THE QUEEN'S FIRST VISIT TO GERMANY.
On the evening of the day that she prorogued Parliament, the Queen and the Prince with the Earl of Aberdeen as the minister in attendance, started from Buckingham Palace that she might pay her first visit to Germany. Surely none of all the new places she had visited within the last few years could have been of such surpassing interest to the traveller. It was her mother's country as well as her husband's, the home of her brother and sister, the place of which she must have heard, with which she must have had the kindliest associations from her earliest years.
The first stage of the journey—in stormy weather, unfortunately—was to Antwerp, where the party did not land till the following day, when they proceeded to Malines, where they were met by King Leopold and Queen Louise, who parted from their royal niece at Verviers. On the Prussian frontier Lord Westmoreland, the English ambassador, and Baron Bunsen met her Majesty. "To hear the people speak German," she wrote in her Journal, "to see the German soldiers, seemed to me so singular. I overheard people saying that I looked very English."
At Aix-la-Chapelle the King and Prince of Prussia received the visitors and accompanied them to Cologne. The ancient dirty town of the Three Kings gave the strangers an enthusiastic reception. The burghers even did their best to get rid of the unsavoury odours which distinguish the town of sweet essences, by pouring eau-de-Cologne on the roadways.
At Bruhl the Queen and the Prince were taken to the palace, where they found the Queen of Prussia, whose hostility to English and devotion to Russian interests when Lord Bloomfield represented the English Government at Berlin, are recorded by Lady Bloomfield. With the Queen was her sister-in-law, the Princess of Prussia, and the Court. The party went into one of the salons to hear the famous tatoo played by four hundred musicians, in the middle of an illumination by means of torches and coloured lamps. The Queen was reminded that she was in a land of music by hearing at a concert, in which sixty regimental bands assisted, "God save the Queen" better played than she had ever heard it before. "We felt so strange to be in Germany at last," repeats her Majesty, dwelling on the pleasant sensation, "at Bruhl, which Albert said he used to go and visit from Bonn."
The next day the visitors went to Bonn, accompanied by the King and Queen of Prussia. At the house of Prince Furstenberg many professors who had known Prince Albert were presented to the Queen, "which interested me very much," the happy wife says simply. "They were greatly delighted to see Albert and pleased to see me…. I felt as if I knew them all from Albert having told me so much about them." The experience is known to many a bride whose husband takes her proudly to his old alma mater.
The day was made yet more memorable by the unveiling of a statue to Beethoven. But, by an unlucky contretemps, the royal party on the balcony found the back of the statue presented to their gaze. The Freischutzen fired a feu-de-joie. A chorale was sung. The people cheered and the band played a Dusch—such a flourish of trumpets as is given in Germany when a health is drunk.
The travellers then went to the Prince's "former little house." The Queen writes, "It was such a pleasure for me to be able to see this house. We went all over it, and it is just as it was, in no way altered…. We went into the little bower in the garden, from which you have a beautiful view of the Kreuzberg—a convent situated on the top of a hill. The Siebengebirge (seven mountains) you also see, but the view of them is a good deal built up."
This visiting together the ground once so familiar to the Prince formed an era in two lives. It was the fulfilment of a beautiful, brilliant expectation which had been half dim and vague when the ardent lad was a quiet, diligent student, living simply, almost frugally, like the other students at the university on the Rhine, and his little cousin across the German Ocean, from whom he had parted in the homely red-brick palace of Kensington, had been proclaimed Queen of a great country. The prospect of their union was still very uncertain in those days, and yet it must sometimes have crossed his mind as he built air-castles in the middle of his reading; or strolled with a comrade along those old-fashioned streets, among their population of "wild-looking students," with long fair hair, pipes between their lips, and the scars of many a sword-duel on forehead and cheek; or penetrated into the country, where the brown peasant women, "with curious caps and handkerchiefs," came bearing their burden of sticks from the forest, like figures in old fairy tales. He must have told himself that the time might come when something like the transformation of a fairy-tale would be effected on his account; the plain living and high-thinking and college discipline of Bonn be exchanged for the dignity and influence of an English sovereign's consort. Then, perhaps, he would bring his bride to the dear old "fatherland," and show her where he had dreamt about her among his books.
At the banquet in the afternoon the accomplished King gave the Queen's health in a speech fit for a poet. He referred to a word sweet alike to British and German hearts. Thirty years before it had echoed on the heights of Waterloo from British and German tongues, after days of hot and desperate fighting, to mark the glorious triumph of their brotherhood in arms. "Now it resounds on the banks of our fair Rhine, amidst the blessings of that peace which was the hallowed fruit of the great conflict. That word is 'Victoria.' Gentlemen, drink to the health of her Majesty the Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and to that of her august consort."
"The Queen," remarked Bunsen, "bowed at the first word, but much lower at the second. Her eyes brightened through tears, and as the King was taking his seat again, she rose and bent towards him and kissed his cheek, then took her seat again with a beaming countenance."
After the four-o'clock dinner, the royal party returned to Cologne, and from a steamer on the Rhine saw, through a drizzle of rain which did not greatly mar the spectacle, a splendid display of fireworks and illumination of the town, in which the great cathedral "seemed to glow with fire."
We quote a picturesque description of the striking scene. "The Rhine was made one vast feu-de-joie. As darkness closed in, the dim city began to put forth buds of light. Lines of twinkling brightness darted like liquid gold or silver from pile to pile, then by the bridge of boats across the river, up the masts of the shipping, and along the road on the opposite bank. Rockets now shot from all parts of the horizon. The royal party embarked in a steamer at St. Tremond and glided down by the river. As they passed the banks blazed with fireworks and musketry. At their approach the bridge glowed with redoubled light, and, opening, let the vessel pass to Cologne, whose cathedral burst forth a building of light, every detail of the architecture being made out in delicately-coloured lamps—pinkish, with an underglow of orange. Traversing in carriages the illuminated and vociferous city, the King and his companions returned by the railroad to Bruhl."
Next morning there was a great concert at Bonn—part of the Beethoven festival, in which much fine music was given, but, oddly enough, not much of Beethoven's, to her Majesty's regret. The Queen drove to the University—in the classrooms of which the Prince had sat as a student—and saw more of the professors who had taught him, and of students similar to those who had been his class-fellows. Then she went once more to Cologne, and visited its glory, the cathedral, at that time unfinished, returning to Bruhl to hail with delight the arrival of the King and Queen of the Belgians. "It seems like a dream to them and to me to see each other in Germany," the Queen wrote once more. The passages from her Majesty's Journal read as if she were pleased to congratulate herself on being at last with Prince Albert in his native country.
The last day at Cologne ended in another great concert, conducted by Meyerbeer, for which he had composed a cantata in honour of the Queen. Jenny Lind sang in the concert. It was her Majesty's first opportunity of hearing the great singer, who, of all her sister singers, has most identified herself with England, and from her noble, womanly character and domestic virtues, endeared herself to English hearts.
The tutelary genius of the river which is the Germans' watchword was not able to procure the Queen her weather for her sail on its green waters. Rain fell or threatened for both of the days. Not even the presence of three queens—of England, Prussia, and Belgium—two kings, a prince consort, an archduke, and a future emperor and empress, could propitiate the adverse barometer, or change the sulky face of the sky. Between showers the Queen had a glimpse of the romantic scenery, and perhaps Ehrenbreitstein was most in character when the smoke from the firing of twenty thousand troops "brought home to the imagination the din and lurid splendours of a battle."
The halt was made at Schlossenfels, which included among its distinguished guests Humboldt and Prince Metternich. Next day the King and Queen of Prussia took leave of their visitors, still under heavy rain. The weather cleared afterwards for a time, however, and beautiful Bingen, with the rest of the Rhenish country, was seen in sunshine. The only inconvenience remaining was the thunder of cannons and rattle of muskets which every loyal village kept up.
At Mayence the Queen was received by the Governor, Prince William of Prussia, and the Austrian commander, while the Prussian and Austrian troops, with their bands, gave a torchlight serenade before the hotel windows. On the rest-day which Sunday secured, the Queen saw the good nurse who had brought the royal pair into the world. Her Majesty had also her first introduction to one of her future sons-in-law—an unforeseen kinsman then—Prince Louis of Hesse, whom she noticed as "a very fine boy of eight, nice, and full of intelligence."
There were still long leagues to drive, posting, before Coburg could be reached, and the party started from Mayence in two travelling carriages as early as seven o'clock next morning. They went by Frankfort to Aschaffenburg, where they were met by Bavarian troops and a representative of the King on their entrance into Bavaria. Through woodland scenery, and fields full of the stir of harvest, where a queenly woman did not relish the spectacle of her sister-women treated as beasts of burden, the travellers journeyed to Wurzburg. There Prince Luitpold of Bavaria met and welcomed them to a magnificent palace, where the luggage, which ought to have preceded the wearied travellers, was not forthcoming. Another long day's driving, beginning at a little after six in the morning, would bring the party to Coburg. By one o'clock they were at the old prince- bishop's stately town of Bamberg. In the course of the afternoon the Queen had changed horses for the last time in Franconia. "I began," she wrote, "to feel greatly moved, agitated indeed, in coming near the Coburg frontier. At length we saw flags and people drawn up in lines, and in a few minutes more were welcomed by Ernest (the Duke of Coburg) in full uniform…. We got into an open carriage of Ernest's with six horses, Ernest sitting opposite to us."
The rest of the scene was very German, quaintly picturesque and warm- hearted. "The good people were all dressed in their best, the women in pointed caps, with many petticoats, and the men in leather breeches. Many girls were there with wreaths of flowers." A triumphal arch, a Vice-Land-Director, to whose words of greeting the Queen replied, his fellow-officials on either side, the people welcoming their prince and his queen in "a really hearty and friendly way."
The couple drove to what had been the pretty little country house of their common grandmother, the late Dowager-Duchess of Coburg, and found King Leopold and Queen Louise awaiting them there. He also was an honoured son of Coburg, pleased to be present on such a proud day for the little State. He and his queen took their places beside Queen Victoria and Prince Albert—Ernest Duke of Coburg mounting on horseback and riding beside the carriage as its chief escort. In this order the procession, "which looked extremely pretty," was formed. At the entrance to the town there was another triumphal arch, beneath which the Burgomaster addressed the royal couple. "On the other side stood a number of young girls dressed in white, with green wreaths and scarfs, who presented us with bouquets and verses."
Oh! what anxious, exciting, girlish rehearsals must have been gone through beforehand.
"I cannot say how much I felt moved on entering this dear old place, and with difficulty I restrained my emotion. The beautifully- ornamented town, all bright with wreaths and flowers, the numbers of good affectionate people, the many recollections connected with the place—all was so affecting. In the Platz, where the Rathhaus and Rigierungshaus are, which are fine and curious old houses, the clergy were assembled, and Ober-Superintendent Genzler addressed us very kindly—a very young-looking man for his age, for he married mamma to my father, and christened and confirmed Albert and Ernest." Neither was the motherly presence of her whose marriage vow the Ober- Superintendent had blessed, who had done so much to contribute to the triumph of this day, wanting to its complete realization of all that such a day should have been. The Duchess of Kent was already on a visit to her nephew, standing on the old threshold—once so well known to her—ready to help to welcome her daughter, prepared to show her the home and cherished haunts of her mother's youth. As the carriage drew up, young girls threw wreaths into it. Beside the Duchess of Kent were the Duchess and Dowager-Duchess of Coburg, Prince Albert's sister-in-law and stepmother. The staircase was full of cousins. "It was an affecting but exquisite moment, which I shall never forget," declared the Queen.
But in the middle of the gratification of the son of the house who thus brought his true wife under its roof-tree, and of his satisfaction of being with her there, the faithful hearts did not forget the late sovereign and house-father who had hoped so eagerly to welcome them to the ancestral home. They were there, but his place was filled by another. At Coburg and at Rosenau, which had been one of the old Duke's favourite resorts, his memory haunted his children. "Every sound, every view, every step we take makes us think of him and feel an indescribable hopeless longing for him."
By an affectionate, thoughtful provision for their perfect freedom and enjoyment, Rosenau, Prince Albert's birthplace, was set apart for the Queen and the Prince's occupation on this very happy occasion when they visited Coburg, and still it is the widowed Queen's residence when she is dwelling in the neighbourhood. Beautiful in itself among its woods and hills, it was doubly beautiful to both from its associations. The room in which the Queen slept was that in which the Prince had been born. "How happy, how joyful we were," the Queen wrote, "on awaking to find ourselves here, at the dear Rosenau, my Albert's birthplace, the place he most loves…. He was so happy to be here with me. It is like a beautiful dream."
Fine chorales were sung below the window by some of the singers in the Coburg theatre. Before breakfast the Prince carried off the Queen to see the upper part of the house, which he and his brother had occupied when children. "It is quite in the roof, with a tiny little bedroom on each side, in one of which they both used to sleep with Florschutz, their tutor. [Footnote: The Prince was then such a mere child that the tutor used to carry him in his arms up and down stairs. One is reminded of the old custom of appointing noble governors for royal children of the tenderest years, and of the gracious pathetic relations which sometimes existed between bearded knights and infant kings. Such was the case where Sir David Lindsay of the Mount and little King James V. were concerned, when the pupil would entreat the master for a song on the lute with childish peremptoriness, "P'ay, Davie Lindsay, p'ay!">[ The view is beautiful, and the paper is still full of holes from their fencing; and the very same table is there on which they were dressed when little."
The days were too short for all that was to be seen and done. The first day there was a visit to the fortress overhanging the town, which looks as far away as the sea of trees, the Thuringerwald. It has Luther's room, with his chair and part of his bed.
In the evening the Queen went to the perfect little German theatre, where Meyerbeer's Huguenots was given, and the audience sang "God save the Queen" to German words.
The next day the visitors drove to Kalenberg, another of the Duke's seats. In the evening they held a reception at the palace, when not only those persons who had the magic prefix von to their names were admitted, but deputations of citizens, merchants, and artisans were presented, the Queen praising their good manners afterwards.
The following day was the Feast of St. Gregorius, the children's festival, in which thirteen hundred children walked in procession through Coburg, some in fancy dresses, most of the girls in white and green. Three girls came up to the palace balcony and sang a song in honour of the Queen. Then great and small repaired to the meadow— fortunately the fine weather had set in—where there were tents decorated with flowers, in which the royal party dined, while the band played and the children danced "so nicely and merrily, waltzes, polkas, and it was the prettiest thing I ever saw," declared the Queen. "Her Majesty talked to the children, to their great astonishment, in their own language. Tired of dancing and processions, and freed from all awe by the ease of the illustrious visitors, the children took to romps, 'thread my needle,' and other pastimes, and finally were well pelted by the royal circle with bon-bons, flowers and cakes" is the report of another observer.
The day ended with a great ball at the palace.
The next day was spent more quietly in going over old favourite haunts, among them the cabinet or collection of curiosities, stuffed birds, fossils, autographs, &c., which had been formed partly by the Princes when boys. Prince Albert continued to take the greatest interest in it, and had made the Queen a contributor to its treasures. At dinner the Queen tasted bratürste (roasted sausages), the national dish of Coburg, and pronounced it excellent, with its accompaniment of native beer. A royal neighbour, Queen Adelaide's brother, the Duke of Saxe-Meiningen, joined the party at dinner, and the company witnessed the performance of Schiller's Bride of Messina at the theatre.
On Sunday the August weather was so hot that the Queen and the Prince breakfasted for the second time out of doors. In the course of the morning they drove over with Duke Ernest and the Duchess to St. Moritz Kirche—equivalent to the cathedral of the town. The clergy received the party at the door of the church, and the Ober-Superintendent Genzler made a brief oration "expressive of his joy at receiving the great Christian Queen who was descended from their Saxon dukes, who were the first Reformers, and at the doors of the church where the Reformation was first preached." The Queen describes the service as like the Scotch Presbyterian form, only with more ceremony and more singing. The last impressed her deeply. The pastor preached a fine sermon. The afternoon's drive led through scenery which, especially in its pine woods, resembled the Scotch Highlands, and ended in the Thiergarten, where the Duke reared his wild boars.
"I cannot think," the Queen wrote longingly, "of going away from here. I count the hours, for I have a feeling here which I cannot describe— a feeling as if my childhood also had been spent here." No wonder; Coburg was home to her, like her native air or her mother tongue; she must have learnt to know it at her mother's knee. Her husband's experience was added to the earlier recollection of every salient point, every Haus-Mahrchen; and never were husband and wife more in sympathy than the two who now snatched a short season of delight from a sojourn in the cradle of their race.
Another brilliant sunshiny day—which the brother Princes spent together reviving old associations in the town, while the Queen sketched at Rosenau—closed with the last visit to the theatre, when the people again sang "God save the Queen," adding to it some pretty farewell verses.
The last day which the Queen passed in Coburg was, by a happy circumstance, the Prince's birthday—the first he had spent at Rosenau since he was a lad of fifteen, and, in spite of all changes, the day dawned full of quiet gladness. "To celebrate this dear day in my beloved husband's country and birthplace is more than I ever hoped for," wrote her Majesty, "and I am so thankful for it; I wished him joy so warmly when the singers sang as they did the other morning." The numberless gifts had been arranged by no other hands than those of the Queen and the Prince's brother and sister-in-law on a table "dressed with flowers."' Peasants came in gala dress, [Footnote: The Queen admired greatly many of the peasant costumes, often as serviceable and durable as they were becoming, which she saw in Germany. She expressed the regret so often uttered by English travellers that English labourers and workers at handicrafts, in place of retaining a dress of their own, have long ago adopted a tawdry version of the fashions of the upper classes. Unfortunately the practice is fast becoming universal.] with flowers, music, and dancing to offer their good wishes. In the afternoon all was quiet again, and the Queen and the Prince took their last walk together, for many a day, at Rosenau, down into the hayfields where the friendly people exchanged greetings with them, drank the crystal clear water from the stream, and looked at the fortifications which two princely boys had dug and built, as partly lessons, partly play.
The next day at half-past eight the travellers left "with heavy hearts," measuring the fateful years which were likely to elapse before Coburg was seen again. The pain of parting was lessened by the presence of the Duke and Duchess of Coburg, who accompanied their guests to the Duke's other domain of Gotha. The way led through Queen Adelaide's country of Meiningen, and at every halting-place clergymen with addresses more or less discursive, and "white and green young ladies," literally bombarded the travellers with speeches, flowers, and poems. At last the Duke of Coburg's territory was again entered after it was dark; and the party reached the lovely castellated country-seat of Reinhardtsbrunn, amidst forest and mountain scenery, with its lake in front of the house, set down in the centre of a mining population that came up in quaint costumes, with flaming torches, to walk in procession past the windows. The Queen was charmed with Reinhardtsbrunn, and would fain have lingered there, but time pressed, and she was expected in the course of the next afternoon at Gotha, on a visit to the Prince's aged grandmother who had helped to bring him up, and was so fondly attached to her former charge.
The old lady at seventy-four years of age anticipated the visit. She travelled the distance of eight miles before breakfast, in order to take her grandchildren by surprise. "I hastened to her," is the Queen's account, "and found Albert and Ernest with her. She is a charming old lady, and though very small, remarkably nice-looking, erect and active, but unfortunately very deaf…. She was so happy to see us, and kissed me over and over again. Albert, who is the dearest being to her in the world, she was enraptured to see again, and kissed so kindly. It did one's heart good to see her joy."
In the afternoon the travellers proceeded to Gotha, which was in a state of festival and crowded with people. The Queen and the Prince resided at the old Duchess's house of Friedrichsthal, where the greatest preparations, including the hanging of all her pictures in their rooms, had been made for them. The first visit they paid in Gotha was a solemn one, to the chapel which formed the temporary resting-place of the body of the late Duke, till it could be removed to its vault in Coburg. Then the rooms in which the father had died were visited. These were almost equally melancholy, left as they had been, unchanged, with the wreaths that had decorated the room for his last birthday still there; "and there is that sad clock which stopped just before he died." Who that has seen in Germany these faded wreaths, with their crushed, soiled streamers of white riband, can forget the desolate aspect which they lend to any room in which they are preserved!
There was a cabinet or museum here, too, to inspect, and the curious old spectacle of the popinjay to be witnessed, in company with the Grand Duke of Weimar and his son. This kind of shooting was harmless enough, for the object aimed at was a wooden bird on a pole. The riflemen, led by the rifle-king (schutzen-konig), the public officials, and deputations of peasants marched past the platform where the Queen stood, like a pageant of the Middle Ages. All the princes, including King Leopold, fired, but none brought down the bird; that feat was left for some humbler hero.
On the Queen's return from the popinjay she had the happiness to meet Baroness Lehzen, her old governess, who had come from Buckeburg to see her Majesty. During the next few days the old friends were often together, and the Queen speaks with pleasure of the Baroness's "unchanged devotion," only she was quieter than formerly. It must have appeared like another dream to both, that "the little Princess" of Kensington, travelling with her husband, should greet her old governess, and tell her, under the shadow of the great Thuringerwald, of the four children left behind in England.
The next day the forest itself was entered, when "the bright blue sky, the heavenly air, the exquisite tints," gave a crowning charm to its beauties. The road lay through green glades which occasionally commanded views so remote as those of the Hartz Mountains, to Jagersruh, a hunting-lodge on a height "among stately firs that look like cedars." Here the late Duke had excited all his skill and taste to make a hunter's paradise, which awoke again the regretful thought, "How it would have pleased him to have shown all this himself to those he loved so dearly!"
But Jagersruh was not the goal of the excursion; it was a "deer-drive" or battue, which in Germany at least can be classed as "a relic of mediaeval barbarism." A considerable space in the forest was cleared and enclosed with canvas. In the centre of this enclosure was a pavilion open at the sides, made of branches of fir-trees, and decorated with berries, heather, and forest flowers; in short, a sylvan bower provided for the principal company, outside a table furnished with powder and shot supplied a station for less privileged persons, including the chasseurs or huntsmen of the Duke, in green and gold uniforms.
Easy-chairs were placed in the pavilion for the Queen, the Queen of the Belgians, and the Duchess Alexandrina, while Prince Albert, King Leopold, the Prince of Leiningen, and Duke Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg, the Prince's uncle, stood by the ladies. Stags to the number of upwards of thirty, and other game, were driven into the enclosure, and between the performances of a band which played at intervals, the gentlemen loaded their rifles, and fired at the helpless prey in the presence of the ladies.
Her Majesty records in her Journal, "As for the sport itself, none of the gentlemen like this butchery." She turns quickly from the piteous slaughter to the beautiful, peaceful scenery.
A quiet Sunday was spent at Gotha. Monday was the Lieder fest, or festival of song, to which, on this occasion, not only the townspeople and villagers from all the neighbouring towns and villages came with their banners and bands, but every small royalty from far and near flocked to meet the Queen of England. These innumerable cousins repaired with the Queen to the park opposite the Schloss, and shared in the festival. The orchestra, composed of many hundreds of singers, was opposite the pavilion erected for the distinguished visitors. Among the fine songs, rendered as only Germans could render them, songs composed by Prince Albert and his brother, and songs written for the day, were sung. Afterwards there was a State dinner and a ball.
The last day had come, with its inevitable sadness. "I can't—won't think of it," wrote the Queen, referring to her approaching departure. She drove and walked, and, with her brother-in-law and his Duchess, was ferried over to the "Island of Graves," the burial-place of the old Dukes of Gotha when the duchy was distinct from that of Coburg. An ancient gardener pointed out to the visitors that only one more flower-covered grave was wanted to make the number complete. When the Duchess of Gotha should be laid to rest with her late husband and his fathers, then the House of Gotha, in its separate existence, would have passed away.
One more drive through the hayfields and the noble fir-trees to the vast Thuringerwald, and, "with many a longing, lingering look at the pine-clad mountains," the Queen and the Prince turned back to attend a ball given in their honour by the townspeople in the theatre.
On the following day the homeward journey was begun. After partings, rendered still more sorrowful by the fact that the age of the cherished grandmother of the delightful "dear" family party rendered it not very probable that she, for one, would see all her children round her again, the Duke and Duchess of Coburg went one stage with the travellers, and then there was another reluctant if less painful parting.
The Queen and the Prince stopped at the quaint little town of Eisenach, which Helen of Orleans was yet to make her home. They were received by the Grand Duke and Hereditary Duchess of Saxe-Weimar, with whom the strangers drove through the autumn woods to the famous old fortress of the Wartburg, which, in its time, dealt a deadly blow to Roman Catholicism by sheltering, in the hour of need, the Protestant champion, Luther. Like the good Protestants her Majesty and the Prince were, they went to see the great reformer's room, and looked at the ink-splash on the wall—the mark of his conflict with the devil—the stove at which he warmed himself, the rude table at which he wrote and ate, and above all, the glorious view over the myriads of tree-tops with which he must have refreshed his steadfast soul. But if Luther is the hero of the Wartburg, there is also a heroine—the central figure of that "Saint's Tragedy" which Charles Kingsley was to give to the world in the course of the next two or three years—St. Elizabeth of Thuringia, the tenderest, bravest, most tortured soul that ever received the doubtful gain of canonization. There is the well by which she is said to have ministered to her sick poor, half-way up the ascent to the Wartburg, and down in the little town nestling below, may be seen the remains of an hospital bearing her name.
From Fulda, where the royal party slept, they journeyed to Goethe's town of Frankfort, where Ludwig I., who turned Munich into a great picture and sculpture gallery, and built the costly Valhalla to commemorate the illustrious German dead, dined with her Majesty.
At Biberich the Rhine was again hailed, and a steamer, waiting for the travellers, carried them to Bingen, where their own little vessel, The Fairy, met and brought them on to Deutz, on the farther side from Cologne. The Queen says naively that the Rhine had lost its charm for them all—the excitement of novelty was gone, and the Thuringerwald had spoilt them. Stolzenfels, Ehrenbreitstein, and the Sieben-Gebirge had their words of praise, but sight-seeing had become for the present a weariness, and after Bonn, with its memories, had been left behind, it was a rest to the royal travellers—as to most other travellers at times—to turn away their jaded eyes, relinquish the duty of alert observation, forget what was passing around them, and lose themselves in a book, as if they were in England. Perhaps the home letters had awakened a little home-sickness in the couple who had been absent for a month. At least, we are given to understand that it was of home and children the Queen and the Prince were chiefly thinking when they reached Antwerp, to which the King and Queen of the Belgians had preceded them, and re-embarked in the royal yacht Victoria and Albert, though it was not at once to sail for English waters. In gracious compliance with an urgent entreaty of Louis Philippe's, the yacht was to call, as it were in passing, at Tréport.
On the morning of the 8th of September the Queen's yacht again lay at anchor off the French seaport. The King's barge, with the King, his son, and son-in-law, Prince Joinville, and Prince Augustus of Saxe- Coburg, and M. Guizot, once more came alongside. After the friendliest greetings, the Queen and Prince Albert landed with their host, though not without difficulty. The tide would not admit of the ordinary manner of landing, and Louis Philippe in the dilemma fell back on a bathing-machine, which dragged the party successfully if somewhat unceremoniously over the sands.
The Queen of the French was there as before, accompanied among others by her brother, the Prince of Salerno and his Princess, sister to the Emperor of Austria. The crowd cheered as loudly as ever; there seemed no cloud on the horizon that bright, hot day; even the plague of too much publicity and formality had been got rid of at Château d'Eu. The Queen was delighted to renew her intercourse with the large, bright family circle—two of them her relations and fast friends. "It put me so much in mind of two years ago," she declared, "that it was really as if we had never been away;" and the King had to show her his Galerie Victoria, a room fitted up in her honour, hung with the pictures illustrating her former visit and the King's return visit to Windsor.
Although she had impressed on him that she wished as much as possible to dispense with state and show on this occasion, the indefatigable old man had been at the trouble and expense of erecting a theatre, and bringing down from Paris the whole of the Opéra Comique to play before her, and thus increase the gaiety of the single evening of her stay.
Only another day was granted to Château d'Eu. By the next sunset the King was conducting his guests on board the royal yacht and seizing the last opportunity, when Prince Albert was taking Prince Joinville over the Fairy, glibly to assure the Queen and Lord Aberdeen that he, Louis Philippe, would never consent to Montpensier's marriage to the Infanta of Spain till her sister the Queen was married and had children.
At parting the King embraced her Majesty again and again. The yacht lay still, and there was the most beautiful moonlight reflected on the water. The Queen and the Prince walked up and down the deck, while not they alone, but the astute statesman Aberdeen, congratulated themselves on how well this little visit had prospered, in addition to the complete success of the German tour. With the sea like a lake, and sky and sea of the deepest blue, in the early morning the yacht weighed anchor for England. Under the hot haze of an autumn noonday sun the royal travellers disembarked on the familiar beach at Osborne. The dearest of welcomes greeted them as they "drove up straight to the house, for there, looking like roses, so well and so fat, stood the four children."
The Queen referred afterwards to that visit to Germany as to one of the happiest times in her life. She said when she thought of it, it made her inclined to cry, so pure and tender had been the pleasure.