THE EAGLE’S NEST, KILLARNEY.
(After a Photograph by W. Lawrence, Dublin.)
In the afternoon the Queen and her family left the Viceregal Lodge for Killarney, and, recording her impressions on the road, her Majesty dwells on the sparseness of the population, and the scarcity of villages and towns. At Thurles she notes how the crowd shrieked rather than cheered, how “wild and dark-looking” the people were, and how handsome the girls seemed, despite their dishevelled hair. At Killarney the Queen was received by Lord Castlerosse, Mr. Herbert of Muckross Abbey, the General commanding the district, and the Mayor, who presented a loyal address. Guarded by a strong escort of troops, her Majesty drove amidst cheering crowds to Lord Castlerosse’s house, which was so charmingly picturesque that she sketched it on her arrival. At dinner in the evening she met the Roman Catholic Bishop, Dr. Moriarty—whom she describes as “a tall, stout, and very intelligent, clever man.”—the Knight of Kerry, and a brother of O’Connell’s, whose views her
KING WILLIAM OF PRUSSIA (AFTERWARDS EMPEROR OF GERMANY).
Majesty found more to her liking than those of the Liberator. On the 27th the Queen spent most of her time on the lakes in this lovely and romantic spot—the close, warm, humid atmosphere being the only drawback to her delightful tour. In the evening Muckross was visited, and next day (28th August), after driving round Muckross Lake, the Queen went on that splendid sheet of water, and admired especially the excellent rowing of the boatmen. Very reluctantly did the Queen bid farewell to her kind hosts on the 29th of August, when she hastened back to her yacht at Kingstown. At nine next morning she reached Holyhead, where she rested, while the Prince Consort and her suite made an excursion to Carnarvon. Leaving Holyhead in the evening, and travelling all night, the Royal party reached Balmoral on the 30th of August.
The affairs of Germany had now drifted into such a critical condition that the Prince Consort felt bound to explain to the King of Prussia the views of the English Court on this subject. All over the Fatherland the people, stirred by the success of the movement in Italy for unity, were forming political clubs, and Prussia, to whom they looked for leadership, was disappointing them by refusing to reform her internal administration. Prince Albert, writing to the King of Prussia, took the popular German view—pointing out how Austria had ever worked for the purpose of weakening the Fatherland, and how she had once more given to France, after her victories in Italy, a strong position on the Rhine. “Is it an evil trait of the spirit of the people,” asks the Prince, “if they yearn for general unity and active co-operation in what is to decide their destiny? Do not allow yourself to be annoyed or misled if here and there the people are guilty of stupid extravagances. They and you are Germany’s only stay, and the power by which alone the enemy can be held at bay. It is not a Cavour that Germany needs, but a Stein.” It has been said that the Queen and her husband were not consistent in their policy, because, while they showed little sympathy for the national movement in Italy, they always encouraged the same movement in Germany. To them it must be remembered that the former movement was an anti-German one. They believed that if Austria lost Venetia, Galicia, Hungary, and Poland, Germany would be crushed—because they assumed that these nations, like the new kingdom of Italy, would be under the hostile influence of France. The mistake which they made in the case of Italy lay in supposing that political gratitude is stronger than the love of national independence.
During this autumn the Prince of Wales visited Germany, ostensibly to be present at the military manœuvres in the Rhine Provinces, but really to make the acquaintance of the Princess Alexandra of Denmark at Speyer and Heidelberg, where she happened to be staying, and where, according to the Prince Consort, “the young people seem to have taken a warm liking for each other when they first met.[106] The visit of the King of Prussia to Compiègne somewhat disturbed the mind of the country, for it set afloat rumours of an alliance with France, one result of which might perhaps be a scheme for the unification of Germany, with Belgium and the Rhine Provinces playing the part which was allotted to Nice and Savoy in the scheme for unifying Italy. The Queen and her husband, however, knew that the visit was purely one of ceremonial courtesy, and that no attempt had been made to inveigle Prussia into any such conspiracy. This information was communicated to the Cabinet, and soon all disquieting rumours ceased.
On the 18th of October the King of Prussia was crowned at Königsberg, and Lord Clarendon, who was present as representing the Queen, congratulated her Majesty on the charming manner in which the Crown Princess did homage to her father-in-law. King William I. was desirous of conferring the Order of the Black Eagle on Lord Clarendon, but the Queen begged him not to offer it, because it was against the traditions of the English Foreign Office to permit a subject to accept such a distinction.[107] Lord Clarendon mixed very freely in society at Berlin, and was able to report to the Queen that the attacks of the Times on everything Prussian would have damaged the position of the Crown Princess, had it not been safeguarded and secured by her own high personal qualities. These attacks broke out afresh over the King’s seeming assertion of the principle of Divine Right in his Address to the Chambers, and Clarendon begged the Queen to remonstrate with Lord Palmerston, who was supposed to influence the Times. Though Lord Palmerston, in one of his letters, penned a high-spirited reply to a Royal communication on the subject, it is a curious coincidence that the attacks of which her Majesty complained suddenly ceased from this moment.