berdeen will be, of course, at
Windsor, and I suppose you will ask, as you told me, the Royal Family.
My father hopes to see also Sir Robert Peel, Lord Stanley, and your
other Ministers. You will probably ask most of them during his stay.
He wishes very much to see again those he already knows, and to make
the acquaintance of those he does not know yet. In writing all this
I think I _dream_, I _cannot believe_ yet that in a few days my dear
father will have, God willing, the _unspeakable happiness_ to see you
again and at _Windsor_, a thing he had _so much wished_ for and which
for a _long time_ seemed so _improbable_. You have _no notion_ of the
_satisfaction_ it gives him, and _how delighted_ he will be to see you
again, and to be once more in England. God grant he may have a good
passage, and arrive to you _safely_ and _well_. _Unberufen_, as you
will soon, I trust, be able to see, he is, notwithstanding the usual
talk of the papers, _perfectly well_.... Yours most devotedly,
LOUISE.
[Footnote 29: The difficulty with France as to Tahiti having
been satisfactorily disposed of, King Louis Philippe was
enabled to visit England, the first French King to come on
a visit to the Sovereign of England. The King was
enthusiastically received in England, visited Claremont (which
he was destined to occupy in exile), was installed as a Knight
of the Garter at Windsor with great magnificence, and visited
Eton College and Woolwich Arsenal.]
[Pageheading: SOLICITUDE OF QUEEN LOUISE]
_The Queen of the Belgians to Queen Victoria._
LAEKEN, _7th October 1844._
MY DEARLY BELOVED VICTORIA,--... I wrote to my mother, to quiet her,
all you kindly tell me about my dear father. We are _quite sure_, I
assure you, that you and Albert will _take care of him_, and that he
is with you _in safe hand_. And what makes my mother _uneasy_ is the
fear that, being at liberty without control, he will make _too much_,
as she says, _le jeune homme_, ride, go about, and do everything as if
he was still twenty years old. If I must tell you _all the truth_, she
is afraid also he will _eat too much_. I am sure he will tell it to
you himself, as he was so much amused with _this fear_; but to do her
pleasure, being well assured by me that you would allow it, and that
it was even _customary_, he has given up, of himself, all thought of
attending your early breakfast: but I perceive I write as if _he was
not alr
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