On the Sunday following the death of the Duke a private service was held in Sandringham Church, attended by King Edward and Queen Alexandra, their daughters, Princess Victoria Mary of Teck, and Prince George. By the King’s special wish his elder son was given the simplest of military funerals, and the coffin was removed from Sandringham to Windsor on a gun-carriage, escorted by a number of the Prince’s old comrades in arms. On the coffin lay the Prince’s busby and a silken Union Jack, and even at Windsor, where among the impressive mass of mourners every Royal House was represented, everything was severely simple, and the pall-bearers were officers of the 10th Hussars.

The career of the Prince, so suddenly cut off ere he had well reached his prime, in addition to its historical interest, throws an instructive light on the pains which King Edward has always expended on the education and training of his children. On none of his children did the King bestow more loving thought and care than on his eldest son, who was destined, as it then seemed, one day to bear all the anxieties and responsibilities of the British Crown.

Prince Albert Victor was popularly, but quite erroneously, supposed to be a weakly, delicate child. The two nurses who successively had the principal charge of him—Mrs. Clark and Mrs. Blackburn—agreed in repudiating this idea, and their testimony is certainly supported by the photographs which were taken of the Prince in babyhood. His early death is to be attributed, not to any original delicacy of constitution, but to the weakness following a severe attack of typhoid, which delayed by two months his joining the Britannia.

Once out of the nursery, the brothers were committed to the charge of a tutor selected for them by Queen Victoria—the Rev. John Neale Dalton—an admirable choice as events proved. From childhood Prince Albert Victor was devotedly attached to his younger brother, Prince George, who warmly reciprocated his affection, and their father wisely determined that the two boys should not be separated, but should enter the Royal Navy together as cadets. This was done in June 1877, Prince Albert Victor being then thirteen and a half and Prince George being some seventeen months younger. From the very first King Edward caused it to be understood that his sons were to enjoy no privileges on account of their rank, but were to be treated exactly like their fellow-cadets on board the Britannia, and made to learn their profession just as if they had been the sons of an ordinary private gentleman. The only exceptions were that Mr. Dalton attended the Princes as governor, and that, by special request of the Admiralty, their hammocks were slung behind a separate bulkhead in a space about 12 feet square. The young Princes spent two years in the Britannia, and both obtained a first-class in seamanship, entitling them to three months’ sea-time, and for general good conduct they obtained another three months.

The King thoroughly realised the benefit he had himself derived from the travels which he had undertaken as a youth, and therefore he arranged that his sons should spend three years in making a tour round the world, that their minds might be equipped by experience of men and cities, and that they might acquire an abiding impression of the extent and resources of the British Empire. Accordingly, the young Princes started in the Bacchante cruiser, Captain Lord Charles Scott, being again entrusted to the care of Mr. Dalton, who was afterwards made a Canon of Windsor. Canon Dalton, it is interesting to note, attended Prince George when, as Duke of Cornwall and York, and accompanied by the Duchess of Cornwall and York, he visited Australia to inaugurate the Federal Parliament, coming home by New Zealand and Canada.

The Princes kept careful diaries, and on their return they published a detailed account of their experiences. In the Bacchante, just as in the Britannia, they were treated exactly like other officers of their age and standing, except that they had a private cabin under the poop. They joined the gun-room mess, the members of which were granted a special allowance—an arrangement which had before been made when the Duke of Edinburgh began his naval career.

The Bacchante cruised to Gibraltar, Messina, Gibraltar again, Madeira, the West Indies, and home to Spithead on 3rd May. Then, on 19th July, the Princes rejoined the Bacchante for another cruise, first with the combined Channel and Reserve Squadrons to Bantry Bay and Vigo, and afterwards to Monte Video. The ship arrived off the Falkland Islands, but the Princes never landed, as had been arranged, for the troubles in South Africa had come to a head and the squadron was suddenly ordered to the Cape. The Bacchante reached Simons Bay on 16th February, and not many days later came the news of Majuba Hill and Laing’s Nek.

Early in April the Princes left for Australia, a voyage which was destined to be not without danger, for the Bacchante broke a portion of her steering-gear in a heavy gale. Temporary repairs were effected, and the vessel’s course was altered for Albany, in Western Australia. While the Bacchante was refitting, their Royal Highnesses visited the chief Australian ports in a passenger steamer called the Cathay, being everywhere received with enthusiastic loyalty. At last, rejoining the Bacchante, they said good-bye with regret to Australia, and on the voyage home they visited Fiji, Japan (where they were received with great ceremony by the Mikado), Shanghai, Hong-Kong, Singapore, and Colombo. Thence they proceeded to Suez, where they had the pleasure of meeting the great de Lesseps, and went in the Khedive’s yacht on a trip up to the First Cataract, as their parents had done in 1869.

A somewhat prolonged tour in the Holy Land followed, their Royal Highnesses visiting those sacred scenes which their father had visited before they were born. The Princes left Beirut for Athens on 7th May, and there they had the pleasure of meeting their uncle, the King of the Hellenes, and thence they went to Suda Bay to take part in a naval regatta, in which the Bacchante’s boats covered themselves with glory. By way of Sicily and Sardinia, the Princes passed on to Gibraltar, there renewing their old acquaintance with the famous Lord Napier of Magdala. It is a pathetic circumstance that both Lord Napier and, but two years afterwards, the Duke of Clarence and Avondale, were borne to the grave on the same gun-carriage.

At length the long voyage came to an end. Off Swanage the Osborne, with King Edward, Queen Alexandra, and the three young Princesses, met the Bacchante early in August. A visit to Queen Victoria at Osborne followed, and the two Princes were shortly afterwards confirmed in Whippingham Church by Archbishop Tait, who said to them in his address:—

“From this time forward your course of life, which has been hitherto unusually alike, must, in many respects, diverge. You will have different occupations and different training for an expected difference of position.”

The Archbishop was a true prophet. It was indeed necessary now to separate the brothers. Prince George, as the younger son, might be left to continue his career in the noble service to which he had become devoted, but his elder brother, being in the immediate succession to the Throne, must, it was felt, be associated, as his father had been before him, with other walks of national life as well. First of all, it was decided, must come some terms at Cambridge University, and to prepare Prince Albert Victor in the particular kind of knowledge required Mr. J. K. Stephen was associated with Mr. Dalton in the summer of 1883. Mr. Stephen, the son of one of the greatest Judges who ever adorned the English Bench—Sir James Fitz-James Stephen—was not merely a most lovable man, possessed of extraordinary intellectual powers, but his total personality was of so rare a kind as to be indescribable to those who never came under its conquering influence. Probably from no human being were all things mean and paltry so utterly alien. Large in heart and mind as he was large in bodily frame, he left, when an untimely death snatched him away, not only a bitter personal grief among his friends, but a conviction that the nation’s loss was even greater than theirs.

Prince Albert Victor became warmly attached to Mr. Stephen, who gives in some private letters, quoted in Mr. J. E. Vincent’s memoir of the Duke of Clarence and Avondale, a characteristic picture of the life led by the Royal pupil and his tutors in a little house in the park at Sandringham.

“He is a good-natured, unaffected youth,” writes Mr. Stephen, “and disposed to exert himself to learn some history.… We are six in this little house, a sort of adjunct to the big one in whose grounds it stands, and we lead a quiet and happy reading-party sort of life with all the ordinary rustic pursuits.” The other four members of the party were Mr. Dalton, “a lively little Frenchman,” “a young aristocrat, whose father is the Earl of Strathmore, and a naval lieutenant, kept on shore by a bad knee, both of whom are very pleasant, and have more brains than they take credit for.”

In October 1883 the King accompanied Prince Albert Victor to Cambridge, and saw him matriculated as an undergraduate member of Trinity College, that ancient and splendid foundation to which he himself belonged. Two sets of rooms, one for the Prince and one for Mr. Dalton, were prepared on the top floor of a staircase in Nevile’s Court, the quietest court in Trinity.

It was at Cambridge that certain sterling qualities possessed by Prince Albert Victor first became manifest to any considerable circle, and through them to the public at large. His life at the University was simple and well ordered. He had not—nor was it desirable that he should have—the specialised intellect which wins University prizes and scholarships, but he displayed in a marked degree that peculiarly Royal quality of recognising intellect in others. Of those whom he admitted to his friendship while at Cambridge nearly all have become, or are becoming, distinguished in various walks of life. He was not distinguished from his undergraduate contemporaries except by the silk gown of the fellow-commoner—the Prince never wore the gold tassel to which he was entitled—and by immunity from University examinations.

It must not, however, be supposed that the Prince was idle at the University. On the contrary, he read for six or seven hours a day regularly—a good deal more than the average undergraduate can be persuaded to do; and he was in another respect intellectually ahead of most of his contemporaries, namely, in his familiar knowledge of modern languages. He had read German at Heidelberg with Professor Ihne, and he kept it up while at Cambridge with a German tutor. He spoke French easily and well, and he had also a literary knowledge of that language, having spent some time in Switzerland with a French tutor. His college tutor was Mr. Joseph Prior. Mr. Stephen exercised a general supervision over his reading, and he attended the late Professor Seeley’s History Lectures and Mr. Gosse’s Lectures on English Literature.

Prince Albert Victor strongly resembled his father in many respects, notably in his habits of order and method, and in his complete freedom from affectation or assumption. He was, indeed, if anything, almost too modest and retiring, but those who knew him bore witness to his real geniality and thoughtful consideration for others. At Cambridge he attended his College chapel twice on Sundays, and once or twice during the week. He generally dined in the College hall, when he would be assigned a place at the Fellows’ table. He was fond, however, of giving little dinner-parties of six or eight in his own rooms in College, usually on Thursdays, his guests on these occasions often including some of the senior members of the University.

After dinner, the Royal host would generally arrange a rubber or two of whist. He did not play cricket or football, but was fond of polo and hockey, and he occasionally hunted. He might often have been met in the neighbourhood of Cambridge riding in the company of a few of his undergraduate friends, to whom he liked to offer a mount, especially in cases where he knew it was needed. The Prince had an inherited love of music, and he attended pretty regularly some weekly concerts of chamber music given at the Cambridge Town Hall. He was also a member of the Cambridge A.D.C., and patronised its performances, and he occasionally attended the debates at the Union, though he did not speak himself. He joined the University Volunteer Corps, and was photographed in his uniform.

One traditionally Royal quality the Prince possessed in an extraordinary degree, namely, a perfectly marvellous memory for names and faces. Indeed, his memory in general was singularly tenacious, and in his historical studies he exhibited a wonderful power of quickly mastering the most intricate genealogical tables.

The Prince went for the Long Vacation on a reading party to Heidelberg, and while there he received an amusing poem from Mr. H. F. Wilson, one of his Cambridge friends, which is printed in Mr. Vincent’s memoir. The following may be quoted as perhaps the most characteristic lines:—

The Prince came of age in 1885, and the house-party at Sandringham given to celebrate the occasion was one of the largest gatherings ever held there. The company included a considerable number of Prince Albert Victor’s Cambridge friends.

On the conclusion of Prince Albert Victor’s residence at Cambridge, the honorary degree of LL.D. was conferred upon him, and then his father decided that it was time for him to enter the army. He was gazetted a lieutenant in the 10th Hussars, of which the King is now colonel-in-chief, and while he was quartered at Aldershot the father and son saw a great deal of each other. In the army, as in the navy, Prince Albert Victor was treated as far as possible exactly like his brother officers; and indeed it is highly probable that, had he been offered any exceptional privileges, he would have steadily refused to take advantage of them. The Prince became a captain in the 9th Lancers and in the 3rd King’s Royal Rifles and aide-de-camp to the Queen in 1887, and two years later attained the rank of major, returning to his old regiment, the 10th Hussars.

Prince Albert Victor’s training as a soldier was real and thorough. He was not spared the drudgery of drill and the riding school through which the ordinary subaltern has to pass, and yet at the same time his work was frequently interrupted by the duty of attending various ceremonial functions. This life was but sparingly varied with days with the hounds and shooting, to which the Prince eagerly looked forward. It is generally agreed by his contemporaries that he became an excellent officer, and his private letters to his friends prove how absorbed he was in his military career.

King Edward had retained such pleasant recollections of his own visit to India, that he determined that his elder son should at an early date make a tour in the great Eastern dependency. The tour was arranged, and proved extremely successful from every point of view, the Prince particularly enjoying the excellent and varied sport shown him by his keen Indian hosts. His Royal Highness was gazetted honorary colonel of the 4th Bengal Infantry, the 1st Punjab Cavalry (Prince Albert Victor’s Own), and the 4th Bombay Cavalry.

Soon after his return from India, Prince Albert Victor was created Duke of Clarence and Avondale, and Earl of Athlone, in the peerage of the United Kingdom. He was formally introduced to the House of Lords by his father on 23rd January 1890, the ceremony being watched by Queen Alexandra from a gallery. This was an event unique in English history. The Duke of Clarence was the only eldest son of a Prince of Wales who attained his majority, to say nothing of taking his seat in the House of Lords, while his father was still Heir-Apparent to the Crown.

During the year which followed, the King gave up regularly a certain portion of his time to initiating his elder son in all the varied, if monotonous, duties which were likely to fall to his lot, a task which was really in no wise irksome, for those who knew the Duke of Clarence best were well aware that his father had ever been his best friend, and that he himself was never so happy as when he was allowed to share in any sense his father’s life and interests.

After the death of the Duke of Clarence, the King and his family naturally retired into the deepest privacy, and it was many months before His Majesty had sufficiently recovered from the blow to be able to take up again the thread of his public duties.

CHAPTER XVII
THE HOUSING OF THE WORKING CLASSES—MARRIAGE OF PRINCE GEORGE—THE DIAMOND JUBILEE—DEATH OF THE DUCHESS OF TECK

The year 1893 brought to the King a very fortunate distraction, which prevented his mind from dwelling too much on his still recent bereavement in a way that could not have been accomplished by the customary round of ceremonial visits and functions. This distraction was his appointment as a member of the Royal Commission on the Housing of the Poor. The King was genuinely delighted with this opportunity. He threw himself with the greatest zeal into the work, and not only attended all the sittings, which took place in one of the House of Lords’ Committee Rooms, but visited, incognito, some of the very poorest quarters of London. It is well known that he was exceedingly anxious to serve on the Labour Commission, but Ministers have always been unwilling that the Heir-Apparent should take an active part in matters connected, even indirectly, with politics, and he has had, therefore, constantly to play the part of the Sovereign’s deputy without the responsibilities and interests naturally attaching to the position.

It is no exaggeration to say that there are few men now living who possess better general qualifications for the difficult work of serving on Royal Commissions than the King. He is familiar with an almost bewildering variety of subjects, and possesses a wonderful faculty for almost instinctively grasping the important features and the really essential points of any matter under discussion. He is a model chairman of a committee, and, though he cannot ever display the slightest trace of personal or party feeling, it is well known that he follows with intense interest all the political and social movements of the day, and it is no secret that he is thoroughly an Imperialist.

The King’s work on the Housing of the Poor Commission was particularly congenial to him, for he has always shown an unaffected interest in the working classes. He has long been an annual subscriber to the Working Men’s Club and Institute Union, and is a generous donor to the Working Men’s College. Still more recently, in his reply to the loyal address of condolence presented to him by the London County Council on the death of Queen Victoria, His Majesty made a significant allusion to his interest in the problem of the housing of the working classes. In 1889, some years before the King joined the Housing of the Poor Commission, he took the trouble to go to Lambeth on business seemingly of nothing but local interest—namely, to receive a deputation of working men on the subject of providing a park for the district. His host was the late Primate, Dr. Benson, who thus describes the scene in his diary:—

“Went up to receive Prince of Wales and twelve Representative Working Men at Lambeth. The latter to read him an address on the purchase of ‘The Lawn,’ South Lambeth, for a Public Park, and its great importance to them and their children. Their chairman read a natural, honest speech; nothing could be better than the tone and line of the Prince’s answer. They were delighted by his strong shake of the hand. ‘Not the tips of his fingers,’ they said; ‘working men have feelings, and they would not like that.’ And, ‘It isn’t everybody that education refines as it has him,’ said a blacksmith. ‘When he’s king I shall be able to say that I’ve shook hands with the Crown,’ said an engine-driver. Octavia Hill, and James Knowles, and my wife were the only people admitted besides his Equerry, and Donaldson, and Phillips. It will do good, and he spoke so well.”

This incident is only mentioned as one out of many that could be cited in proof, if proof were needed, of His Majesty’s keen interest in everything that concerns the welfare of the working classes. On another occasion the King was accidentally informed that an exhibition, promoted by the working men in South London, was somewhat languishing for lack of sufficient notice, and unofficially His Majesty arranged to visit the exhibition. He went through it carefully, buying and paying for such articles as took his fancy, and the moment the fact became known, the promoters had no reason to complain of neglect on the part of the general public, who were eager to see what had interested so good a judge of exhibitions as King Edward.

Throughout the year 1893 the King was busily employed in other ways also. In March he paid a formal visit to the Public Record Office to inspect some of the priceless national manuscripts deposited there, and in May he had the satisfaction of seeing that great enterprise which he had himself originated, the Imperial Institute, inaugurated in State by his Royal Mother. It was at the Institute that Mr. Gladstone was hissed by some unmannerly persons, to the great annoyance of the King, who never concealed the strong respect and esteem in which he held both Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone.

It is interesting also to record that in March of this year the Queen, who was accompanied by her son, was received by the Pope in private audience. The interview lasted about an hour.

The official announcement was made, appropriately enough in May, of the betrothal of the King’s son, then Duke of York, to Princess May of Teck. It is recorded in the late Duchess of Teck’s Life that Prince George proposed to Princess May on 3rd May 1893, at Sheen Lodge, which for some time had been occupied by the Duke and Duchess of Fife. Both the bride and her mother agreed that the trousseau should be entirely of home workmanship. “I am determined,” said the Duchess of Teck, “that all the silk shall come from England, all the flannel from Wales, all the tweeds from Scotland, and every yard of lace and poplin from Ireland.” The wedding gown was woven at Spitalfields, and was of silver and white brocade, the design being of roses, shamrock, and thistles. The bridal veil—the same which had been worn by the bride’s mother on her wedding day in 1866—was of the finest Honiton lace, designed in a sequence of cornucopiæ filled with roses, thistles, and shamrock.

The time of the short engagement was filled with preparations of all kinds, and from a letter written by Mrs. Dalrymple, and quoted in the Duchess of Teck’s Life, we obtain a good idea of how the days passed by at White Lodge:—

“I remember the happy afternoon I spent at White Lodge a few days before the marriage. We were a large and merry party, including the Grand Duchess of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, and some time was spent in looking at the numerous presents. Tea was served on the lawn under the copper beech, and the dear Princess sat at the head of the table making tea for all; on one side of her was a pile of telegrams received, while on the other, scattered about amongst the cups, were packets of telegraph forms. Messages were constantly being delivered, and the Princess and the Duke as quickly wrote out the replies; no word of complaint was uttered at these incessant interruptions. Her Royal Highness’s amiable readiness to accede to the many appeals for a place from which to see the bridal procession was wonderful. Princess Mary begged me to visit her the day after the marriage, and her eyes filled with tears as she spoke of parting from ‘her precious child.’ Much, however, as I wished to accept the suggestion, I did not do so, but implored the Princess to take the rest that I knew she so urgently needed.”

The qualities both of head and of heart possessed by Prince George’s bride were, at any rate partially, realised by the nation. An incident that occurred at St. Moritz in 1894 is not so well known. The Duchess of Teck and her daughter were on a visit there when a fire broke out which entirely destroyed several shops and houses, and threatened destruction to the lower village. Both the Princess and her mother took active steps to rescue the goods from burning, carrying out the things in their arms. They were the first to go among the sufferers by the fire offering words of consolation, and started a subscription in their aid.

After a very short engagement, the marriage took place in the Chapel-Royal, St. James’s, on 6th July, in the presence of all the Royal family, as well as the present Emperor of Russia and the King and Queen of Denmark. King Edward naturally took a prominent part in supervising all the arrangements, and was much gratified by the outburst of popular enthusiasm which greeted his son’s union with the daughter of the universally-beloved Duchess of Teck.

It is interesting to note how frequently, ever since the marriage, the King has associated his heir with himself in the performance of his public duties, while the constant companionship of father and son is a striking testimony to their complete sympathy with one another.

The following year was notable for two Royal marriages in the King’s immediate circle, and for a bereavement which touched both His Majesty and the Queen in their closest family affections. The King went to Coburg in April to be present at the wedding of his niece, Princess Victoria Melita of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, and his nephew, the Grand Duke of Hesse, the only son of the lamented Princess Alice. The occasion brought together a remarkable number of prominent members of Royal Houses, including Queen Victoria and the German Emperor, and was rendered additionally memorable by the fact that the engagement of the present Tsar of Russia to the bridegroom’s sister was then publicly announced.

The King, who was on this occasion accompanied by Queen Alexandra, went to St. Petersburg in August for the wedding of the Grand Duchess Xenia, which was celebrated with all the lavish magnificence of Russian Court ceremonies.

Although the Tsar was not then in his usual robust health, there was nothing to indicate how soon the King and Queen were to be recalled to Russia on a far different mission. To their lasting sorrow, the summons to the Tsar’s death-bed at Livadia arrived too late for them to be present at the last. Their Majesties left London on 31st October, immediately on receipt of an urgent message from the Tsaritsa, and had proceeded as far as Vienna when the news was broken to them that all was over. They, however, continued their melancholy journey, which was much delayed by bad weather, in order that they might be with the widowed Empress and her son through the terrible strain of the return to St. Petersburg, and the ordeal of the funeral ceremonies.

The King’s fifty-third birthday was spent at Livadia, and for the first time since his birth the anniversary celebrations in London and at Sandringham did not take place.

When the funeral cortège reached St. Petersburg, Prince George joined his parents, and together they attended the elaborate obsequies of the Emperor, and the very quiet wedding of the young Tsar and Princess Alix of Hesse, which followed a few days later. The King remained in Russia for the Queen’s birthday, and left with his son the following day, while Her Majesty stayed behind to support her sister, the Empress Alexander.

The relations between England and Russia after the King’s return became noticeably more cordial, and there is no doubt that this was owing in a large measure to His Majesty’s personal exertions, and the sympathy which he and his son displayed with the Russian people in their great sorrow.

During this year of 1894 the King exhibited his usual complaisance in attending various local ceremonies. Among these may be mentioned the opening of the Tower Bridge by the King and Queen, on behalf of Queen Victoria, in June; while in July their Majesties attended the Welsh Eisteddfod at Carnarvon, where they were received with great enthusiasm. A special session was held, at which the King was initiated as “Iorweth Dywysog” (Edward the Prince), Queen Alexandra as “Hoffder Prydain” (Britain’s Delight), and the Princess Victoria as “Buddug” (the modern Welsh form of Boadicea).

The King was always willing to emphasise his connection with the Principality from which he then took his title, and when the long-desired University of Wales became an accomplished fact, he readily consented to be its first Chancellor. His Majesty was installed in this office at Aberystwyth in June 1896, and his first act as Chancellor was to confer an honorary degree on Queen Alexandra. At the luncheon which followed, the King’s health was proposed by Mr. Gladstone.

In the following month, the marriage of Princess Maud to Prince Charles of Denmark took place in the chapel of Buckingham Palace in the presence of Queen Victoria and the Royal families of the two countries.

Archbishop Benson officiated at the wedding, and he gives the following charming description of the ceremony in his diary:—

“Married the Princess Maud to Prince Charles of Denmark. The brightest of the Princesses, and almost as young as when I confirmed her. He is a tall, gallant-looking sailor. Hope he will make her happy. The Chapel and old conservatory ineffectually disguised by church furniture—all well arranged, and the banquet also. The whole very royally done. The group of great peers of the Queen’s Household afterwards was striking, as were the greater peers also in Chapel, and Mr. Gladstone decidedly ageing and paling, though they say he is well. The Queen was the wonderful sight—so vigorous. In the Bow Room afterwards, where fifty Royalties signed the book, she called me to her, and I knelt and kissed her hand, and she talked very spiritedly a few minutes. As soon as it was over an Indian servant wheeled in her chair to take her out; she instantly waved it back. ‘Behind the door,’ she said, and walked all across the room with her stick most gallantly.”

The month of May was naturally a very busy one for the King and Queen. On the 22nd their Majesties, representing Queen Victoria, opened the new Blackwall tunnel in State, the East End of London giving them a right Royal reception. On this occasion His Majesty was presented with one of the heaviest gold medals ever struck in England, weighing 12 ounces, and bearing on the reverse a representation of the tunnel in perspective. On the 26th His Majesty opened the new Medical School of Guy’s Hospital; on the 27th the King and Queen, with their son and two of their daughters, opened the Royal Military Tournament; on the 28th, at the request of Queen Victoria, the King and Queen, accompanied by Princess Victoria, laid the first stone of the Royal London Ophthalmic Hospital in the City Road; on the 29th the King and Queen, with their son and two of their daughters, went down to Canterbury to open the restored Chapter-house of the Cathedral, and in the evening the King dined with the past and present officers of the Norfolk Artillery Militia, of which he is honorary colonel. On the 31st the King held a levée at St. James’s Palace, and in the evening dined with the 1st Guards Club.

This is a short summary, which does not pretend to be by any means exhaustive of His Majesty’s engagements for a very few days, but it brings out perhaps more vividly than a detailed list could possibly do the whole-hearted manner in which the King threw himself into the great tide of national rejoicing which reached its flood in that memorable June of 1897.

King Edward, for a variety of reasons, took a much greater part in the Diamond Jubilee festivities of 1897 than he did in those of ten years before. All the arrangements were submitted for his approval as well as Queen Victoria’s, and it was largely owing to his conspicuous organising ability that everything went off with such triumphant success. Both the King and Queen Alexandra associated themselves in a special manner with the occasion, the former by his Hospital Fund for London, and the latter by her thoughtful scheme of providing one good dinner for the very poorest. The Hospital Fund greatly benefited by the sale of a special stamp, the design of which was selected by the King himself.

King Edward, who had been made an honorary Admiral of the Fleet at the Golden Jubilee of 1887, represented his mother at the magnificent naval review at Spithead, which was generally agreed to be, in its way, the finest spectacle of all that the Jubilee festivities afforded. Many foreign warships were sent by other countries as tokens of international courtesy. Towards the officers of these vessels the King displayed all his wonted cordiality; and in the arrangements for their entertainment his efforts were heartily seconded by Viscount Goschen, then First Lord of the Admiralty, and the other naval authorities. The spectacle of so vast a concourse of British vessels was rendered doubly impressive by the knowledge that it had been assembled without weakening in the slightest degree the squadrons on the numerous British naval stations all over the world. There was much point in the remark said to have been made by the United States Special Ambassador to the First Lord: “I guess, sir, this makes for peace!”

On the eventful morning of the 22nd June, when the Jubilee honours were announced, it was found that Queen Victoria, while conferring some mark of her favour on each of her sons, had created a new and special dignity for the Heir-Apparent. The announcement was made in the following terms:—

“The Queen has been graciously pleased, on the occasion of Her Majesty’s Diamond Jubilee, to appoint Field-Marshal His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, K.G., G.C.B., to be Great Master and Principal Knight Grand Cross of the Most Honourable Order of the Bath.”

That this distinction was very gratifying to the King was significantly shown in the following month, when he gave a great banquet at St. James’s Palace to the Knights Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath in celebration of his appointment. It was an absolutely unique gathering of men who had rendered distinguished service to the State, in statesmanship, in diplomacy, in the profession of arms, in the navy, and in the departments of civil administration.

Since his accession, His Majesty has appointed his brother, the Duke of Connaught, to succeed him as Great Master of the Order of the Bath.

By command of Queen Victoria, the King held a State reception and investiture at St. James’s Palace on 21st July, when he received on behalf of Her Majesty a large number of Diamond Jubilee addresses and invested the newly-created Companions of the Orders of the Bath, the Star of India, St. Michael and St. George, and the Indian Empire, and on the same day His Majesty also opened the new Tate Gallery at Millbank.

It was in this month that His Majesty was elected to the fellowship of the Royal College of Physicians of London at a comitia of the College—an honour which he valued highly. As a non-medical fellow the King had had only three predecessors, the Marquis of Dorchester in 1658, the Duke of Manchester in 1717, and the Duke of Richmond in 1729. The Royal diploma was, it is understood, specially composed for the occasion, and did not give the new fellow complete freedom to practise in his new profession! Later on, His Majesty was destined to experience in his own person the marvellous benefits which modern surgery has placed at the service of suffering humanity.

The rest of the Diamond Jubilee year was spent in comparative quietude by the King and Queen Alexandra, although His Majesty took an active part in the exceptionally brilliant season. He attended, among other great functions, the Fancy Dress Ball given by the Duchess of Devonshire, wearing on this occasion the splendid costume of the Grand Master of the Knights-Hospitallers of Malta.

King Edward and Queen Alexandra left Marlborough House on 10th August for Bayreuth, and His Majesty arrived at Marienbad on the 18th, travelling incognito as Lord Renfrew. Her Majesty went to Bernstorff to visit her parents, and was joined there early in September by the King. His Majesty afterwards visited the Empress Frederick at Cronberg, and returned to Marlborough House on 25th September, while Her Majesty prolonged her stay in Denmark till October.

On 16th October the King stood as sponsor at the christening of the infant son and heir of the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough—an interesting occasion, for His Majesty had been godfather to the Duke himself some twenty-five years before.

This summer was also rendered memorable for the visit paid by the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall and York to Ireland. Their Royal Highnesses spent a fortnight there, stopping with the Lord-Lieutenant, Earl Cadogan, in Dublin; afterwards visiting some of the great houses of the Irish nobility, and seeing a great deal of the lovely scenery for which Ireland is famous, including Killarney, from which the Duke takes the title of Baron.

In Dublin the Duke of Cornwall and York and the ever-popular Lord Roberts were installed with great pomp and ceremony as Knights of the Order of St. Patrick. The Duke wore the same sword which his father had used when he was installed some three-and-twenty years before.

His Royal Highness on the termination of the visit wrote the following letter to Lord Cadogan, the Lord-Lieutenant:—

Their Royal Highnesses came home by way of Scotland, visiting Glasgow, where they performed several ceremonial functions, and staying with Lord Rosebery at Dalmeny for two nights. They then went to Ness Castle and on to Guisachan for fishing and deer-stalking as the guests of Lord and Lady Tweedmouth, and ultimately visited Queen Victoria at Balmoral.

This Royal visit to Ireland exhibited in a striking manner the extent to which party passions had been allayed in the distressful country. The Duke and Duchess had everywhere a respectful and frequently an enthusiastic reception; and in almost every address received by their Royal Highnesses the desirability of establishing a Royal residence in Ireland was pointedly referred to. The profound effect of the visit was seen a month or two later, when, on the death of the lamented Duchess of Teck, the Lord Mayor and Lady Mayoress of Dublin telegraphed their condolences, both officially and privately, not to the Duke of Teck, as might have been expected, but to the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall and York. On this mournful occasion, also, the Corporation of “rebel” Cork passed a resolution of sympathy.