Page:Life of Her Majesty Queen Victoria (IA lifeofhermajesty01fawc).pdf/34

26 authority, but baffled and outwitted, and consequently furious. It was too well for the Princess Victoria and for England too that he was not the predominant influence in her education; but it is not difficult to understand his wrath. The game of cross purposes was constantly going on, and the King was constantly being worsted. The duchess of Kent selected as her daughter's tutor the Rev. George Davys. The King objected that the education of the heiress-presumptive to the throne should be under the care of some distinguished prelate. The Duchess acquiesced, and, while retaining the services of Dr. Davys, intimated that there would be objection on her part to his receiving the highest ecclesiastical preferment. A very extensive knowledge of human nature is not needed to know that this sort of thing is to the last degree irritating, nor that the fact of the Duchess and her brother being generally in the right, and the King generally in the wrong, was not soothing to the latter.

In this too stormy atmosphere the heiress of England was reared. Her naturally happy disposition and healthy physical constitution carried her through with less disadvantages than other less happily endowed natures would have sustained. Among other relatives who were uniformly kind and considerate to the young Princess special mention should be made of the Duke of York, whom she loved like a second father. His death, in 1827, was her first real sorrow as a child. Queen Adelaide also was uniformly kind and loving to her niece. Her own two baby girls had died in their infancy, and she transferred a good deal of motherly tenderness to Princess Victoria. A meaner