester,
through the Queen's young cousins in the Cambridge family, with much
admiration bestowed on the beautiful child, Princess Mary, and the
exceedingly attractive young girl, Princess Augusta, to another and a
venerable Princess Augusta--one of the elder daughters of George III., an
aged lady upwards of seventy, who then made her final appearance in public.
Doubtless she had been among the company who were present at the last royal
marriage in St. James's, on the night of the 8th of April, 1795, forty-five
years before, a marriage so widely removed in every particular from this
happy wedding. The two royal Dukes of Cambridge and Sussex walked next, the
Lord Chamberlain and Vice-Chamberlain, with Lord Melbourne between, bearing
the Sword of State before the Queen.

Her Majesty's train was carried by twelve unmarried ladies, her
bridesmaids. Five of these, Lady Fanny Cowper, Lady Mary Grimston, Lady
Adelaide Paget, Lady Caroline Gordon Lennox, and Lady Catherine Stanhope,
had been among her Majesty's train-bearers at the coronation. Of the three
other fair train-bearers on that occasion, one at least, Lady Anne
Wentworth Fitzwilliam, was already a wedded wife. The remaining seven
bridesmaids were Lady Elizabeth West, Lady Eleanor Paget, Lady Elizabeth
Howard, Lady Ida Hay, Lady Jane Bouverie, Lady Mary Howard, and Lady Sarah
Villiers. These noble maidens were in white satin like their royal
mistress, but for her orange blossoms they wore white roses. Still more
than on their former appearance together, the high-bred English loveliness
of the party attracted universal admiration.

The Master of the Horse and the Mistress of the Robes, the Ladies of the
Bedchamber, Maids of Honour, and Women of the Bedchamber followed, closed
in by Yeomen of the Guard and Gentlemen-at-Arms.

In the chapel there had been a crowd of English nobility and foreign
ambassadors awaiting the arrival of Prince Albert, when at twenty minutes
past twelve he walked up the aisle, carrying a prayer-book covered with
green velvet. He advanced, bowing to each side, followed by his supporters
to the altar-rail, before which stood four chairs of State, provided for
the Queen, the Prince, and, to right and left of them, Queen Adelaide and
the Duchess of Kent. The Queen-dowager was in her place, wearing a dress of
purple velvet and ermine; the bridegroom kissed her hand and entered into
conversation with her, while his father and brother took their seats near
him.

The Queen entered the chapel at twenty-five minutes to one, and immediately
proceeded to her chair in front of the altar-rails. She knelt down and
prayed, and then seated herself. Her mother was on her left side. Behind
her stood her bridesmaids and train-bearers. On stools to right and left
sat the members of the Royal Family. The Archbishop of Canterbury and the
Bishop of London were already at the altar. In a few minutes the Queen and
the Prince advanced to the communion-table. The service was the beautiful,
simple service of the Church of England, unchanged in any respect. In reply
to the question, "Who giveth this woman to be married to this man?" the
Duke of Sussex presented himself. The Christian-names "Albert" and
"Victoria" were all the names used. Both Queen and Prince answered
distinctly and audibly. The Prince undertook to love, comfort, and honour
his wife, to have and to hold her for better, for worse, for richer, for
poorer; the Queen promised to obey as well as to love and cherish her
husband till death them did part, like any other pair plighting their
troth. When the ring was put on the finger, at a concerted signal the Park
and Tower guns fired a royal salute and all London knew that her Majesty
was a married woman.

The usual congratulations were exchanged amongst the family party before
they re-formed themselves into the order of procession. The Duke of Sussex
in his character of father kissed his niece heartily on the cheek besides
shaking her by the hand. The Queen stepped quickly across and kissed her
aunt, Queen Adelaide, whose hand Prince Albert saluted again. The
procession returned in the same order, except that the bride and bridegroom
walked side by side and hand in hand, the wedding-ring being seen on the
ungloved hand. Her Majesty spoke once or twice to Lord Uxbridge, the Lord
Chamberlain, as if expressing her wishes with regard to the procession. Her
paleness had been succeeded by a little flush, and she was smiling
brightly. On the appearance of the couple they were received with clapping
of hands and waving of handkerchiefs. In the Throne-room the marriage was
attested and the register signed "on a splendid table prepared for the
purpose."

The whole company then repaired to Buckingham Palace, Prince Albert driving
in the carriage with the Queen. The sight of the pair was hailed everywhere
along the short route with loud cheering, to the joyous sound of which "the
Queen walked up the grand staircase, in the presence of her court, leaning
on her husband's arm."

An eye-witness--the Dowager Lady Lyttelton, who, both as a Lady of the
Bedchamber and Governess to the royal children, knew the Queen and Prince
well--has recorded her impression of the chief actor in the scene. "The
Queen's look and manner were very pleasing, her eyes much swollen with
tears, but great happiness in her countenance, and her look of confidence
and comfort at the Prince when they walked away as man and wife was very
pleasing to see. I understand she is in extremely high spirits since; such
a new thing to her to _dare_ to be unguarded in conversation with
anybody, and, with her frank and fearless nature, the restraints she has
hitherto been under from one reason or another with everybody must have
been most painful." The wedding-breakfast with the toast of the day
followed, then the departure for Windsor, on which the skies smiled, for
the clouds suddenly cleared away and the sun shone out on the journey and
the many thousand spectators on the way.

The Queen and Prince drove in one of the five carriages--four of which
contained the suite inseparable from a couple of such rank. The first
carriage conveyed the Ladies in Waiting, succeeded by a party of cavalry.
The travelling chariot came next in order, and was enthusiastically hailed,
bride and bridegroom responding graciously to the acclamations. Her
Majesty's travelling dress was bridal-like: a pelisse of white satin
trimmed with swans' down, a white satin bonnet and feather. The Prince was
in dark clothes. The party left before four, but did not arrive at Windsor
till nearly seven--long after darkness had descended on the landscape. Eton
and Windsor were in the height of excitement, in a very frenzy of
rejoicing. The travellers wended their way through a living mass in
brilliantly illuminated streets, amidst the sending up of showers of
rockets, the ringing of bells, the huzzaing of the people, the glad
shouting of the Eton boys. Her Majesty was handed from the carriage by the
Prince, she took his arm and the two entered the castle after a right royal
welcome home.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning celebrated this event also in her eloquent
fashion.

"She vows to love who vowed to rule, the chosen at her side,
Let none say 'God preserve the Queen,' but rather 'Bless the Bride.'
None blow the trump, none bend the knee, none violate the dream
Wherein no monarch but a wife, she to herself may seem;
Or if you say, 'Preserve the Queen,' oh, breathe it inward, low--
She is a _woman_ and _beloved_, and 'tis enough but so.
Count it enough, thou noble Prince, who tak'st her by the hand,
And claimest for thy lady-love our Lady of the land.
And since, Prince Albert, men have called thy spirit high and rare,
And true to truth and brave for truth as some at Augsburg were,
We charge thee by thy lofty thoughts and by thy poet-mind,
Which not by glory and degree takes measure of mankind,
Esteem that wedded hand less dear for sceptre than for ring,
And hold her uncrowned womanhood to be the royal thing."

Up in London and all over the country there were feasts and galas for rich
and poor. There was a State banquet, attended by very high and mighty
company, in the Banqueting-room at St. James's. Grand dinners were given by
the members of the Cabinet; the theatres were free for the night to great
and small; at each the National Anthem was sung amidst deafening applause;
at Drury Lane there was a curious emblematical ballet--like a revival of
the old masques, ending with a representation of the Queen and Prince
surrounded by fireworks, which no doubt afforded immense satisfaction to
the audience.

The Queen's wedding-cake was three hundred pounds in weight, three yards in
circumference, and fourteen inches in depth. In recognition of the national
interest of the wedding, the figure of Hymen, on the top, was replaced by
Britannia in the act of blessing the royal pair, who, as a critic observed,
were represented somewhat incongruously in the costume of ancient Rome. At
the feet of the image of Prince Albert, several inches high, lay a dog, the
emblem of fidelity. At the feet of the image of her Majesty nestled a pair
of turtle-doves, the token of love and felicity. A Cupid wrote in a volume,
spread open on his knees, for the edification of the capering Cupids
around, the auspicious "10th of February, 1840," the date of the marriage;
and there were the usual bouquets of white flowers, tied with true lovers'
knots of white riband, to be distributed to the guests at the wedding
breakfast and kept as mementoes of the event.

There were other trophies certain to be cherished and preserved among
family treasures, and perhaps shown to future generations, as we sometimes
see, turning up in museums and art collections, relics of the marriages of
Mary Tudor and Catharine of Aragon. These were the bridesmaids' brooches.
They were the royal gift to the noble maidens, several of whom had, two
years before, received rings from the same source to commemorate the
services of the train-bearers at the Coronation. These brooches were in the
shape of a bird, the body being formed entirely of turquoises, the eyes
were rubies, and the beak a diamond, the claws were of pure gold, and
rested on pearls of great size and value. The design and workmanship were
according to the Queen's directions.

The twelve beautiful girls who received the gifts have since fulfilled
their various destinies--each has "dreed her weird," according to the
solemn, sad old Scotch phrase. Some, perhaps the happiest, have passed
betimes into the silent land; the survivors are elderly women, with
granddaughters as lovely as they themselves were in their opening day. One
became a princess--Lady Sarah Villiers married Prince Nicholas Esterhazy.
Two are duchesses--Lady Elizabeth Sackville-West, Duchess of Bedford; and
Lady Catherine Stanhope, married first to Lord Dalmeny, eldest son of the
Earl of Rosebery, and secondly to the Duke of Cleveland. Three are
countesses--Lady Caroline Gordon Lennox, Countess of Bessborough; Lady Mary
Grimston, Countess of Radnor; and Lady Ida Hay, Countess of Gainsborough.
Lady Fanny Cowper, whose beauty was much admired by Leslie, the painter,
married Lord Jocelyn, eldest son of the Earl of Roden. Lord Jocelyn was
one of the victims to cholera in 1854. He was seized while on duty at
Buckingham Palace, and died after two hours' illness in Lady Palmerston's
drawing-room. Lady Mary Howard became the wife of Baron Foley. One
bridesmaid, Lady Jane Bouverie, married a simple country gentleman, Mr.
Ellis, of Glenaquoich.

CHAPTER IX.
A ROYAL PAIR.

The Queen and the Prince were only one whole day holding state by
themselves at Windsor. It is not given to a royal couple to flee away into
the wilds or to shut themselves up from their friends and the world like
meaner people; whether a prolonged interval of retirement be spent in
smiling or in sulking, according to cynical bachelors and spinsters, it is
not granted to kings and queens. On the single day of grace which her
Majesty claimed she wrote to Baron Stockmar the emphatic estimate of the
man of her choice. "There cannot exist a dearer, purer, nobler being in the
world than the Prince." A young bride's fond judgment; but to her was given
the deep joy of finding that time only confirmed the proud and glad
conviction of that first day of wedlock.

On Wednesday, the 12th, the royal couple at Windsor were rejoined by the
Duchess of Kent, the Duke of Coburg, the hereditary Prince, and the whole
Court. Then two more days of holiday were spent with something of the
heartiness of old times, when brides and bridegrooms did not seem either as
if they were ashamed of their happiness or too selfish to share it with
their friends. No doubt there were feasting and toasting, and there was
merry dancing each night.

On Friday, the 14th, the Court returned to London, that the principal
person might gratify the people by appearing in public and that she might
take up once more the burden of a sovereign's duties. Addresses were
received from the Houses of Parliament. The theatres were visited in
state. On the 19th of the month the Queen held her first levee after her
marriage, when the Prince took his place at her left hand. On Sunday, the
20th, the newly-married couple attended divine service together in the
Chapel Royal, St. James's, and were loudly cheered on their way through the
Park.

Buckingham Palace was to continue the Queen's town residence, but St.
James's, by virtue of its seniority in age and priority in historical
associations, remained for a considerable time the theatre of all the State
ceremonials which were celebrated in town until gradually modifications of
the rule were established. A chapel was fitted up in Buckingham Palace,
which accommodated the household in comparative privacy, and prevented the
inconvenience of driving in all states of the health and the weather for
public worship at the neighbouring palace chapel. It was found that there
was better accommodation for holding Drawing-rooms, and less crowding and
inconvenience to the ladies attending them, when the Drawing-rooms were
held at Buckingham Palace instead of St. James's. The levees are nearly all
that is left to St. James's, in addition to the fact that it contains the
offices of the Lord Chamberlain, &c. But the place where her Majesty was
proclaimed Queen and wedded deserves a parting word.

The visitor to St. James's passes up the great staircase, which has been
trodden by the feet of so many generations, bound on such different
errands. Here and there, from a picture-frame high up on the wall, a
painted face looks down immovably on the comings and goings below. The
Guard-room has a few stands of glittering arms and one or two women's
portraits; altogether a different Guard-room from what it must have been
when it received its name. Beyond is the Armoury, where arms bristle in
sheaves and piles, surmounted by hauberks and casques, smooth and polished
as if they had never been dinted in battle or rusted with blood. Queen
Anne's Drawing-room, spacious and stately, is resplendent in yellow satin.
Old St. James's has sustained a recent renovation, its faded gorgeousness
has been renewed, not without a difficult compromise between the
unhesitating magnificence of the past and the subdued taste of the present
day. The compromise is honourable to the taste of the decorator, for there
is no stinting of rich effect, stinting which would have been out of place,
in the great doors, picked out and embossed, the elaborately devised and
wrought walls and ceilings, the huge chandeliers, &c. But warm, deep
crimson is relieved by cool pale green, and sage wainscot meets the dull
red of feathery leaves on other walls. The Queen's Closet, which misses its
meaning when it is called a boudoir, with the steel-like embroidery on its
walls, matching the grey blue of its cut velvet hangings, recalls the
natural pauses in a busy life, when the Queen awaits the call of public
duty, or withdraws for a breathing space from the pressure of fatiguing
obligations.

In more than one of the principal rooms there are low brass screens or
railings drawn across the room, to be used as barricades; and the
uninitiated hears with due respect that behind those the ambassadors are
supposed to congregate, while these fence the approach to the throne.

In spite of such precautions, large Drawing-rooms became latterly
hard-pressed crowds struggling to make their way, and the State-rooms of
Buckingham Palace were put in request as affording better facilities for
these ceremonies.

There is a picture gallery where a long row of Kings and Queens, in their
full-length portraits, stand like Banquo's descendants. The portraits begin
with that of bluff King Hal, very bluff and strident. According to Mr.
Hare's account, which he has taken from Holinshed, Henry VIII. got St.
James's when it was an hospital for "fourteen maidens that were leprous,"
and having pensioned off the sisters, "reared a fine mansion and park" in
the room of the hospital. The picture of his young son is a quaint, slim
edition of his father. There is a sad and stiff Mary Tudor, who laid down
her embittered and brokenhearted life in this palace, and by her side, as
she seldom was in the flesh, a high-ruffed, yellow-haired, peaked-chinned
Elizabeth--a noble shrew. The British Solomon has the sword-proof padding
of his doublet and trunk hose very conspicuous. A wide contrast is a
romantic, tragic King Charles, with a melancholy remembrance in his long
face and drooping eyes of the day when he bade farewell to the world at St.
James's and left it for the scaffold at Whitehall. His swarthy periwigged
sons balance the sister queens, Mary and Anne. St. James's, like Kensington
and Hampton Court, seems somehow peculiarly associated with them. Though
other and more striking royal figures dwelt there both before and after the
two last of the reigning Stuarts, they have left a distinct impression of
themselves, together with a Sir Peter Lely and a Sir Godfrey Kneller
flavour about all the more prominent quarters of the palace. The likenesses
of Mary and Anne occur as they must have appeared before they lost the
comeliness of youth, when St. James's was their home, the house of their
father, the Duke of York and Anne his Duchess, where the two sisters wedded
in turn a princely hero and a princely nobody.

In the Throne-room, amidst the portraits of later sovereigns to which royal
robes and the painter's art have supplied an adventitious dignity, there
are fine likenesses of the Queen and Prince Albert, which must have been
taken soon after their marriage, when they were in the first bloom of their
youth and happiness. Her Majesty wears a royal mantle and the riband of the
Garter, like her compeers; behind her rise the towers of Windsor.

In the double corridor, along which two streams of company flow different
ways to and from the Presence-chamber, as the blood flows in the veins and
arteries, are more pictures--those of some charming children. A stout
little Prince Rupert before he ever smelt the smoke of battle or put pencil
to paper. Representations of almost equally old-world-looking children of
the Georgian era by their royal mother's knee, one child bearing such a bow
as figures often in the hands of children in the portraits of the period; a
princely boy in miniature robes of State, with a queen's hand on his
shoulder; a little solitary flaxen-haired child with a tambourine. The bow
has long been unbent, the royal mother and child are together again, the
music of the tambourine is mute.

In the Banqueting-room there are great battle-pieces by land and sea from
Tournay to Trafalgar, like a memory of the Hall of Battles at Versailles.

The Chapel Royal, where the Queen was made a wife, has ceased in a measure
to be a royal place of worship. Still within its narrow bounds and plain
walls a highly aristocratic congregation have, if they choose, a right to
the services of the dean and sub-dean and the five-and-thirty
chaplains--not to say of the bishops duly appointed to officiate on special
occasions. Not only is the royal closet still in readiness furnished with
its chairs of State, there are other closets or small galleries for the
Household, peeresses and their daughters, &c. The simplest pew below
belongs to the Lord Chamberlain, the Lord Steward, peers and their sons, or
members of Parliament, &c. The Chapel Royal, like the State-rooms, is fresh
and spruce from renewal. It has, however, wisely avoided all departure from
the original character of the building, which has nothing but the carved
roof and the great square window to distinguish it from any other chapel of
the same size and style. It is difficult to realise that it was here Queen
Mary listened attentively to Bishop Burnet, and Queen Caroline was guilty
of talking, while Princess Emily brought her little dog under her arm. Nor
is it easy to fancy the brilliance of the scene in the quiet place when it
was lined from floor to ceiling with tier upon tier of seats for the
noblest in the land, when every inch of standing-room had its fit occupant,
and a princely gathering was grouped before the glittering altar to hear a
Queen plight her troth.

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