In reproducing some of these highly coloured comments it must not be believed that my loyalty is peccable. I merely recognise that words that inflamed people eighty years ago are amusing now, and for those who can take from them the little spark of truth they are also to some extent serviceable as illuminators of the past.
Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg had already settled the career of his eldest son, and he saw no reason why—like a good matchmaking parent—he should not try to find a kingdom for his second son Augustus, who was much the less attractive of the two. As soon as they arrived everyone was on the watch, the pity was that none of the gossip-mongers could be present when intentions were talked over. Because they were not there, no one can now tell whether intentions were mentioned at all, or whether things were left to develop in an ordinary way. In any case, Prince Ferdinand must have been disappointed, for Augustus was a silent lad, and did little to make himself agreeable, while the handsome Ferdinand the younger is said to have been captivated by his fresh young cousin—they were all cousins—at first sight.
The visitors went first to Kensington, and then to Windsor, where they were royally entertained, and returned to pass two weeks at Kensington Palace. The Prince and Augustus went home, hoping nothing, and still Ferdinand remained, in spite of his bride awaiting him in Lisbon. A lady diarist of the day says that he lingered from day to day, “nay, week after week,” allured by “the fascinations of Kensington’s Royal bowers.” However, this was something of an exaggeration, as Ferdinand had to be in Lisbon by a certain date for his marriage in April. At last he had to go, and he travelled with the Duchess and Princess to Claremont. There he took an “affectionate leave,” and went his solitary—but for a few attendants—way to the sea.
He met his young and dark bride kindly, and within a week or two took the same disease of the throat which had killed his predecessor less than a year earlier. Being a young man of great determination, he absolutely refused the kind ministrations of the Portuguese doctors, and was cured by his own German attendant. Whether he was happier alive than he would have been dead it is not easy to say, for his new subjects prepared a nice little quarrel for him before he arrived, and he was soon in the midst of mutinies and revolutions.
The first young man who probably caused a real flutter in the Kensington home was not of Royal blood at all. This was young Lord Elphinstone, to whom it was said the Princess had lost her heart, and who was therefore thought sufficiently formidable to make the Duchess take a very extreme step. He was Lord of the Bedchamber to King William, was handsome, well-mannered, unassuming, always ready to help in small matters, and eminently fitted to catch a girl’s fancy. He was also, as one paper put it satirically, a most convenient person to engage to do the amiable at balls and parties, and beyond all doubt was a most useful and agreeable master of the ceremonies of fashion. It was said that he had not only lost his heart to the pretty Princess, but had taken hers in return. He would sit and watch her surreptitiously in church, and on one occasion so far forgot his religious duties as to make a sketch of her while there, which sketch he was later imprudent enough to present to her. Maternal care took alarm; Sir John Conroy was consulted, and a whole set of hidden wires were pulled to put a stop to love’s young dream. The result was to be read in every morning paper one day at the beginning of 1836:—
“Lord Elphinstone has been appointed Governor of Madras. The Court of Directors (of the East India Company) ratified the nomination on Wednesday.” So ran the announcement. The Satirist, much annoyed, commented, “The appointment of Lord Elphinstone is certainly not one to be applauded.... To send him out as the Governor of Madras is, to say the very least of it, unwise”; and it went on to point out that many a man better fitted for the post had been overlooked that he might have it. “A Lord of the Bedchamber spoiled in a Governor of Madras! Lord Elphinstone may have qualified for the appointment, but the public surely has a right to demand tried ability and weight of character,” was another comment. And so, though gossip awoke several times later to nod and hint, the young lord left his goddess and his native land, not to return for seven long years.
The Age, ultra-Tory and virulently anti-Catholic in its sentiments, outspoken to the verge of libel, and unscrupulous in its assertion of wild facts, had something to say weekly at this time about the Princess’s lovers. It started the campaign by asserting the obvious truth that the Princess Victoria was now becoming the object of the highest and purest interest to England, and must not be lightly bestowed, adding, “The gentleman who with a few sons lives at the Tuileries would perhaps like to nibble here—but until the established Protestant religion is overthrown he has no chance. A German paper mentions that a rumour is current that Prince Augustus of Saxe-Coburg is likely to win the Princess Victoria. Whether or not the desire be father to the thought we know not, nor do we care; to omit all other objections to a union such as the one hinted at, it is sufficient to state that the Prince alluded to is a Catholic.”
With the end of April arrived further papas with two sons each, and then began the duel between King William and his sister-in-law. The latter had, as has been said, quietly made choice of her daughter’s bridegroom, being guided in the selection by her brother Leopold, and we are told that her nephew Albert had been taught from his early childhood that he would one day marry his cousin Victoria. However, he did not see his destined mate until May, 1836, when he was nearly seventeen, and when he and his elder brother Ernest, escorted by his father, the Duke of Saxe-Coburg, paid a visit of a month’s duration to Kensington. King William hated the idea, and he did his little best to spoil the scheme, which was too unformed to allow of any open action. He had behind him the Tories generally and all the Tory Press, while the anti-Catholics wasted much good energy in traducing Leopold, the Prince whom long before everyone had received with open arms. Leopold had married the daughter of the King of France, and was suspected of having become a Catholic, thus adding to the dislike which was felt for him in England. One paper said of him at this time, “The name of Leopold is the most unpopular in the kingdom, and is accompanied with certain sordid associations of which our national ledger gives ample and disgraceful evidence.”
So, to counterbalance the schemes of the Duchess, King William invited to England the young Duke of Brunswick, also the Prince of Orange and his two sons, William and Alexander, who were reported to be fine young men, though stiff and formal in their manner. These were as heartily welcomed by the King’s supporters as the others were traduced. “There is something in the very name of William of Orange which is encouraging in these times of Popish assumption and pseudo-Protestant treachery. Whether our fancies as to a certain union be verified or not, time will prove. Should it take place, we think the people of England will not object, whatever the malignants of Ireland may say against one of the same family as the Hero of the Boyne.”
Those who looked on enjoyed the situation, and there is little doubt but that the Prince of Orange, on behalf of his son, would have won in the contest if it had depended on the sympathies of the English people. In his youth the Prince had been an aspirant for the hand of Princess Charlotte, his rival being the successful Leopold, who had not only taken his hoped-for bride, but later half of his Principality. When Leopold was mentioned in his presence, Orange would say, “Voilà un homme qui a pris ma femme et mon royaume.” Gossip went that he intended to place his sons at an English university, that he might make them as English as possible; and there were those who affirmed that the House of Orange had great claims upon the country’s gratitude, but that we had satisfied in full any claim that the House of Saxe-Coburg might put forward. Advice was offered freely to the Duchess of Kent; she “is a shrewd and sensible woman, and will not, we hope, misunderstand our loyalty when we say, ‘We must have no more Coburgs.’ One fair rose of England has been gathered by a Coburg, and there shall be no further sacrifice of a future Queen to them.” The Coburgs were dubbed a mercenary, good-for-nothing set by one section, while another put all the German princes into the same category. “All the multitudinous progeny of the small peoples of the Saxe-Gotha, Saxe-Coburg, and their cousin Saxes are racing against each other for the hand of the Princess Victoria, to say nothing of a brace of Brunswicks and a Prince of Orange and his two sons, who probably thinks he should be given first chance, as he was done out of the Princess Charlotte. The Duke of Cumberland’s son is quite hors-de-combat, and the simple child, George of Cambridge, is not encouraged by the Government on account of his mental incapacity. The Saxe tribe are the most hungry, the most persevering, and the most lucky.”