In March, 1849, the Prince laid the foundation-stone for the Great Grimsby Docks, and made a noble speech on the occasion. From that I will not quote, but I am tempted to give entire a charming note which he wrote from Brocklesby, Lord Yarborough's place, to the Queen.
It runs thus:
"Your faithful husband, agreeably to your wishes, reports: 1. That he is still alive. 2. That he has discovered the North Pole from Lincoln Cathedral, but without finding either Captain Ross or Sir John Franklin. 3. That he arrived at Brocklesby and received the address. 4. That he subsequently rode out and got home quite covered with snow and with icicles on his nose. 5. That the messenger is waiting to carry off this letter, which you will have in Windsor by the morning. 6. Last, but not least, that he loves his wife and remains her devoted husband."
We may believe the good, fun-loving wife was delighted with this little letter, and read it to a few of her choicest friends.
A few months later, while the Queen was driving with her children in an open carriage over that assassin-haunted Constitution Hill, she was fired at by a mad Irishman—William Hamilton. She did not lose for a moment her wonderful self-possession, but ordered the carriage to move on, and quieted with a few calm words the terror of the children.
We have seen that at the time of Oxford's attempt she "laughed at the thing"; but now there had been so many shootings that "the thing" was getting tiresome and monotonous, and she did not interfere with the carrying out of the sentence of seven years' transportation. This was not the last. In 1872 a Fenian tried his hand against his widowed sovereign, and we all know of the shocking attempt of two years ago at Windsor. In truth, Her Majesty has been the greatest royal target in Europe. Messieurs les assassins are not very gallant.
All this time the Prince-Consort was up to his elbows in work of many kinds. That which he loved best, planning and planting the grounds of Osborne and Balmoral and superintending building, he cheerfully sacrificed for works of public utility. He inaugurated and urged forward many benevolent and scientific enterprises, and schools of art and music. This extraordinary man seemed to have a prophetic sense of the value and ultimate success of inchoate public improvements, and when he once adopted a scheme allowed nothing to discourage him. He engineered the Holborn Viaduct enterprise, and I notice that at a late meeting of the brave Channel Tunnel Company, Sir E. W. Watkin claimed that "the cause had once the advocacy of the great Prince-Consort, the most sagacious man of the century."
With all these things he found time to carefully overlook the education of his children. The Prince of Wales was now thought old enough to be placed under a tutor, and one was selected—a Mr. Birch (let us hope the name was not significant), "a young, good-looking, amiable man," who had himself taken "the highest honors at Cambridge";—doubtless a great point those highest Cambridge honors, for the instructor of an eight-years-old boy. For all the ability and learning of his tutor, it is said that the Prince of Wales never took to the classics with desperate avidity. He was never inclined to waste his strength or dim his pleasant blue eyes over the midnight oil.
Prince Albert never gave the training of his boys up wholly to the most accomplished instructors. His was still, while he lived, the guiding, guarding spirit. The Queen was equally faithful in the discharge of her duties to her children—especially to her daughters. In her memoranda I find many admirable passages which reveal her peculiarly simple, domestic, affectionate system of home government. The religious training of her little ones she kept as much as possible in her own hands, still the cares of State and the duties of royal hospitality would interfere, and, writing of the Princess Royal, in 1844, she says: "It is a hard case for me that my occupations prevent me from being with her when she says her prayers."
Some instructions which she gave to this child's governess should be printed in letters of gold: