In the Days of Queen Victoria

by Eva March Tappan

"Your Majesty," said Lord Melbourne one day, "there is no need of your examining this paper, as it is of no special importance."

"But it is of special importance to me," replied the Queen, "whether I sign a paper with which I am not thoroughly satisfied."

Papers of all sorts were showered upon her. Sometimes after listening to Lord Melbourne's advice she would come to a decision on the first reading, but often she would say, "I must think about this before I sign it." Never was a sovereign so overwhelmed with papers, and her friends began to suspect that some of the officials who wished to have matters go their own way were trying to disgust her with public business hoping that after a little while she would become so tired of it that she would sign whatever was sent her. They did not know that they were dealing with a Queen who had had to finish her haycocks when she was a little girl. Even Lord Melbourne used to say laughingly, "I'd rather manage ten kings than one queen."

There could hardly have been a better man than Lord Melbourne for the difficult position of adviser to a young woman who was also a queen. He was three times her age, and while his manner to her was always one of most profound respect, he showed an almost fatherly feeling for the fatherless young girl. He was her Prime Minister and was also her trusted friend. Before she became Queen, he had won her confidence in a remarkable way, by opposing her desires and those of her mother. In one of those constantly recurring differences between King and Duchess, he had stood firmly for the King's wishes, because he was the King's servant, although he knew that in a few months at most the Princess would be on the throne. Victoria was wise enough to see that the man who would be faithful even at the probability of his own loss was the man whom she might safely trust, and she did trust him implicitly.

Another member of the Queen's household was the honest Baron Stockmar. He had been sent by King Leopold, as soon as his royal niece had attained her eighteenth birthday, to guard her interests and advise her if it should be necessary. With people in general he was quiet and reserved. At table he "ate nothing and talked less," according to the description of one who was at the court; but all felt that the Queen was especially frank with him, and that he and Lord Melbourne were in perfect agreement. One other duty he had at the English court which was known only to himself and King Leopold and that was to prepare the way for the marriage that the King hoped would come about between his niece and his nephew. The two young people were really in training for sovereignty. King Leopold kept Prince Albert with him for nearly a year after Victoria's accession He saw to it that the young man should acquire a good knowledge of English and of the English constitution. Baron Stockmar was in the meantime teaching the Queen the rightful position of the sovereign of England. "The sovereign must belong to no party," he said. "Whatever party is in power has been put in power by the nation, and has a right to claim the loyalty of the Queen."

Of course the devoted Baroness Lehzen had followed her beloved pupil, for one of the first acts of the Queen was to appoint her private secretary. The Baroness said: "I copy all her private correspondence just as I used to do when she was my Princess, and she is as frank with me as when she was a child; but she has never shown me a state document or said a word to me about any state business. She knows that such matters should go to her advisers, and not to me or any other woman."

Surely the little Queen was not without good friends. There were King Leopold, the wisest sovereign in Europe; Baron Stockmar, the "only honest man"; Lord Melbourne, who seemed to have no thought but for her, and Baroness Lehzen, who had loved her from her babyhood. The position of her mother was very peculiar and not agreeable in all respects. For eighteen years her only aim in life had been to prepare her daughter for the throne of England. The daughter was now on the throne, and the Duchess felt that her occupation was gone. She realized that matters of state must be discussed with the councilors only, and for this she was prepared; but it was not a pleasant surprise to find that the young girl who less than a year before her accession had meekly left the ballroom for bed at her mother's bidding was now manifesting very decided opinions of her own. The Duchess had the fullest confidence in one of the executors of her husband's will, and she would have been glad that he should hold some office in the new government. The Queen treated her mother with the most tender affection, and she willingly granted the gentleman a generous pension, but she refused to have anything to do with him.

Victoria had ascended the throne, but she had never yet worn the English crown, for though a young girl may become a queen in a moment, a coronation is a different matter. "The King is dead, and therefore Victoria is Queen," declared the Council, and she was Queen; but the preparations for a coronation require more time than does the writing of an address of loyalty, and it was a whole year before these preparations were completed. It was not an easy task to decide just what ceremonies should be observed. One matter to be seriously deliberated upon was whether the left cheek of the young girl should be forced to endure six hundred kisses of state from the six hundred nobles and bishops. There was not even a crown suited to the occasion, for the old one weighed seven pounds, and the most devoted admirers of the ancient usages could not ask that the "little Queen" should carry that load on her head. After many lengthy consultations, these momentous questions were decided. The tradesmen were assured that there would be enough ceremony to bring about large sales, the peers and bishops were told that they would not be allowed to kiss the pink cheek of the Queen, and the crown jewelers were bidden to set to work on a new crown that should weigh only half as much as the old one.

The day came at last, June 28, 1838. London evidently meant to make the most of it, and as soon as the eager watchers saw the first glimpse of dawn, a salute of twenty-one cannon was fired. It was only a little after three o'clock, but the earliness of the hour made little difference to the thousands that had been up all night. Some had stayed up to be sure of securing a good place to see the procession, some because the services of the hairdressers were in such demand that, when a head was once in order, no risk of disarrangement could be ventured upon, and some had been kept awake by pure excitement and nervousness. There was no sleeping after daylight for anyone, for those who were far enough from the Tower to drowse through the firing of cannon were aroused by the ringing of bells which followed, as every church tower rang out its merriest chimes. At five o'clock Westminster Abbey was opened, and this was none too early, for the people who were fortunate enough and rich enough to obtain tickets had long been thronging the entrance. These people in the Abbey had a long time to wait, for it was fully ten o'clock before the salute of twenty-one guns from the park gave the signal that the procession had started from Buckingham Palace.

Such a procession as it was! First came the trumpeters, then the Life Guards, bands, foreign ambassadors in most gorgeous carriages, more Life Guards, the carriage of the Duchess of Kent, the Duke of Sussex, and others of the royal family, the officers of the royal household, and the Yeomen of the Guard. Then all the thousands along the way were agape, for the eight cream-colored horses were seen drawing the chariot of state, wherein sat the pretty little maiden who was the center and cause of all this magnificence. A circlet of diamonds was on her head. She wore a dress of gold tissue, and a mantle of crimson velvet trimmed with gold lace and lined with ermine. Pearls and diamonds gleamed and flashed at every motion. With her rode the Mistress of the Robes and the Master of the Horse. A body of cavalry followed her.