he never knew a kinder or more amiable
disposition. The Queen fears that people who do not know him well have
been led away by their present very natural feelings of hatred and
distrust of all Indians to slander him. What he might turn out, if
left in the hands of unscrupulous Indians in his own country, of
course no one can foresee.

[Footnote 48: See _ante_, 23rd September, 1857, note 40.]

_Queen Victoria to Viscount Palmerston._

WINDSOR CASTLE, _17th October 1857_.

The Queen has received yesterday evening the box with the Dockyard
Returns. It will take her some time to peruse and study them; she
wishes, however, to remark upon two points, and to have them pointed
out also to Sir Charles Wood,[49] viz. first, that they are dated some
as early as the 27th August, and none later than the 10th September,
and that she received them, only on the _17th October_; and then
that there is not one original Return amongst them, but they are all
copies! When the Queen asks for Returns, to which she attaches great
importance, she expects at least to see them in original.

[Footnote 49: First Lord of the Admiralty.]

[Pageheading: MARRIAGE OF THE PRINCESS ROYAL]

_Queen Victoria to the Earl of Clarendon._

WINDSOR CASTLE, _25th October 1857_.

The Queen returns these letters. It would be well if Lord Clarendon
would tell Lord Bloomfield not to _entertain_ the _possibility_ of
such a question as the Princess Royal's marriage taking place at
Berlin.[50] The Queen _never_ could consent to it, both for public
and private reasons, and the assumption of its being _too much_ for a
Prince Royal of Prussia to _come_ over to marry _the Princess Royal
of Great Britain_ IN England is too _absurd_, to say the least. The
Queen must say that there never was even the _shadow_ of a _doubt_ on
_Prince Frederick William's_ part as to _where_ the marriage should
take place, and she suspects this to be the mere gossip of the
Berliners. Whatever may be the usual practice of Prussian Princes, it
is not _every_ day that one marries the eldest daughter of the Queen
of England. The question therefore must be considered as settled and
closed....

[Footnote 50: The marriage took place at the Chapel Royal, St
James's.]

[Pageheading: DEATH OF THE DUCHESS DE NEMOURS]

_Queen Victoria to the Earl of Clarendon._

WINDSOR CASTLE, _12th November 1857_.

The Queen thanks Lord Clarendon much for his kind and s