Page:Life of Her Majesty Queen Victoria (IA lifeofhermajesty01fawc).pdf/59

 Greville then describes the young Queen's thoughtful consideration for everything that could soothe and cheer the Queen Dowager, and adds:—

"'In short, she appears to act with every sort of good taste and good feeling, as well as good sense; and, as far as it has gone, nothing can be more favorable than the impression she has made, and nothing can promise better than her manner and conduct do, though it would be rash to count too confidently upon her judgment and discretion in more weighty matters. No contrast can be greater than that between the personal demeanor of the present and the late Sovereigns at their respective accessions. William IV. was a man who, coming to the throne at the mature age of sixty-five, was so excited by the exaltation that he nearly went mad, and distinguished himself by a thousand extravagances of language and conduct to the alarm or amusement of all who witnessed his strange freaks. … The young Queen, who might well be either dazzled or confounded with the grandeur and novelty of her situation seems neither the one nor the other, and behaves with a decorum and propriety beyond her years, and with all the sedateness and dignity, the want of which was so conspicuous in her uncle.'"

In this vivid personal description by an eye-witness we see in the grave dignity of the young girl the same dutiful child who, at eleven years old, had said, when she learned her future destiny,"There is much splendor, but there is more responsibility," and, lifting her little hand, added, "I will be good."

Greville describes the impression made by the young Queen within the Palace upon her Ministers and servants. Miss Martineau, another contemporary, describes the impression produced outside the Palace, on the crowd in the streets who came to witness the ceremony of the proclamation. She refers to the intense joy of whatever was sound and wholesome in the nation, that the ill-doing sons of George III. no longer occupied the throne, and that it was filled instead by a young girl, prudent, virtuous, and conscientious, reared in health, simplicity, and purity. She says even exaggerated hopes were awakened by the change; people seemed to expect that the fact of having a virtuous Sovereign, strong in the energies of youth,