They took breakfast at nine; then they went through details of routine business, and sketched or played till luncheon, after which the Queen had a daily interview with Lord Melbourne (prime-minister till the next year). Then they drove, walked, or rode, dined at eight o'clock, and had pleasant social circles afterwards, which were broken up before midnight. Both were fond of art and music. Indeed the Prince-Consort gave a powerful impulse to that study of classical music which has since become so universal. Mendelssohn himself praised the Queen's singing, though without flattering blindness to its faults and shortcomings. And the brightness of life was all the brighter because it flowed over a substratum of seriousness and solemnity. The first time that the Queen and her husband partook of holy communion together, they spent the preceding evening—the vigil of Easter—in retirement, occupied with good German books, and soothed and elevated by Mozart's music, for the prince was master of the organ, and the Queen of the piano. The prince made his maiden speech at a meeting for the abolition of the slave-trade, speaking in a low tone, and with 'the prettiest foreign accent.' While she was driving up Constitution Hill, an attempt was made upon the Queen's life by a weak-minded youth, but luckily neither of the pistol shots took effect. There have been at least seven other happily futile attempts on the life of the Queen.
The Princess Royal was born on the 21st November 1840; and the royal mother, fondly tended by her husband, made a speedy and happy recovery. Prince Albert's care for the Queen in these circumstances was like that of a mother.
The Prince of Wales was born on November 9, 1841, and after that the little family circle rapidly increased, and with it the parents' sense of responsibility. 'A man's education begins the first day of his life,' said the prince's tried friend, the wise Baron Stockmar, and the Queen felt it 'a hard case' that the pressure of public business prevented her from being always with her little ones when they said their prayers. She has given us her views on religious training:
'I am quite clear that children should be taught to have great reverence for God and for religion, but that they should have the feeling of devotion and love which our Heavenly Father encourages His earthly children to have for Him, and not one of fear and trembling; and that the thoughts of death and an after-life should not be presented in an alarming and forbidding view; and that they should be made to know, as yet, no difference of creeds.'
Court gossips considered the Queen 'to be very fond of her children, but severe in her manner, and a strict disciplinarian in her family.' A nurse in the royal household informed Baron Bunsen that 'the children were kept very plain indeed: it was quite poor living—only a bit of roast meat, and perhaps a plain pudding.' Other servants have reported that the Queen would have made 'an admirable poor man's wife.' We used to hear how the young princesses had to smooth out and roll up their bonnet strings. By these trifling side-lights we discern a vigorous, wholesome discipline, striving to counteract the enervating influences of rank and power, and their attendant flattery and self-indulgence. 'One of the main principles observed in the education of the royal children was this—that though they received the best training of body and mind to fit them for the high position they would eventually have to fill, they should in no wise come in contact with the actual court life. The children were scarcely known to the Queen's ladies-in-waiting, as they only now and then made their appearance for a moment after dinner at dessert, or accompanied their parents out driving. The care of them was exclusively intrusted to persons who possessed the Queen and Prince-Consort's entire confidence, and with whom they could at all times communicate direct.' An artist employed to decorate the pavilion in the garden of Buckingham Palace, wrote of Her Majesty and the prince: 'In many things they are an example to the age. They have breakfasted, heard morning prayers with the household in the private chapel, and are out some distance from the palace talking to us in the summer-house before half-past nine o'clock—sometimes earlier. After the public duties of the day and before their dinner, they come out again evidently delighted to get away from the bustle of the world to enjoy each other's society in the solitude of the garden.'
[Illustration: Osborne House.(From a Photograph by Frith.)]
The seaside villa of Osborne, built at the Queen's own charges at a cost of £200,000, and the remote castle of Balmoral, the creation of the Prince-Consort, were the favourite homes of the royal household: the creations as it were, of their domestic love, and inwrought with their own personalities, as statelier Windsor could never be. In the Swiss cottage at Osborne, with its museum, kitchen, storeroom, and little gardens, the young people learned to do household work and understand the management of a small establishment. The parents were invited as guests, to enjoy the dishes which the princesses had prepared with their own hands, and there each child was free to follow the bent of its own industrial inclination. In the Highlands, again, among the reserved and dignified Scottish peasantry, the children were encouraged to visit freely, to make themselves acquainted with the wants and feelings of the poor, and to regard them with an understanding sympathy and affection.
Sir Robert Peel, who succeeded Lord Melbourne in 1841 as prime-minister, had the following advice from his predecessor as to his conduct in office, which shows the Queen's good sense: 'Whenever he does anything, or has anything to propose, let him explain to her clearly his reasons. The Queen is not conceited; she is aware there are many things she cannot understand, and she likes to have them explained to her elementarily, not at length and in detail, but shortly and clearly.
One of the minor posts in the new ministry was filled by a young member of parliament, who was destined in after-years to become as celebrated as Peel himself. This was the distinguished scholar and orator, William Ewart Gladstone, the son of Sir John Gladstone, a Scotch merchant who had settled in Liverpool. He was already a power in parliament, and every year after this saw him rising into greater prominence.
In the new parliament, too, though not in the ministry, was another member, who afterwards rose to high office, and became very famous. This was Benjamin Disraeli, son of Disraeli the elder, a distinguished literary man. Although very clever, Benjamin Disraeli had not as yet obtained any influence in the House. His first speech, indeed, had been received with much laughter; but, as he himself had then predicted, a time came at last when the House did listen to him.