The bride, who, according to Lord Ronald Gower, was. "very pale, but
handsome as she always is," was accompanied by the Prince of Wales; her
uncle, the Grand Duke of Coburg; and, to the great joy of all the
assembly, by her mother, the Queen. The wedded pair went to Claremont for
their honeymoon. As they drove away, "rice and white satin slippers were
sent after them, and John Brown threw a new broom, Highland fashion."
The people were much comforted at this appearance of the Queen once more
in the great gay world. They had begun to think that her social seclusion
would never end. When she went down into the "valley of the shadow of
death" with her beloved, though she struggled bravely up alone, she
brought the shadow with her; it enveloped her and wrapped her away from
her subjects--even the most loving and sympathetic. Now they took heart,
believing that royalty was finally coming out from under its eclipse of
mourning, that the Court would be re-established in Buckingham Palace,
and things generally, go on as in the good old days. They never did,
however, and never will, under her reign. It is too much to ask of her,
it seems.
Whether it is true, as I hear, that the air of London is hurtful to her,
giving her severe headaches, or that the scenes of her childhood and
early queenhood, and of her marriage, are too much for her, and heart-
ache is the matter, I know not; but it is undeniable that the Queen
prefers any one of her other homes to Buckingham Palace.
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