About this time also, like another feature of the spirit of adventure which sent Franklin to the North Pole, and operated to a certain extent in the flush of railway enterprise, England was talking half chivalrously, half commercially, and alas! more than half sceptically, of Brook and Borneo, and the new attempt to establish civilization and herald Christianity under English influence in the far seas. All these conflicting elements of new history were felt in the palace as in other dwellings, and made part of Queen Victoria's life in those days.
A great statesman closed his eyes on this changing world. Earl Grey, who had been in the front in advocating change in his time, died.
A brave soldier fell in the last of his battles. Sir Robert Sale, who had been the guest of his Queen a year before, having returned to India and rejoined the army of the Sutlej on fresh disturbances breaking out in the Punjab, was killed at the battle of Moodkee.
Something of the wit and humour of the country was quenched or undergoing a transformation and passing into other hands. Two famous English humorists, Sydney Smith and Tom Hood the elder, went over to the great majority.
By the close of 1845 it had become clear that a change in the Corn Laws was impending. In the circumstances Sir Robert Peel, who, though he had been for some time approaching the conclusion, was not prepared to take immediate steps—who was, indeed, the representative of the Conservative party—resigned office. Lord John Russell, the great Whig leader, was called upon by the Queen to summon a new Ministry; but in consequence of difficulties with those who were to have been his colleagues, Lord John was compelled to announce himself unable to form a Cabinet, and Sir Robert Peel, at the Queen's request, resumed office, conscious that he had to face one of the hardest tasks ever offered to a statesman. He had to encounter "the coolness of former friends, the grudging support of unwilling adherents, the rancour of disappointed political antagonists."
In February, 1846, the royal family spent a week at Osborne, glad to escape from the strife of tongues and the violent political contention which they could do nothing to quell. The Prince was happy, "out all day," directing the building which was going on, and laying out the grounds of his new house; and the Queen was happy in her husband and Children's happiness. During this short absence Sir Robert Peel's resolutions were carried, and his Corn Bill, which was virtually the repeal of the Corn Laws, passed. He had only to await the consequences.
In the middle of the political excitement a single human tragedy, which Sir Robert Peel did something to prevent, reached its climax. Benjamin Haydon, the painter, the ardent advocate, both by principle and practice, of high art, took his life, driven to despair by his failure in worldly success—especially by the ill-success of his cartoons at the exhibition in Westminster Hall.
On the 25th of May a third princess was born, and on the 20th of June Sir Robert Peel's old allies, the Tories, who had but bided their time for revenge, while his new Whig associates looked coldly on him, conspired to defeat him in a Government measure to check assassination in Ireland, so that he had no choice save to resign. He had sacrificed himself as well as his party for what he conceived to be the good of the nation. His reign of power was at an end; but for the moment, at least, he was thankful.
To Lord John Russell, who was more successful than on an earlier occasion, the task of forming a new Ministry was intrusted. The parting from her late ministers, on the 6th of July, was a trial to the Queen, as the same experience had been previously. "Yesterday," her Majesty wrote to King Leopold, "was a very hard day for me. I had to part from Sir Robert Peel and Lord Aberdeen, who are irreparable losses to us and to the country. They were both so much overcome that it quite upset me. We have in them two devoted friends. We felt so safe with them. Never during the five years that they were with me did they ever recommend a person or a thing that was not for my or the country's best, and never for the party's advantage only…. I cannot tell you how sad I am to lose Aberdeen; you cannot think what a delightful companion he was. The breaking up of all this intercourse during our journeys is deplorable."
In the separation the Queen turned naturally to a nearer and dearer friend, whom only death could remove from her. "Albert's use to me, and I may say to the country, by his firmness and sagacity in these moments of trial, is beyond all belief." And beyond all gainsaying must have been the deep satisfaction with which the uncle, who was like a father, heard the repeated assurance of how successful had been his work—what a blessing had rested upon it.