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 and Biddulph. She was especially fortunate, too, in General Sir Henry Ponsonby, Grey's successor as private secretary, who, as equerry to the prince consort, had been brought within the sphere of influence which the queen deemed the best inspiration for her advisers. Sir Henry remained her secretary for the long period of a quarter of a century —8 April 1870 to May 1895, when he was succeeded by her last private secretary, Colonel Sir Arthur Bigge. Outside her household she derived much benefit from the counsel of Gerald Wellesley, son of Lord Cowley, and nephew of the Duke of Wellington, who had been her domestic chaplain since 1849, and was dean of Windsor from 1854 until his death in 1882. She was often in consultation with him, particularly in regard to the church appointments which her ministers suggested to her. In one direction only did the queen relieve herself of any of her official work on the prince's death. It had been her custom to sign (in three places) everv commission issued to officers in all branches of the officers' military service, but she had fallen into arrears with the labour of late years, and sixteen thousand documents now awaited her signature. In March 1862 a bill was introduced into parliament enabling commissions to be issued without bearing her autograph, though her right of signing was reserved in case she wished to resume the practice, as she subsequently did. Public business, in accordance with her resolve, occupied her almost as soon as her husband was buried. On 9 Jan. 1862 she received the welcome news that the authorities at Washington had solved the difficulty of the Trent by acceding to the requests of the English government. She reminded Lord Palmerston that 'this peaceful issue of the American quarrel was greatly owing to her beloved prince,' and Palmerston considerately replied that the alterations in the despatch were only one of innumerable instances 'of the tact and judgment and the power of nice discrimination which excited Lord Palmerston's constant and unbounded admiration.' A day or two later she assented to Palmerston's proposal to confer the garter on Lord Russell, though she would not hear of a chapter of the order being held, and insisted on conferring the distinction by warrant. On 11 Jan. she presided over a meeting of her privy council.

Two plans of domestic interest which the prince had initiated she at once carried to completion. It had been arranged that it the prince of Wales should make a tour to the Holy Land with Dr. A. P. Staril, late prince's chaplain. In January 1862 the queen finally settled the tour with Stanley, who visited her at Osborne for the purpose, and from 6 Feb. till 14 June her eldest son was absent from her on the expedition. There was some inevitable delay in the solemnisation of the marriage of  Princess Alice, but it was quietly celebrated at Osborne on 1 July. The queen was present in deep mourning. Her brother-in-law, the Duke of Saxe-Coburg, gave the princess away. The queen felt acutely the separation from the daughter who had chiefly stood by her in her recent trial.

During the autumn visit to Balmoral (21 Aug. 1862) the queen laid the foundations of a cairn ' to the beloved memory of Albert the Great and Good, Prince Consort, raised by his broken-hearted widow.' She and the six children who were with her placed on it stones on which their initials were to be carved. Next month (September 1862) negotiations were in progress for the betrothal of the prince of Wales. His choice had fallen on Princess Alexandra, daughter of Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburg, the next heir to the throne of Denmark, to which he ascended shortly afterwards on 15 Nov. 1863. Her mother, Princess Louise of Hesse-Cassel, was niece of Christian VIII of Denmark, and sole heiress of the old Danish royal family. Princess Alexandra was already a distant connection of the queen by marriage, for the queen's aunt, the old Duchess of Cambridge, a member of the princely house of Hesse-Cassel, was also aunt of the princess's father. The queen readily assented to the match, and the princess was her guest at Osborne in November. Her grace and beauty fascinated the queen and the people of England from the first, and although the princess's connection with Denmark did not recommend the alliance to the Prussian government, which anticipated complications with its little northern neighbour, the betrothal had little political significance or influence.

More perplexing was the consideration which it was needful to devote in December 1862 to a question affecting the future of her second son, Alfred, who, under the prince consort's careful supervision, had been educated for the navy. The popular assembly of the kingdom of Greece had driven their king, Otho, from the throne, and resolved to confer the vacant crown on Prince Alfred.