, 1901-01-23

Bronte, Harriet Martineau. The queen
portrayed to every English home the
tender, affectionate, child bearing wom-
an, and thus her example upon the
try has been of the greatest influence
upon its domestic civilization. The high
est figure there is still like the Madonna,
she who cvaded no responsibility OF ma
lures and by her fruitful wifehood pro
longcd her years and lived to see her
children's grandchildren.
Indeed the compensations for beiA1
queen of England are not such as a friv-
olous woman anywhere would long en-
joy. She cannot flirt - the kingdom
watches her. A widow at AZ, she made
no overtures to marry anybody. Even
her confidence in her old BOBBY, John
Brown, was liable to be misinterpreted by
e low plane of English criticism. Every
vote of money to her sons-in-law wa
hailed with a cry in the socialistic prints
of another German eating our bread"
AS his beer shown, several attempts had
been made to assassinate her. Privacy she
can only nave after a fashion, and there
fore HES to the sparse parts of Scotland
often, where the climate is cold and show
cry. She cannot leave the realm at will
any more than the queen bee can leave
the hive. Sometimes she went abroad in
cognito, well watched, well begged from.
Her girls were her treasures. Her boys
went off and got their wives. Her eldest
son was fond of free and vivacious com
pany, and she saw most of him when ne
was sick. Her length of life she knew
must awaken hard thoughts in them who
would reign in her stead.
She loved a glass Of beer, but it made
her fat. Her real home was Windso
castle, an hour from London, among til
bones of her predecessors-a dull little
village dominated by an old stone palace
with n hard, ~treeless stone yard, but re
lieved by the appendage of a fine forest.
Her London palace was an old, stilted
thing. Her drawing rooms were held in
an old, low, brick palace, like n stable.
The best the queen possessed, next to
her family and her education, was the
society of her distinguished subjects,
who had sometimes read to her Tenny-
son, Dickens, Norman Mcleod, Dean
Stanley.
She refused to cnnoble any man of the
art or literary fields whose private life
was tainted. A spotless walk, n domes-
tic diploma, she demanded from these.
Her receptions were not scanned like
those of some of our senatorial parve-
nues, to see if an obscure person got In,
but the brazen and cunning and those
made prosperous by low ways were turn
ed back when the lists were scanned.
She liked tho Germans because they
were of her lineage, the Americans be-
cause they were of her race, and she be-
friended the French empress when she
had nothing ambitious to hope for.
Victoria's reign has been great in her
subjects, in Besselmer, Bulwer, Foley
Faraday, Darwin, Tennyson. She stands
above a galaxy of great gentleman like
their tutelar saint. Her kingdom has
had unexampled prosperity, and she had
been opposed to war.
We are to mention that Victoria never
was born to the crown and never was
married to a king.
Her father was n ruined younger son
Of a king; her husband the younger son
of a poor German duke. The vices of
her uncles emptied the throne of good pos
| terity and let her up. She married be-
fore she was spoiled, and her husband
was her own cousin. How many private
lives are there demure and acquiescent?
She has proved that 'the meek shall in
herit the earth"
The woman who paid her deceased
fathers debts in a spirit of honor he did
not have became empress of 800, 00O, 900
of the oldest people and princes in the
world.
Had Victoria disdained her friend Leo
pold's advice to marry his nephew Al
bert, the perils and batteries of court 30
ciety might have made her another Eliz-
abeth, but she hearkened to advice and
blessed the poor young man with her
hand and awoke to the blessings Of ma
ture in smiling babes and the dignity Of
a large motherhood. Eugene with n
babe mourns his barbarous death. Queen
Isabella of Spain loses her crown and is
an exile from her son. Victoria, nodded
by the hand of love and husbandry, sur
vived every contemporary of her corona
ton and takes precedence Of the women
of all the world. Three queens" say
the English, Elizabeth, Anne, Victoria.
have given us our greatest reigns."
1t is high treason in the queen to be
unchaste. She would be tried by the
peers. She pays no toll, is relieved from
amercement in any court. Her husband,
| however, does not commit high treason
if unfaithful.
Victoria surrendered at the commence
ment of her reign her hereditary revenues
for the sum of nearly + 1000, 900 per an
mum. Of this her purse received direct
$500, 900, her house and household 3d.
115, 900; for aims, the court, etc, the re-
mainder. Her probable personal income
was $500, 900 a year clear, 10 times our
presidents, not including her own prop
erty. The Prince of Wales receives
5000, 900, his wife $4,000, and each Of
the family a liberal provision. Pensions
of Sc, 900 a year she was allowed to give
amounted i'll 1892 to 1925, 0OO. She there
fore handled &, $50 900 a year. Vic
toria's refusal to change the official la
| dies of the bedchamber in 1889 led to the
prolongation of Melbourne's ministry till
1871, covering the period of Victories
courtship and marriage.
Victoria lost by death In 1878 her
dauphter Alice of Hesse: the Duke of