| Victoria, Queen of England |
| by James Parton, 1868 |
|
Related topics: • About Queen Victoria |
 |
| Victoria in 1850 Portrait from www.arttoday.com Used with permission |
Alas! that a union productive of so much happiness and so much good should have been prematurely sundered by death. In the spring of 1862 the Prince was attacked at Windsor Castle by a disease which the physicians pronounced to be gastric fever. After a short illness the patient sank into a kind of stupor, from which he roused himself with ever-increasing difficulty. Americans will never forget that the last act of this truly wise and noble prince was to review the draft of the letter which the ministry proposed to send to the American government, demanding the return of the confederate commissioners taken from a British Mail Steamer by Captain Wilkes of the United States Navy. Every tory mind in the universe desired that letter to be couched in such language as would preclude the possibility of a peaceful issue. But Prince Albert had not a tory mind.
Collecting, with a great effort, his benumbing faculties, he read the letter carefully over, and suggested changes which softened its tone, and made far easier a compliance with its just demands. Soon after the performance of this duty, so honorable to his memory, he relapsed into a lethargy from which death alone released him. The queen was heart-broken. Ever since that lamentable day, she has been a mourner. Her own pathetic words touchingly express the sense she had of his value to her, and of the irreparable nature of her loss.
"It will now be, in fact," she said, "the beginning of a new reign."
I have spoken of the sovereignty of this lady as a "fiction," and compared it with one of the romantic creations of Sir Walter Scott. It is not, however, wholly fictitious. In one respect, it has been a solid and precious reality.
The time has not yet come when nations can safely dispense with imposing and venerable fictions; and until they can, it is highly desirable that those fictions should not be too closely inspected, nor too frankly criticised. If the sailor-king, William the Fourth, had been succeeded by another male creature so devoid of all human worth and dignity as George the Fourth, so licentious, so extravagant, so ignorant, and so vain, could he have reigned over England for thirty peaceful years? Probably not. Long ere this, the sensible people of Great Britain would have begun to ask themselves, " Why maintain this costly pageant, since it is but a pageant?" The reign of this virtuous and amiable queen has postponed this question for thirty years, during which the people of England have been gaining political knowledge and experience, and drawing nearer the time when it will be safe and expedient to let that man have the name of governing England who does actually bear the chief part in governing. History will, perhaps, decide that this was the chief service which Queen Victoria rendered her country.
Back to first page
Pages: 1 >2 >3 >4 >5 >6 >7 >8 >9 >10 >11 >12 >13 >14 >15 >16 >17
Also on this site:
