All through the land
free dinners were provided for the poor--good roast beef, plum-pudding--
'alf and 'alf fare--and I am afraid the Queen's pauper-subjects would
have been unwilling to have the occasion indefinitely repeated, with such
observances,--would not have objected to Her Majesty proving a female
Henry VIII.
Victoria and Albert drove that afternoon more than twenty miles between
ranks of frantically loyal, rejoicing people,--past countless festive
decorations, and a world of "_V_"s and "_A_"s--under arches so
gay that one wondered where and how at that season all the flowers and
foliage were produced,--if nature had not hurried up her spring work, so
as to be able to come to the wedding. The Queen turned now and then her
happy face on her shouting subjects, in graceful acknowledgment of their
sympathy with her happiness; but much of the time she was observed to be
regarding her husband, intently or furtively. So she had betrayed her
heart during She marriage ceremony, when, as an eye-witness records, she
"was observed to look frequently at Prince Albert,--in fact, she scarcely
ever took her eyes off him." I suppose she found him "goodly to look
upon." It is certain that she worshiped him with her eyes, as well as
with her heart and soul,--then and ever after.
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