The letter-writers who dealt with court incidents at the period of the accession of this domestic couple tell of various illustrations of the simplicity of the new sovereigns. When the Duke of Norfolk had an interview with William IV. at Bushey, on the affair which had brought him thither being concluded, the King declared he must not leave the house without seeing the Queen; and, thereupon ringing the bell, he bade the official who answered the summons to ‘tell the Queen I want her.’
This lady, at the time when her husband was Duke of Clarence and Lord High Admiral, had been accustomed, on her visits to Chatham, to be received and entertained by the daughters of the then Commissioner, Cunningham. As soon as the Duchess became Queen, among her first invited visitors to Bushey were these ladies. At the meeting they offered to kiss her Majesty’s hand, but ‘No, no,’ said Queen Adelaide, ‘that is not the way I receive my friends. I am not changed;’ and therewith ensued a greeting less dignified, but not less sincere.
Queen Adelaide and King William kept a ‘state’ at Brighton which had a burlesque element in it. They were the last sovereigns who held a court or entertained friends at the Pavilion—that place of big and little domes, which made Lord Alvanley say of it that it looked ‘as if St. Paul’s had come down to the sea-side and pupped.’ It was not etiquette for any guest (of an evening) to stir till Queen and King retired, which was at midnight. On one occasion, when Captain and Mrs. Marryat were present, and anxious to go to a second party, the King remarked that the lady often looked at the clock. Being asked the reason, she frankly told him. ‘Why don’t you go then?’ said his Majesty. ‘Sir,’ answered the lady, ‘we cannot move till her Majesty and yourself have departed.’ ‘Oh, d—n it!’ rejoined the royal sailor, ‘take my arm; I’ll smuggle you out.’ At the Pavilion balls, after the ladies had kissed the Queen’s hand, the King kissed the ladies, who then passed into the ball-room, where one of the Fitzclarences used to greet them with: ‘Well, has Dad bussed you yet?’
There are other stories told of incidents at Windsor which indicate the difference of the court going out from that of the court coming in. This change required the removal from the palace of a little household, the head lady of which reluctantly gave way to the new Queen. People generally rejoiced in seeing a ‘wife’ installed where ‘queans’ used to rule it; and, when William IV. was seen walking arm-in-arm with Watson Taylor or some other happy courtier, they added one incident to the other, and, comparing the new court with the old, exclaimed, ‘Here is a change indeed!’ No one ever dreamed at that moment that the time would come when party-spirit would stir up the ‘mobile’ against the sovereigns; that the Queen would be accused of plotting with the Duke of Wellington against reform; that stones would be cast at the royal carriage as it bore the King and his Consort from the theatre; and that, when matters went adversely to the humour of the ultra-chiefs of the popular movement, the first lady in the land should be marked out for vengeance by the famous cry in the Times, ‘The Queen has done it all!’
The drawing-room at which good Mrs. Blomfield appeared in ‘immortal velvet’ was remarkable for another incident, related in ‘Frazer’s Magazine,’ by John Wilkes, ex-M.P. for Sudbury, in his ‘Regina’s Regina’:—‘The drawing-room of her Majesty Queen Adelaide, held in February, 1831, was the most magnificent which had been seen since that which had taken place on the presentation of the Princess Charlotte of Wales, upon the occasion of her marriage. No drawing-room excited such an interest when compared with that as the one held by Queen Adelaide, at which the Princess Victoria was presented on attaining her twelfth year. It was on this occasion that the Duchess of Kent and her illustrious daughter arrived in state, attended by the Duchess of Northumberland, Lady Charlotte St. Maur, Lady Catherine Parkinson, the Hon. Mrs. Cust, Lady Conroy, La Baronne Letzen, Sir John Conroy, and General Wetheral. This was the first public appearance of the Princess Victoria at court. Her dress was made entirely of articles manufactured in the United Kingdom. Victoria wore a frock of English blonde, simple, modest, and becoming. She was the object of interest and admiration on the part of all assembled, as she stood on the left of her Majesty on the throne. The scene was one of the most splendid ever remembered, and the future Queen of England contemplated all that passed with much dignity, but with evident interest.’
Nearly three-quarters of a century had elapsed since a Queen-consort had been crowned in Great Britain. On the present occasion, such small pomp as there was was confined to the religious part of the ceremony. The procession to and from Westminster Hall, the banquet there, and the dramatic episode of the entry of the Champion were all dispensed with. There was an idea prevalent that the cost would be too great, and that the popular voice would be given to grumble—others thought that money spent in the country, and made to circulate rapidly through many hands, would be a public benefit rather than a public injury. The ministry, however, would only sanction the maimed rites which were actually observed; the privileged people were deprived of many a coveted perquisite which might have dipped deeply into the public purse, and the heir of Marmion and the owner of Scrivelsby kept his horse and his defiance at home in the domain of the Dymokes. The public, cheated of their show, called it a ‘half-crownation.’
There was only one incident at this ceremony which is worth narrating. The Queen-consort’s crown was a rich little toy, sparkling but small. It would hardly fit a baby’s head, and, accordingly, Queen Adelaide’s hair was turned up in a knot, in order that on this knot the little crown might safely rest. The Archbishop of Canterbury, in place of fitting the crown down upon this knot of hair, only lightly placed the glittering toy on the top of it. Had the Queen moved she would have been discrowned in an instant, and all the foolish people whose footsteps go wandering on the borders of another world, instead of going honestly straightforward in this, would have had a fine opportunity of discussing the value of omens. But, in a case of adornment, the ladies had their wits about them, and were worth the whole episcopal bench when the matter at issue was surmounting a head of hair with its supreme adornment of a crown. Some of those in attendance stepped forward, saved their embarrassed mistress from an annoyance, and Queen Adelaide was crowned in Westminster Abbey by a couple of ladies-in-waiting!
It may be that the Archbishop was not so much to blame on this occasion. The little crown was made up at the Queen’s expense for the occasion, by Rundell, out of her own jewels, and it may not have fitted easily. She had a dread of unnecessary outlay, and, perhaps, remembered that at George the Fourth’s coronation the sum charged by Rundell merely for the hire of jewels by the King amounted to 16,000l., as interest on their value. The whole expense of the double coronation of William and Adelaide did not amount to much more than twice that sum.
The Queen herself was not ill-dressed on this occasion, as will be seen by the record made by those who have registered the millinery portion of the ceremony:—‘Her Majesty wore a gold gauze over a white satin petticoat, with a diamond stomacher, and a purple velvet train, lined with white satin, and a rich border of gold and ermine. The coronet worn by Her Majesty, both to and from the Abbey, was most beautiful. It was composed entirely of diamonds and pearls, and in shape very similar to a mural crown.’
When the modest coronation of William and Adelaide was yet a subject of general conversation, the expensive finery of that which preceded it was actually in the market, and was subsequently sold by public auction. Out of the hundred and twenty lots ‘submitted’ by Mr. Phillips, the new King and Queen might have been tempted to secure a souvenir of their predecessor; but they had no taste for ‘bargains,’ perhaps small regard for their defunct kinsman. Nevertheless, so thrifty a lady as the Queen may have sighed at the thought of the coronation ruff of Mechlin lace going ‘dirt cheap’ at two pounds; and she may have regretted the crimson velvet coronation mantle, with its star and gold embroidery, which, originally costing five hundred pounds, fetched, when yet as good as new, only a poor seven-and-forty guineas. There was the same depreciation in other articles of originally costly value. The second coronation mantle of purple velvet fell from three hundred to fifty-five pounds; and the green velvet mantle, lined with ermine, which had cost the Czar, who presented it to the late King, a thousand guineas, was ‘knocked down’ at a trifle over a hundred pounds. Sashes, highland-dresses, aigrette-plumes—rich gifts received, or purchases dearly acquired—went for nothing; and, after all, seeing into what base hands coronation bravery is apt to fall, the economical King and Queen were not without justification in setting an example of prudence, which was followed at the next great crowning.