Page:The life and times of King Edward VII by Whates, Harry Richard 1.djvu/22

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are not of imperishable merit as an essay in verse, have an appropriate lightness:

"Huzza! we've a little Prince at last,
 * A roaring Royal boy;

And all day long the booming bells
 * Have rung their peals of joy.

And the little park guns have blazed away,
 * And made a tremendous noise,

Whilst the air has been filled since eleven o'clock
 * With the shouts of little boys."

A Gazette Extraordinary was forthwith issued. "This morning, at ten minutes before eleven o'clock," it said, "the Queen was happily delivered of a Prince, His Royal Highness Prince Albert, Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Kent, several Lords of the Privy Council, and the Ladies of Her Majesty's Bedchamber being present. This great and important news"—one seems to detect here the hand of the Prince Consort—"was immediately made known to the town by the firing of the Park and the Tower guns; and the Privy Council being assembled as soon as possible thereupon, it was ordered that a Form of Thanksgiving for the Queen's safe delivery of a Prince be prepared by His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury, to be used in all Churches and Chapels throughout England and Wales and the town of Berwick-on-Tweed on Sunday the 14th of November, or the Sunday after the respective ministers shall receive the same"—an extension of time that reminds us that the late Sovereign was born before the days when England was interlaced with railways and telegraph wires. "Her Majesty and the infant Prince are, God be praised, both doing well," ran the final sentence of the Gazette.

All Royal babies are described in courtly chronicles as perfect specimens of their kind; but it was no flattery that credited the new Duke of Cornwall a title which the eldest son of the Sovereign acquires at birth with being a lusty and beautiful child. Lord Hill, a Privy Councillor of reddish hair and ruddy hue, was met by the Duke of Wellington when the latter was leaving the Palace, Lord Hill being too late to be among the Ministers in attendance. "All over! Fine boy—very fine boy! Almost as red as you, Hill!" said the Duke, whose pleasantries were rare but bluntly apt. By the time the Court painters saw the child the hue was a delicate pink and white, and he had grown to an amazing plumpness. Undoubtedly he was a fine child. The earliest representation, says Mrs. Sarah A. Tooley in "The Royal Family by Pen and Camera," was "a baby face drawn on a tiny silk pincushion, which was sold by thousands in the streets of London within a few hours of the Prince's birth. The portrait was purely imaginary, but the artist doubtless considered that all babies are alike—a heresy