act of removing a couple of pictures from the National Gallery.
_Punch_ pointedly inquires, "Taking them to Kensington Gore? Suppose you
leave 'em where they are, eh?"

More justifiable perhaps, but still somewhat harsh, was _Punch's_
protest (1854) against the Prince's supposed interference in State
politics. He is shown skating on the ice, warned off by Mr. Punch from a
section of it labelled "Foreign Affairs--Dangerous." And in the same
year he is attacked with extraordinary gusto by reason of the new hat he
had devised for the British army--or, at least, for the Guards. In 1843
the first "Albert shako" had appeared, and Leech, in a cartoon called
"Prince Albert's Studio," exhibited it as a pretended work of art in the
most ludicrous light. Again, in 1847 the Prince had invented a similar
headgear, popularly christened "the Albert Hat," which _Punch_ converted
to his uses and worked to death. "The New Albert Bonnet for the Guards"
ridicules the idea unmercifully, and "the British Grenadier as improved
by His Royal Highness Prince Albert, decidedly calculated to frighten
the Russians," was another grotesque perversion of a praiseworthy
attempt with which Mr. Punch was in his heart a good deal in sympathy.
For his artists were as diligent as the Prince in trying to improve the
uniform of the British soldier, contrasting with its wretched
inconvenience the serviceability and ease of the sailor's. The drawing
in which a private, half choked by his stock, held helplessly rigid by
his straps and buckles, and unable to hold his gun as his "head's coming
off!" illustrates the fact that _Punch's_ views and Prince Albert's had
much in common. We have the authority of Sir Theodore Martin, in his
biography (Vol. II., p. 299), that the Prince Consort took _Punch's_
humours in very good part, and made a large collection of the
caricatures of the day, in the belief that in them alone could the true
position of a public man be recognised. But it is said that soon after
this last crusade a hint was received from Windsor Castle to the effect
that a little less personality and a little more justice in respect to
the Prince would be appreciated, as much by the people as by the Court.
It is certain that after this time the attacks practically came to an
end. And when the Prince died, there were few truer mourners in the
land, and the widowed Queen had few sincerer sympathisers, than the
jester whose raillery had been so keen, and who fel