Look on the record of your life;
Think of What is, What might have been.
Empress of Peace 'mid constant strife!
The last year of her reign was sadly clouded by the uncertainties of the South African war, and she paid the inevitable penalty of those who live to fourscore by surviving many of those who were nearest to her; but age brought her consolations as well. The marriage of the Duke of York in 1893 inspired Punch with a genial ode, full of classical tags and headed "Hymen Hymenæe!" He would not "trill a fulsome lay," but contented himself with showing "good will to goodness," typified in his cartoon of the royal pair seated on a Lion led by Punch with a bridle of roses. A year later the birth of the present Prince of Wales, Queen Victoria's great-grandson, is celebrated by an ingenious adaptation of Shakespeare:—
Now is the Winter of our discontent
Made glorious by this Son of York.
A BORN LEGISLATOR
"Do you often attend the sittings in the House of Lords, Duke?"
"I did once—if I remember, to vote against some measure of Mr. Gladstone's—but I caught a bad cold there, so I never went again!"