Bishop Wilberforce describes the scene. "The royal christening was a very beautiful sight, in its highest sense of that word 'beauty.' The Queen, with the five royal children around her, the Prince of Wales and Princess Royal hand-in-hand, all kneeling down quietly and meekly at every prayer, and the little Princess Helena alone, just standing, and looking round with the blue eyes of gazing innocence."
When the statues of the royal children were executed by Mrs. Thornycroft, Princess Helena was modelled as Peace. The engraving is a representation of the graceful piece of sculpture, in which a slender young girl, wearing a long loose robe and having sandalled feet, holds the usual emblematic branch and cluster—one in each hand.
As one Princess was born, another of a former generation, whose birth had been hailed with equal rejoicing, passed away, on the 27th of May, immediately after the Birthday Drawing-room. Princess Sophia, the youngest surviving daughter and twelfth child of George III. and Queen Charlotte, died in her arm-chair in the drawing-room of her house at Kensington, aged seventy-one. At her own request she was buried at Kensal Green, where the Duke of Sussex was interred.
CHAPTER IX.
THE QUEEN'S FIRST STAY AT BALMORAL.
From France, in June, came the grievous news of the three days' fighting in the streets of Paris, because no Government provision could secure work and bread for the artisans. The insurrection was only put down by martial law under the Dictator, General Cavaignac.
In Sardinia the King, Charles Albert, fighting gallantly against the
Austrian rule, was defeated once and again, and driven back.
In England, though the most swaggering of the Chartists still blustered a little, attention could be given to more peaceful concerns. In July Prince Albert went to York, though he could "ill be spared" from the Queen's side in those days of startling events and foreign turmoil, to be present at a meeting of the Royal Agricultural Society, of which he had been governor for half-a-dozen years. The acclamations with which the Prince was received, were only the echo of the tempest of cheers which greeted and encouraged her Majesty every time she appeared in public this year.
In August strong measures had again to be taken in Ireland. These included the gathering together of a great military force in the disturbed districts, and the assemblage of a fleet of war-steamers on the coast. As in the previous instance, little or no resistance was offered. In the course of a few days the former leaders, Meagher, Smith O'Brien, and Mitchel, were arrested. They were brought to trial in Dublin, convicted of high treason, and sentenced to death—a sentence commuted into transportation for life.
The Queen had the pleasure of finding her brother, the Prince of Leiningen, appointed head of the department of foreign affairs in the short-lived Frankfort assembly of the German states. It showed at least the respect in which he was held by his countrymen.