“was astonished and delighted. Sir George Grey (Home Secretary) in tears.” On the way home her Majesty again met with a magnificent reception. After entering the Palace, she and the Prince showed themselves on the balcony and bowed their adieus to the vast throng, whose loyal shouts rent the air. The most perfect order was maintained, and, writes the Queen, “the wicked and absurd reports of dangers of every kind which a set of people, namely, soi-disant fashionables and the most violent Protectionists spread, are silenced.... I must not,” she adds, “omit to mention an interesting episode of this day, namely, the visit of the good old Duke on this his eighty-second birthday to his little godson, our dear little boy.[40] He came to us both at five, and we gave him a golden cup and some toys, which he himself had chosen, and Arthur gave him a nosegay.” From every quarter congratulations on the complete success of the day poured in upon the Queen, and though 700,000 spectators lined the route between the Exhibition and the Palace, no accidents and not a single police case could be traced to this enormous gathering of sightseers.
One result of the Exhibition was the celebration of the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts. It was thought that the great gathering of foreigners offered a fitting occasion for celebrating an event of the kind, and Prince Albert was asked to preside over the commemoration. His Royal Highness agreed, but stipulated that the celebration was to have no denominational or sectarian turn. Representatives of all parties, therefore, were invited; and the Prince’s speech, which he prepared with unusual care, was marked by broad catholicity of feeling, and was admirably in harmony with the great festival of civilisation which he himself had organised. Lord John Russell was so deeply impressed with the speech, that he wrote to the Queen congratulating her on the effect that it had produced. In reply the Queen wrote as follows:—“We are both much pleased at what Lord John Russell says about the Prince’s speech of yesterday. It was on so ticklish a subject, that we could not feel certain beforehand how it might be taken.” At the same time, the Queen felt sure that the Prince would say the right thing, from her entire confidence in his great tact and judgment. The Queen, at the risk of not appearing sufficiently modest (and yet why should a wife ever be modest about her husband’s merits?), must say that she thinks Lord John Russell will admit now that the Prince is possessed of very extraordinary powers of mind and heart. She feels so proud of being his wife, that she cannot refrain from herself paying a tribute to his noble character.”[41]
As might have been expected, the London season of the Exhibition year was an exceptionally brilliant one. It was marked by a strange combination of eccentricity and gaiety. The Duke of Brunswick kept the town talking with sufficient volubility, and his voyage to France in a balloon, the “Victoria,” with Mr. Green, the aëronaut, was a nine days’ wonder. In midsummer “Bloomerism” whetted the wits of Londoners. The votaries of “Bloomerism” took their name from the wife of a gallant American officer. This lady invented a new costume for women, consisting of loose trousers gathered at the ankles, a short, full skirt, and a broad hat. Adventuresses and “advanced” ladies tried to popularise the costume, but failed. Ridicule killed their cause, and when barmaids in public-houses and “fast” women generally began to adopt “Bloomerism,” its doom was sealed. The season of 1851 was, indeed, clouded with but one dismal fact; the aristocracy were somewhat pinched because agricultural prices were low, and yet the nobility bore their part in the great vortex of hospitality, which the World’s Fair had set whirling, bravely enough. London swarmed with distinguished foreigners, and balls and routs and dinner-parties went on without ceasing.
ST. GEORGE’S HALL, LIVERPOOL.
The first striking event of the season was the withdrawal of Macready from the stage on the 1st of February, and from the Memoirs of that great actor we find that the Queen made a point of being present at his farewell performance on the 26th of February at Drury Lane—the scene of his triumphs, not only as an actor but as a manager, who had restored Shakespeare’s plays to the stage in their fullest integrity. Nor was this the only performance which her Majesty honoured with her presence. Writing on May 17th, Lord Malmesbury records that “Lady Londonderry appeared at the Duke of Devonshire’s play in a gown trimmed with green birds, small ones round the body and down the sides, and large ones down the centre. The beak of one of the birds caught in the Queen’s dress, and was some time before it could be disentangled.” On the 12th of June there was a grand fancy ball at the Palace, the period chosen for illustration being the time of Charles II. The nobility and gentry appeared in the characters of their ancestors. The high officers of State donned the costumes of their predecessors in the reign of the “Merry Monarch.” “We went to the Queen’s Ball,” writes Lord Malmesbury; “it is said that her Majesty received 600 excuses out of 1,400 invitations, and that she did not fill up their places. I thought it very inferior to the first two. Most of the fancy dresses shabby, as if they had been got up cheap.”
