perfect
taste? Had she really once loved London and late hours and dissipation?
She who now was only happy in the country, she who jumped out of bed
every morning--oh, so early!--with Albert, to take a walk, before
breakfast, with Albert alone! How wonderful it was to be taught by him!
To be told by him which trees were which; and to learn all about the
bees! And then to sit doing cross-stitch while he read aloud to her
Hallam's Constitutional History of England! Or to listen to him playing
on his new organ 'The organ is the first of instruments,' he said; or
to sing to him a song by Mendelssohn, with a great deal of care over
the time and the breathing, and only a very occasional false note! And,
after dinner, to--oh, how good of him! He had given up his double chess!
And so there could be round games at the round table, or everyone could
spend the evening in the most amusing way imaginable--spinning counters
and rings.' When the babies came it was still more wonderful. Pussy was
such a clever little girl ("I am not Pussy! I am the Princess Royal!"
she had angrily exclaimed on one occasion); and Bertie--well, she could
only pray MOST fervently that the little Prince of Wales would grow up
to "resemble his angelic dearest Father in EVERY, EVERY respect, both in
body and mind." Her dear Mamma, too, had been drawn once more into the
family circle, for Albert had brought about a reconciliation, and the
departure of Lehzen had helped to obliterate the past. In Victoria's
eyes, life had become an idyll, and, if the essential elements of an
idyll are happiness, love and simplicity, an idyll it was; though,
indeed, it was of a kind that might have disconcerted Theocritus.
"Albert brought in dearest little Pussy," wrote Her Majesty in her
journal, "in such a smart white merino dress trimmed with blue, which
Mamma had given her, and a pretty cap, and placed her on my bed,
seating himself next to her, and she was very dear and good. And, as my
precious, invaluable Albert sat there, and our little Love between us, I
felt quite moved with happiness and gratitude to God."

The past--the past of only three years since--when she looked back upon
it, seemed a thing so remote and alien that she could explain it to
herself in no other way than as some kind of delusion--an unfortunate
mistake. Turning over an old volume of her diary, she came upon this
sentence--"As for 'the confidence of the Crown,' God knows! No MINISTER,
NO FRIEND, EV