Page:Life of Her Majesty Queen Victoria (IA lifeofhermajesty01fawc).pdf/79

 her "my precious Albert," "my incomparable Albert," "my beloved Albert, looking so handsome in his uniform." Sometimes, even in very happy marriages, the King of the fireside has to descend from his throne when the babies arrive; the wife becomes less the wife and more the mother. This was never so in the case of the Queen; her husband was always first and foremost in her heart. She wrote after many years of marriage, during one of the Prince Consort's short absences from home, "You cannot think how much this costs me, nor how completely forlorn I am and feel when he is away, or how I count the hours till he returns. All the numerous children as as nothing to me when he is away. It seems as if the whole life of the house and home were gone." King Leopold had read her rightly, when he wrote immediately after her engagement, that she was one to whom a happy home life was in a special degree indispensable. The cares and anxieties of her political duties made it more necessary for her happiness than even for that of most women, to have her home hallowed by the sympathy, support, advice, and affection of the husband who never ceased to be her lover.

Most women can sympathize with what the Queen must have felt when she had to announce to her Council her intended marriage. This took place on November 23d 1839. There was a large attendance, eighty Councillors being present. Greville describes the scene in his usual graphic manner: "The folding-doors were thrown open, and the Queen came in, attired in a plain morning gown, but wearing a bracelet containing Prince Albert's picture. She read the declaration in a clear, sonorous, sweet-toned voice, but her hands trembled so excessively that I wonder she was able to read the paper which she held. Lord Lansdowne made a little speech, asking her permis-