The Married Life of Queen Victoria - Paperback

THE M AHMED LIFE O F OUEEN VICTORIA BY CLARE JERROLD Author of Tht Early Court ef Queen rirtoria. Alexandria Victoria Fidei, Hm hiu how run the jargon being on the throne.---Calvertfy. NEW YORK i, . rcTN vrs SONS 913 TO A. M. BROADLEY MOST GENEROUS OF BIBLIOPHILES IN GRATITUDE PREFACE THE married life of an individual predicates a second individual, and this volume is as much a con sideration of the character of the Prince Consort as of that of Queen Victoria. Though in his youth he pro fessed liberal tendencies, the Prince was a strong up holder of Monarchy, and resisted with all his strength anything that he considered an encroachment on the powers of the Crown. He went further, for his life in England was, on one side of it, a long attempt to put back the hands of the clock and reinstate authority which had already been delegated to Parliament. Had the Prince lived long, the history of England would have been very different from what it is, for either our Parliament would have succumbed to his ideals, and England would have become reactionary, or the struggle between the people and the Crown would have ended in the abolition of the Monarchy and it is not difficult to believe which part the English people would have chosen in the critical time of thirty and forty years ago. Furthermore, had the Prince lived there would have been no great Queen Victoria, for by 1860 the vU vni PREFACE Queen had so entirely transferred all work to her husband that, excepting as an appearance and a signa ture, the Queen-Regnant may almost he said not to have existed a state of things which would eventually have had to be acknowledged it would have been upon that point that an English revolution wouldhave occurred. However, the Prince was not physically strong enough to bear the burden. That T have written more fully about the first ten years of the married life than about the second is due to the fact that the Royal pair were more interest ing to the public then than later they were more studied, mon thought about, and more written about. Later, when they had become a habit, it needed special events to raise marked comment. It is a curious fact that of Prince Albert only two Lives Bave been written the five-volume work by Sir Theodore Martin, and The Early Year of the Prince Consort, by the Mem, C. Grey both written by command of Queen Victoria, to both of which she supplied all personal matter, and both of whirh were therefore essentially her books. Among recently published volumes I have found Mr. Edmund B. cPAuvtrgnes work on The Cohurgs helpful. To my friend, Mr. A. M. Broadley, I must acknow ledge my great gratitude for allowing nie to make use of his fine library, and of selecting from his valuable collection of prints the illustrations to this volume, C. I. HAMWf N-mi Tf A IKS t January CONTENTS CHAPTER I PACK THE QUEENS BRIDEGROOM ...... i CHAPTER II THE YOUNG PRINCE . . . . . . .21 CHAPTER HI THB QUEEN AND THE PRINCE ..... 41 CHAPTER IV THE QUEENS CHILDREN ..... 71 CHAPTER V THE QUEKN AND SIR ROBERT PEKL . . . .106 CHAPTER VI THE QUEEN AND IRELAND ...., 136 CHAPTER VII THE QUERN AND Louis PHILIPPE . x6a CHAPTER VIII THE QUKKN AND THE SPANISH MARRIAGES . . .188 CHAPTER IX THK QUEENS HOMES 2x8 CHAPTER X THE QUEEN ANI THE PRESSMAN . .250 x CONTENTS CHAPTER XI THE QUEEN AND THE PROFESSIONS . . - 285 CHAPTER XII THE QUEENS VISITS ....... 30 CHAPTER XIII THE QUEEN AND THECRIMEA, . - 333 CHAPTER XIV THE QUEEN AND THE ENI . . . . .363 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Queen Victoria. From a painting by Winterhalter . Frontispiece Queen Victoria To face page 22 Sarah, Lady Lyttelton. From a pastel by Swinton in the possession of Viscount Cobham . 60 H. R. H. Prince Albert. From a painting by Sir W. C. Ross, R. A, 96 Light Sovereigns. From an old political sketch . 122 Lord George Bentinck 134 Lady Jocelyn. From a painting by J. Hayter . 146 Queen Victoria and Prince Albert in Fancy Dress ...