QUEEN VICTORIA'S RELATIONS AND FRIENDS
It may be held to have been one of the chief blessings of Queen
Victoria's girlhood that she was brought closely under the influence
of an enlightened and large-minded Prince, Leopold, her maternal
uncle, afterwards King of the Belgians. He was born in 1790, being the
youngest son of Francis, Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, and his youth
was spent in the Russian military service. He had shown talent and
courage in the field, and had commanded a battalion at Lützen and
Leipsic. He had married, in 1816, the Princess Charlotte, only child
of George IV. For many years his home was at Claremont, where the
Princess Charlotte had died; there the Princess Victoria spent many
happy holidays, and grew to regard her uncle with the most devoted
affection, almost, indeed, in the light of a father. It is said that
Prince Leopold had hoped to be named Regent, if a Regency should be
necessary.[1] He was offered, and accepted, the throne of Greece in
1830, but shrank from the difficulties of the position, and withdrew
his acceptance upon the plea that Lord Aberdeen, who was then Foreign
Secretary, was not prepared to make such financial arrangements as he
considered satisfactory.[2]
[Footnote 1: A practical proof of his interest in his niece
may be found in the fact that for years he contributed
between three and four thousand a year to the expenses of her
education, and for necessary holidays by the sea, at a time
when the Duchess of Kent's Parliamentary Grant was unequal to
the increasing expenses of her household.]
[Footnote 2: Greece after having obtained autonomy was in a
practically bankrupt condition, and the Powers had guaranteed
the financial credit of the country until it was able to
develop its own resources.]
It is interesting to observe from the correspondence that King Leopold
seems for many years to have continued to regret his decision; it was
not that he did not devote himself, heart and soul, to the country of
his adoption, but there seems to have been a romantic element in his
composition, which did not find its full satisfaction in presiding
over the destinies of a peaceful commercial nation.
[Pageheading: THE KING OF THE BELGIANS]
In 1831, when Louis Philippe, under pressure from Lord Palmerston,
declined the throne of Belgium for his son the Duc de Nemours, Prince
Leopold received and accepted an offer of the Crown. A Dutch invasion
followed, and the new King showed great courage and gallantry in an
engagement near Louvain, in which his army was hopelessly outnumbered.
But, though a sensitive man, the King's high courage and hopefulness
never deserted him. He ruled his country with diligence, ability, and
wisdom, and devoted himself to encouraging manufactures and commerce.
The result of his firm and liberal rule was manifested in 1848, when,
on his offering to resign the Crown if it was thought to be for
the best interests of the country, he was entreated, with universal
acclamation, to retain the sovereignty. Belgium passed through the
troubled years of revolution in comparative tranquillity. King Leopold
was a model ruler; his deportment was grave and serious; he was
conspicuous for honesty and integrity; he was laborious and upright,
and at the same time conciliatory and tactful.
He kept up a close correspondence with Queen Victoria, and paid her
several visits in England, where he was on intimate terms with
many leading Englishmen. It would be difficult to over-estimate the
importance of his close relations with the Queen; by example and
precept he inspired her with a high sense of duty, and from the first
instilled into her mind the necessity of acquainting herself closely
with the details of political administration. His wisdom, good sense,
and tenderness, as well as the close tie of blood that existed between
him and the Queen, placed him in a unique position with regard to her,
and it is plain that he was fully aware of the high responsibility
thus imposed upon him, which he accepted with a noble generosity. It
is true that there were occasions when, as the correspondence reveals,
the Queen was disposed to think that King Leopold endeavoured to
exercise too minute a control over her in matters of detail, and even
to attempt to modify the foreign policy of England rather for the
benefit of Belgium than in the best interests of Great Britain; but
the Queen was equal to these emergencies; she expressed her dissent
from the King's suggestions in considerate and affectionate terms,
with her gratitude for his advice, but made no pretence of following
it.
For her aunt, Queen Adelaide, the Princess Victoria had always felt
a strong affection; and though it can hardly be said that this gentle
and benevolent lady exercised any great influence over her more
vigorous and impetuous niece, yet the letters will testify to the
closeness of the tie which united them.
[Pageheading: QUEEN ADELAIDE]
Queen Adelaide was the eldest child of George, Duke of Saxe-Meiningen;
her mother was a princess of Hohenlohe-Langenburg.
At the age of twenty-six she was married to the Duke of Clarence, then
in his fifty-third year, without any preliminary courtship. They
lived for a year in Hanover, and then principally at Bushey Park. Two
daughters were born to them, the elder of whom lived only a few hours;
the younger, Princess Elizabeth, died in the first year of her age.
Their married life was a happy one, in spite of the disparity of
age. Queen Adelaide was a woman of a deeply affectionate disposition,
sensible, sympathetic, and religious. She had a very definite ideal of
the duties of a wife and a Queen; she made it her pleasure to meet and
anticipate, as far as possible, her husband's wishes; and her husband,
hasty and choleric though he was, repaid her with tender affection. To
such an extent did the Queen merge her views in those of her husband,
that she passed at one time through a period of general unpopularity.
It was believed that she was adverse to Reform, and used her influence
against it. She was mobbed in the streets at the time when the Reform
agitation was at its height; and it is said that when the Melbourne
Ministry of 1834 was dismissed, London was (owing to an unjustifiable
communication of Lord Brougham to the _Times_) placarded with posters
bearing the words, "The Queen has done it all!"
It is a pathetic instance of the irony of fate that Queen Adelaide
should have thus been supposed to desire to take an active part in
politics. It is obvious, from her letters, that she had practically
no political views at all, except a gentle distrust of all proposed
changes, social or political. Her one idea of her position as Queen
was to agree with any expression of opinion that fell from the King.
She was fond of music, and took a deep interest in her religious
duties and in all that concerned the welfare of the Protestant
communion. But apart from this, her interests were entirely domestic
and personal, and her letters reveal her character in the most
amiable light. Her devotion to the King, and the tender and respectful
diffidence with which she welcomed her niece to the Throne, show a
very sweet nature.
The rest of her life, after King William's death, was passed to a
great extent under invalid conditions, though she was only forty-four
at the time of her niece's accession. She travelled a good deal in
search of health, and lived a quiet life in England, surrounded by
a small but devoted circle of friends and relations. Her personal
popularity with the nation became very great, not only for the simple
kindliness of her life, but for her splendid munificence; it is said
that her public subscriptions often exceeded £20,000 a year. She died
in December 1849. Queen Victoria was very much attached to her gentle,
simple-minded, and tender-hearted aunt, and treated her with the
utmost consideration and an almost daughterly affection.
[Pageheading: BARONESS LEHZEN]
Another person who had a large share in forming the Queen's character
was Louise Lehzen, the daughter of a Hanoverian clergyman, who came
to England as governess to Princess Feodore of Leiningen, Queen
Victoria's half-sister, shortly before the Queen's birth. In 1824
she became governess to the Princess Victoria. In 1827 George IV.
conferred upon her the rank of a Hanoverian Baroness. When the Duchess
of Northumberland, in 1830, was appointed the Princess's official
governess, she remained as lady in attendance. The Princess was
devoted to her, but "greatly in awe of her." She remained at Court
after the accession till 1842, without holding an official position,
and then returned to Germany, where she died in 1870.
[Pageheading: BARON STOCKMAR]
Baron Stockmar was another of the interesting personalities who came
into very close contact with the Queen in her early years. He was
forty-nine at the time of the accession, but he had come to England
more than twenty years before as private physician to Prince Leopold.
He endeared himself to the Princess Charlotte, who died holding his
hand. He afterwards became Prince Leopold's private secretary, and
took a prominent part as the Prince's representative in the successive
negotiations with regard to his candidature for the thrones of Greece
and Belgium. Upon the accession of Queen Victoria, Stockmar joined
the Court in a private capacity, and for fifteen months he held an
unofficial position as her chief adviser. There was a general feeling
of dislike in the minds of the English public to the German influences
that were supposed to be brought to bear on the Queen; and Lord
Melbourne found it necessary to make a public and categorical denial
of the statement that Stockmar was acting as the Queen's private
secretary. But the statement, if not technically, was virtually
true. Stockmar lived at Court, had interviews with the Queen and her
Ministers, and though he industriously endeavoured to efface himself,
yet there is no doubt that he was consulted on most important
questions. In 1838, he had been entrusted by King Leopold, with the
Queen's knowledge and consent, with a mission of great delicacy: he
was asked to accompany Prince Albert on a tour in Italy, with the idea
of completing his education, and in order to satisfy himself that
the Prince would be a worthy Consort for the Queen. This task he
discharged admirably, and became the most confidential and trusted of
all the Prince's friends. There are many letters of Stockmar's to the
Prince extant, which prove that Stockmar never shrank from speaking
the plainest truth to the Prince on matters of duty and faults of
temperament, without any courtier-like attempt to blink criticism
that might have been unpalatable. The Prince had the generosity and
humility to value this trait of Stockmar's very highly, to such an
extent that Stockmar's influence possessed if anything too great a
preponderance. Stockmar had jealously nursed two profound political
ideals--the unity of Germany under Prussia, and the establishment of
close relations between Germany and England. He induced Prince Albert,
heavily burdened as he was with work, to devote almost too much time
and thought to the former of these aims. Stockmar was a profound
student of social and constitutional questions. He had made a close
study of English political institutions; but though he grasped the
constitutional theory of the English Throne, and saw that the first
necessity for the Sovereign was to hold a position independent of
party, he never clearly understood that the Monarch should keep as
far as possible clear of political details. Stockmar's view of the
position was that the Sovereign should be practically Premier as well;
and much of the jealousy that was felt, on various occasions, at
the position which Prince Albert assumed with regard to political
situations, is referable to Stockmar's influence.
He was a very able man, with immense political knowledge, and without
personal ambition; Lord Palmerston, who was no friend to Stockmar's
theory of government, admitted that he was the most disinterested man
he had ever encountered. Stockmar's ambition was to achieve his
own political ideals, and to modify the course of events in what he
conceived to be beneficial directions; he was entirely indifferent
to the trappings of power, and this very disinterestedness made his
influence more supreme.
He suffered all his life from feeble health and a hypochondriacal
tendency, and was genuinely fond of retirement and quiet life. He
certainly deserved the devoted confidence reposed in him by Prince
Albert and the Queen; it may perhaps be questioned whether his own
_doctrinaire_ bias did not make itself too strongly felt, in the
minuteness with which Prince Albert dealt with English politics; but
the net result of his influence was that the danger, which lies in
wait for strictly constitutional Sovereigns, was averted--the danger,
that is, of leaving the administration of State affairs in the hands
of specialists, and depriving it of the wise control and independent
criticism which only the Crown can adequately supply.
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
TO CHAPTER IV
Queen Victoria, from the very first, took great pleasure in filing
the correspondence addressed to her. There are many volumes of letters
received from her various relations. We have thought it best to give
some of Queen Adelaide's early letters; they indicate in a remarkable
manner the growing estrangement between King William IV. and the
Duchess of Kent. In the earlier letters the King enquires very
affectionately after the Duchess, and constant mention is made of
presents sent to her; but the references made to her become less
frequent and colder, till at last the King contents himself with
sending messages only to the Princess. But the letters of Queen
Adelaide are always written in a strain of touching devotion and
affection, and reveal her as a woman of large heart and great
simplicity of character.
[Pageheading: KING LEOPOLD]
But the most interesting series of letters are the Queen's own
correspondence with King Leopold, of which several hundred are
preserved. The letters, too, received by her from the King of the
Belgians are preserved in their entirety.
The letters which the Queen wrote to King Leopold are of extraordinary
interest; she kept up an unbroken correspondence with him, and spoke
freely of all that was in her mind. Two points are worthy of special
mention: though she was early convinced of the necessity of holding an
independent constitutional position in politics she mentions the Tory
party with undisguised mistrust; and further, the name of King William
hardly ever occurs until his last illness.
King Leopold's early letters reveal his character in the most amiable
light. He familiarised the Queen with all the complicated details of
foreign politics; he gave her the most sensible and wise advice; he
warned and encouraged her; he answered her enquiries with the minutest
care: and the warm affection to which he gave frequent expression is a
very sacred and beautiful thing to contemplate.
We have selected several of the Princess Victoria's letters to the
King of the Belgians before her accession, because they throw a
remarkable light upon her temperament. In the first place, they reveal
the deep affectionateness of her character, and, what is still more
remarkable at her age, her frankness and outspokenness in expressing
her feelings.
In the second place, they show with what interest and eagerness the
Princess was following the course of foreign politics. Her view was
naturally a personal one, but it may be said that there can have been
very few, if any, girls in England, of the Princess's age, who were
taking any interest at all in Continental affairs. It is true that
King Leopold had early impressed upon the Princess that it was a
duty to become acquainted with the course of current events; but the
letters show that the interest she felt was congenial and innate, and
did not spring from a sense of duty. The allusions to home politics
are not so frequent, but still show that here also her attention was
alert.
Thirdly, they reveal her abounding vitality, her love of life and
amusement, her devotion to music, and the simple unspoilt zest with
which she threw herself into all that surrounded her.
There is a special interest which attaches to the correspondence
between Queen Victoria and King Leopold after the Accession. The
letters reveal, as no other documents could do, the monarchical point
of view. However intimate may be the relations between a Sovereign
and a subject, there is bound to appear a certain discretion, and
even condescension, on the one hand, and on the other a due degree of
deference. But here we have the remarkable spectacle of two monarchs,
both of eminent sagacity, and both, so to speak, frankly interested in
the task of constitutional government, corresponding freely on all the
difficulties and problems inseparable from their momentous task,
and with an immense sense of their weighty responsibilities. It is
impossible to exaggerate the deep and abiding interest of such a
correspondence; and the seriousness, the devotion, the public spirit
that are displayed, without affectation or calculated impressiveness,
make the whole series of letters singularly memorable.
The King of the Belgians had married Princess Louise of Orleans,
daughter of Louis Philippe, in 1832. She was only seven years older
than the Princess Victoria, who grew to regard her with the tenderest
affection.
The letters from Queen Louise are very numerous. A few are in French,
but they are mostly written in brisk, lively English, not always very
correct, either in construction or in spelling. They are full of small
family details--the movements of various relations, the improvement in
her brothers' looks, Court festivities, the childish ailments of her
little boys, the journeys and expeditions, recollections of Windsor,
their visitors, elaborate descriptions of dresses--interesting to
read, but difficult to select from. They are full of heart-felt
expressions of the sincerest affection for "your dear Majesty," a
quaint phrase that often occurs.
[Pageheading: PRINCE ALBERT]
After their marriage in 1840, Prince Albert naturally became the
Queen's confidential Secretary.
A close study of the Queen's correspondence reveals the character of
the Prince in a way which nothing else could effect. Traces of
his untiring labour, his conscientious vigilance, his singular
devotedness, appear on every page. There are innumerable memoranda in
his own hand; the papers are throughout arranged and annotated by him;
nothing seems to have escaped him, nothing to have dismayed him. As
an instance of the minute laboriousness which characterised the Royal
household, it may be mentioned that there are many copies of important
letters, forwarded to the Prince for his perusal, the originals of
which had to be returned, written not only by the Prince himself, but
by the Queen under his direction. But besides keeping a vigilant eye
upon politics, the Prince took the lead in all social and educational
movements of the time, as well as devoting a close and continuous
attention to the affairs of Europe in general, and Germany in
particular. It is obvious from the papers that the Prince can hardly
ever have taken a holiday; many hours of every day must have been
devoted by him to work; yet he was at the same time a tender husband
and father, always ready with advice and sympathy, and devoted to
quiet domestic life.
After the Queen's marriage the correspondence becomes far more
voluminous. It is difficult to exaggerate the amount of conscientious
labour bestowed by the Queen and the Prince Consort on all matters
which concerned the welfare of the nation. The number of documents
which passed through their hands, and which were carefully studied by
them, was prodigious.
The drafts of the Queen's replies to letters are in many cases in the
handwriting of the Prince Consort, but dated by herself, and often
containing interlinear corrections and additions of her own. Whether
the Queen indicated the lines of the replies, whether she dictated the
substance of them, or whether they contain the result of a discussion
on the particular matter, cannot be precisely ascertained. But
they contain so many phrases and turns of expression which are
characteristic of her outspoken temperament, that it is clear that
she not only followed every detail, but that the substance of
the communication bore in most cases the impress of her mind. A
considerable number of the drafts again are in her own hand, with
interlinear corrections and additions by the Prince; and these so
strongly resemble in style the drafts in the handwriting of the
Prince, that it is clear that the Queen did not merely accept
suggestions, but that she had a strong opinion of her own on important
matters, and that this opinion was duly expressed.
One fact must, however, be borne in mind. It happens in many cases
that a correspondence on some particular point seems to be about to
lead up to a definite conclusion, but that the salient and decisive
document is absent. In these cases it is clear that the matter was
settled at a personal interview; in many cases the Prince prepared
a memorandum of an important interview; but there are a considerable
number of such correspondences, where no record is preserved of the
eventual solution, and this incompleteness is regrettable, but, by the
nature of the case, inevitable.
[Pageheading: LEADING STATESMEN IN 1837]
The young Queen, on coming to the Throne, had little technical
knowledge of the details of diplomacy, but she already had a real and
intelligent acquaintance with foreign affairs, though it was rather
personal than political, and, as we have seen, was more inspired by
her interest in the fortunes and position of her numerous maternal
relations than by the political views of her paternal relatives. Among
the English statesmen of the day there were few who were qualified
to help and instruct her. The two men who for over twenty years
alternately guided the foreign policy of the country were Lord
Aberdeen and Lord Palmerston. They represented two opposed schools.
Lord Aberdeen, a Peelite, was naturally and by tradition inclined to
desire harmonious relations with all foreign Powers, and to abstain,
as far as was consistent with maintaining British interests, from any
sort of intervention in European affairs; Palmerston was a disciple of
Canning, who had definitely broken with the principles of the Congress
of Vienna, and openly avowed his approval of a policy of intervention,
to any extent short of actual war, in the interests of liberty and
good government. The only other man who had any title to speak with
authority on foreign affairs was the Duke of Wellington, who had held
the seals as Foreign Secretary for a few months in 1834 and 1835. He
had, however, lost much of the reputation for political sagacity which
he had held at the time when he was the arbiter of Europe and virtual
ruler of France. Moreover, being, as he was, a much occupied man, with
varied business to transact, and at the mercy of his almost excessive
conscientiousness, he held himself to a considerable extent aloof
from current politics, though he never lost his absorbing interest in
Continental affairs.