Year: 1867

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Queen Victoria has pnblished book on
the early life of the late Prince Consort,
much of which is her own composition,
and all of which has had her careful sup
pervision. The record is interesting, but
no part of it will attract so much attention
as the Queens account Of her courtship
and marriage. The match had long been
proposed between the Prince and Princess,
who were cousins, born within some three
months of each other, having the same
midwife to preside at their birth. They
saw each other at the age Of sever teen.
when Prince ALBERT made visit to his
| cousin at kensington Palace. A year after
VICTORIA became Queen Of England, and
her head was a little turned with her new
grandeur. There rs a story of love af-
fair, and handsome young nobleman
sent off to India. There is no hint of this,
but something induced the Queen to put
off the proposed marriage for three years,
when the Prince came to England deter
mined not to be sacrificed in that way, but
to break it off himself, unless it were set
tied. The Queen relented and rcpented,
and, as she says, has ever since bitterly
regretted that she kept him waiting. II
was necessary, in their POSITIONS, that she
should take the initiative-that she should
pop the question. A poor German Prince
could not ask the Queen Of one of the most
powerful kingdoms in the world to marry
him. So she sent for the Prince, and
brayely asked him to name the happy day.


This rendered the Prince exceedingly
happy, as is evinced in a letter to his
grandmother. He writes that the Queen
declared in genuine eutburst of love that
he had gained her whole heart, and asked
him to make the sacrifice Of marrying her
the only thing that troubled her:being her
belief that she was not worthy Of him.
And he adds:


The Joyous openness Of manner with
which she told me this quite enchanted
me, and was quite carried away by it,
She is really most good and amiable, and
| am quite sure Heaven has not given me
into evil hands, that we shall be happy to-
gether. Since that moment Victoria does
whatever she fancies should wish or like,
and we talk together great deal about
our future life, which she promises me to
make as happy as possible .4ltst


Andynow the widowed Queen, looking
back at her past life, regrets every day the
loss of that dear companionship, whose
memory seems her only solace, and she
writes t tr


g Nor can the Queen now think, without
indignation against herself, of her wish to
keep the Prince waiting for probably three
or four years, at the risk of running allhis
prospects for life until she might feel in
clined to marry And the Prince has
since told her that he came over in 1889
with the intention of telling her that if sho
could not make up her mind, she must un-
derstand that he could not now wait for
decision, as he had done at former peri
cd when his marriage was first talked
about. The only excuse the Queen can
make for herself is in the fact that the sud-
den change from the secluded life Mt Ken
sington to the independence of her position
as Queen Regent, at the age of eighteen,
put all ideas of marriage out of her mind,
which she now most bitterly repents. 1to


8 A worse school for young girl, or one
more detrimental to all natural feelings
and affections. cannot well be imagined,
than the position Of a Queen at eighteen.
without experience and without husband
to guide and support her. This the Queen
can state from painful experience, and she
thanks God that none of her dear daugh-
ters are exposed to such danger"