On December 8th following, the little Prince was created by letters-patent Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester—the titles of Prince of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Duke of Saxony, Duke of Cornwall, Duke of Rothesay, Earl of Carrick, Baron Renfrew, Lord of the Isles and Prince, or Great Steward of Scotland, being his already by virtue of his mother being the reigning Sovereign at the time of his birth. During six hundred years there had been from time to time a Prince of Wales. The first was the son of Edward I., but the title was never made hereditary, and there have been periods, totalling altogether 288 years, in which it lay dormant. The Black Prince was perhaps the best known of the line. The new Prince of Wales—destined to hold the designation for nearly sixty years and to make it one of the best known in the world—was solemnly baptized on January 25th, 1842, in St. George's Chapel, Windsor, by the simple names of Albert Edward. The first was after his father, the second in memory of the Queen's father, the Duke of Kent. The scene was one of splendour, and the uniforms and glittering orders and gleaming gems and beautiful dresses harmonized well with the stately setting of the Chapel Royal.
THE GORGEOUS CHRISTENING CEREMONY
Besides the Royal party, which included Frederick William IV., King of Prussia, there were a throng of Ambassadors, Knights of the Garter, Members of the Privy Council, Peers and Peeresses, statesmen and heads of the Church. The Archbishops of Canterbury and York, the Bishops of London, Winchester, Oxford and Norwich were in special attendance, and the sponsors for the young Prince were the King of Prussia, the Duchess of Kent (proxy for the Duchess of Saxe-Cobourg), the Duke of Cambridge (proxy for the Duchess of Saxe-Gotha), Princess Augusta of Cambridge (proxy for Princess Sophia) and Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Cobourg. The cost of this gorgeous christening ceremony and attendant functions was said to have been fully two million dollars. A part of this was, however, due to the entertainments accorded King Frederick William IV., who, as the chief Protestant monarch of the Continent, was given a particularly cordial and elaborate welcome. In connection with the christening of the future King it is interesting to note that an ecclesiastical newspaper, of Toronto, called The Church, referred to the event on March 19th, 1842, and declared that should the Prince live to be King he would be known as Edward VII. On February 3rd Queen Victoria opened Parliament in person with the following as the preliminary words in the Speech from the Throne: "I cannot meet you in Parliament assembled without making a public acknowledgment of my gratitude to Almighty God on account of the birth of the Prince, my son; an event which has completed the measure of my domestic happiness and has been hailed with every manifestation of affectionate attachment to my person and Government by my faithful and loyal people."
CHILDHOOD OF THE PRINCE
The early events of the Prince's life were followed with much interest by the public and with a personal and individual feeling which grew in volume with the ever-increasing popularity of the young Queen. The Court in those years was a gay one and events such as the Queen's famous Plantagenet Ball of 1842; the state visit to King Louis Philippe of France in 1843; the coming of Nicholas I., Czar of all the Russias, to the Court of St. James in 1844, followed a little later by William, Prince of Prussia—afterwards William I. of Germany, and by a return visit of the King and Queen of the French; kept the social demands of the period up to a very high pitch. Yet the quiet, careful surroundings of an almost ideal home were given to the young Prince and to those who afterwards came to the family circle, by a mother who, in the midst of many national cares and private anxieties could write to her much-respected friend and uncle—Leopold of Belgium—that "my happiness at home, the love of my husband, his kindness, his advice, his support and his company make up for all and make me forget all."
The Princess Victoria, afterwards for a brief year Empress of Germany, had been born on November 21, 1840; the Prince of Wales was the next child; the Princess Alice, who afterwards married the Grand Duke of Hesse, was born on April 25, 1843; Prince Alfred—Duke of Edinburgh and of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha in later years—followed on August 6, 1844; the Princess Helena came next on May 25, 1846, and afterwards became the wife of Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein; the Princess Louise, who married the Marquess of Lorne and future Duke of Argyll, was born on March 18, 1848; Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught, followed on May 1, 1850; Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany, on April 7, 1853; Princess Beatrice, afterwards wife and widow of Prince Henry of Battenberg, was born on April 14, 1857, and completed the Royal family for the time.
The greatest care and attention was given to the youthful Prince. Writing to King Leopold soon after his birth—on December 7, 1841—the Queen had said: "I wonder very much who my little boy will be like. You will understand how fervent are my prayers, and I am sure every one's must be, to see him resemble his father in every respect, both in body and mind." From the earliest period the child grew into his life of ceremony and state, but it was a process carefully graded to suit the development of natural faculties. Nothing appears to have been allowed to unduly burden his gradual growth in experience and knowledge and certainly a more pleasant domestic environment and life could hardly be imagined. At a later period his studies were so varied in character as to excite some slight apprehension in a part of the public mind.
The first public appearance of the Prince was on February 4, 1842, when the Queen was inspecting some troops near Windsor and the babe was held up by his nurse from a window of the Castle so that the crowd could see him. He has been described in many prints and stories as being a very lively infant and child. Lady Lyttelton[1], a sister to Mrs. Gladstone, was in charge of the Royal nursery as a sort of trusted Governess during the first six years of his life and everything was conducted with regularity and care. The Queen personally supervised the arrangements, whether for instruction, pleasure or exercise, though she often had to express in diary or letter her regret at not being able to be as much with her children as she desired. Simplicity was, perhaps, the guiding principle of this early training, though it was combined with a certain amount of familiarity in matters of ceremony and formality. In September, 1843, when the Queen and Prince Consort were in France the Royal children were at Brighton in charge of Lady Lyttelton and the people used to take great delight in waiting for the daily outing of the little Prince and his sister and the presentation of a loyal salute by the raising of hats and the waving of handkerchiefs. The child had been taught to raise his chubby fist to his forehead in reply and a journalist of the time veraciously declares that he did it with "evident enjoyment and infantile dignity." A little later, on December 20th, a party of nine Ojibbeway Indians were presented to the Queen at Windsor Castle and the Chief gravely referred to the toddling Royal infant in his speech as "the very big little White Father whose eyes are like the sky that sees all things and who is fat with goodness like a winter bear."
Another attractive event in these annals of childhood was a visit of Tom Thumb to Buckingham Palace on March 23, 1844. Not long afterwards, on June 5th, the little Prince saw his first Review, on the occasion of the Emperor of Russia's visit, and clapped his hands and shouted at the splendid spectacle. On March 24, 1846, he was given that first and greatest pleasure of all children, a visit to the circus (Astley's). He applauded liberally and when the clown was brought to the Royal box at his request, the little Prince gravely shook hands with him and thanked him "for making me laugh so much." Similar stories might be multiplied in many pages. Every trifling incident of the Royal childhood seems, indeed, to have been treasured by some one. Late in 1846 a visit was made on the Victoria and Albert yacht to the coast of Cornwall and, after the landing, the Royal party went to Penrhyn where the little Prince, as Duke of Cornwall, was formally welcomed by Mayor and Corporation as their feudal lord. In August of the succeeding year he was taken by the Queen and Prince Consort on a tour around the west coast of Scotland and during a visit to Cluny Macpherson's Scottish home, he received one of the first of a multitude of interesting presents—a ring containing a miniature of Prince Charles Stuart. In August 1844, he accompanied his parents on a visit to Ireland, where he met with splendid acclamation from the people and was created Earl of Dublin by the Queen. It has been said that the reception was so enthusiastic as to have left a profound impression on the child's mind.