Spanish ladies declare that Victoria of Spain looked every inch a Queen when she first took her seat by her royal Consort. Her diadem-crowned golden hair, beautiful face, and her exquisite toilettes, make a striking feature at the State receptions; and when we consider that it was in an unknown tongue the talk went on, it was wonderful she could preserve her stately and quiet demeanour. Now the Queen has become mistress of the Spanish tongue, her subjects can admire her intellectual as well as her physical charms.
The Court of Spain at Candlemas.
The protocol of the royal Court etiquette at Madrid and the rites of the Roman Catholic Church produce a pageant in the Spanish palace at the Feast of the Purification (commonly called Candlemas) which, in splendour and solemnity, savour more of the Middle Ages than of the present practical period.
The galleries on the first-floor of the magnificent quadrangular Palace of Madrid showed the advent of a great event, for the windows looking on to the spacious colonnaded courtyard were hidden by the fine tapestries of the same character that lined the walls on the opposite sides. Rich carpets covered the floors, and the companies of stalwart halberdiers, the Guard of the palace, were placed at ten o’clock along the corridor, bearing on their shoulders their halberds with the inscription, “Fabrica de Toledo, Alfonso XIII., 1902,” which were presented to them when the present King was added to the list of the Sovereigns to whom the corps had the honour to be the bodyguard. Officials of the palace and officers constantly passed to and fro, giving orders and seeing that the soldiers stood in their right places.
The three-cornered hats edged with white, the high black leggings reaching to the white breeches, and the blue coat decorated with scarlet badges bearing the castle and the crowned lion, is the same uniform of the Royal Guard as it was in the early part of the last century, and it reminds one of the pictures of Napoleon, etc., of that time.
A clap of the hands from a Court official announced the opening of a large door leading to the apartments of the Infanta Maria Teresa and her husband, Prince Ferdinand of Bavaria. Bright and happy looked the young Princess as she passed along, with her ready sweet smile for familiar faces, and looking quite pretty in her pale blue dress. The merry eyes of the stalwart, fair young Prince were cast about in cheerful greetings as he swung along in his striking blue and scarlet hussar uniform, with the jacket slung on one shoulder, revealing the richly embroidered sleeves underneath.
There was a pause after the young couple passed to the seats set apart for the Royal Family in the chapel; then the strains of a march from an opera were heard from the band of the Royal Halberdiers in the courtyard below, the halberdiers stood at attention, and the royal procession was seen coming along the gallery.
The gentlemen of the Court, with the badges marking their respective offices, the Chamberlain, all in full dress, with white silk stockings and richly embroidered coats, were followed by the grandees and officers in their striking uniforms. They walked in two single files, so as to leave clear the view of the Royal Family. The Infantas of Bavaria and the Infanta Isabel came with their respective Ladies and Gentlemen in Waiting in full Court dress. The widowed Prince of Asturias was in his place, and lastly came the King in his uniform as Admiral, and wearing the Order of the Golden Fleece and the Collar of Carlos III., and the procession solemnly passed through the guarded portals of the chapel, where the Queen-mother and the young Queen Victoria had already taken their places. For after December 25, 1886, when a special service was held in the royal chapel of the palace, in which the Virgin’s protection was petitioned for the young Sovereign, the Court was in gala costume for two days. A reception was held, congratulations received, and from then till the birth of the expected heir Queen Victoria did not sit with the King on the throne in the chapel, but in the royal box on the ground-floor. All eyes were soon turned in admiration to the youthful English Sovereign of Spain, who looked like a beautiful picture in her white mantilla shading her diamond-crowned beautiful hair, and dressed in a rich, soft white Court dress.
The doors of the chapel were soon again flung open, the halberdiers were again called to attention, and the procession issued from the chapel in the same order in which it had entered, only now it was preceded by the Canons of the palace and other clerics in gorgeous vestments, with the Archbishop of Sion in gold-and-white mitre and emblazoned cope; and everybody in the procession carried a long candle, as they solemnly made the tour of the gallery to the tune of the psalm of old in which Simeon declared that the Babe brought to the Temple would be “a Light to lighten the Gentiles.”
The King, as he bore his candle, looked ruefully at his sister, as much as to say: “How am I to manage this?” The Infanta smiled pleasantly, and her young husband’s eyes twinkled with fun. The evident strain on the dignity of the stately grandees and Chamberlains to carry their lights befittingly gave a touch of humour to the stateliness of the scene, and I overheard a grandee say, when he was asked by one behind him not to walk so slowly: “I can’t go any quicker, or I shall spill some grease on the Infanta’s train!”