Now she was the Queen. ‘Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown,’ said Shakespeare, and he was a very wise man.
It was so very quiet in the room that one might be in the heart of the country, and although many people were sleeping in the Palace, tonight they seemed far away.
Oh, yes, Lehzen was in the next room but a wall separated them and Buckingham Palace was so different from dear cosy Kensington.
Dash was sleeping in his basket. If anyone came in he would start to bark furiously. Dear, dear Dashy!
Tomorrow, she thought, I will have a door made in the wall so that Lehzen’s room can communicate directly with mine. If it was desired, that door could be left open.
On that comforting thought she went to sleep.
When Lord Melbourne asked her how she liked Buckingham Palace she told him that she liked it; it was, as he said, so much more suitable for a royal residence; and Dashy loved the gardens.
The Duchess was far from pleased with her apartments. They were too cramped, she declared. But what really angered her was that Victoria had ordered that they should be separate and some distance from her own.
It was an insult! declared the Duchess.
Sir John, who was anxious about his future, suggested that it would be unwise to make too much fuss. They had to act with tact for Victoria had shown very clearly that she had forgotten all they had done for her during her childhood and she was completely under the spell of her Prime Minister.
Sir John was sure though that his demands would be met. After all it was a delicate situation and the new Queen would be made to understand that the less talk there was about the man who was reputed to be her mother’s lover the better. The worldly wise Prime Minister would realise that; and as that same gentleman was noted for a somewhat easy-going attitude towards difficult problems Sir John felt that he was right to be optimistic.
Meanwhile Victoria was finding life agreeable, and was very eager to forget Sir John Conroy.
She had taken the Duchess of Sutherland into her household and was greatly attracted to her. Harriet Leveson Gower, Duchess of Sutherland, was at the time in her early thirties, admired for her beauty, respected for her intellect, and being a Whig she had seemed an ideal choice for Mistress of the Robes. Such a good feeling person, Victoria confided to the Baroness; and indeed dear Harriet was constantly telling her about the evils in the country that she was sometimes quite depressed about it. Harriet believed that it was everyone’s duty to improve the lot of the poor and needy and Victoria was horrified to hear of the terrible things that were happening in her realm.
She was so upset that she spoke of this to Lord Melbourne, but he was as comforting as ever.
‘Little children are being dragged from their beds at three in the morning to go to the mines and on all fours drag the carts of coal through underground passages in the coal mines!’
‘Whoever told you such stories?’
‘Harriet did. She knows a great deal about such things. She is very concerned with them.’
‘I think it better not to concern oneself with such matters.’
‘Oh, but do you, Lord Melbourne? Surely my subjects’ welfare is my concern?’
‘It is, indeed it is. But this subject does not like to see his Queen distressed.’
‘Dear Lord Melbourne, but is it not my duty … ?’
‘Your duty is to smile for the people, to let them see how happy you are to be their Queen.’
‘Oh, I am, but the thought of those poor children … little children, no older than dear Lord John Russell’s babies … dragging carriages through the mines … it is terrible.’
‘They enjoy it. It is a game to them.’
‘Can it really be?’
‘You can depend upon it.’
And of course one had to depend upon Lord Melbourne.
‘Harriet is also worried about the way lunatics are treated in our asylums, and the people working in mills and factories. Her great friend, the Earl of Shaftesbury, is determined to do something about it. He cares so much for the poor.’
‘Shaftesbury. He is not so fond of his own family. What a pity he doesn’t concern himself with making life easier for them!’
‘But dear Lord Melbourne, I feel that I should know about these things.’
‘They are things which are best left alone. Change often makes things a thousand times worse.’
Then Lord Melbourne started to tell her a funny story about Grandfather George III who visiting a cottage found a woman baking dumplings and could not understand how an apple got into a dumpling.
She rocked with laughter. Lord Melbourne could be so amusing.
She was also very fond of Lord John Russell – ‘Little Johnny’ as he was called. Lord Melbourne told her in a very humorous manner how Johnny was so small that when he stood up to speak in Parliament he could scarcely be seen above the boxes on the table. He was the Leader of the House of Commons and Victoria, although not as delighted with him as she was with her Prime Minister (that would have been impossible), found him delightful. She liked Lady John and one of the reasons she saw a great deal of the Russell family was because of the children. Little Johnny had married quite late in life, Lord Melbourne had told her, for now she and her Prime Minister discussed not only State matters but as Lord Melbourne put it, ‘everything under the sun’, which meant quite racy stories about some of his fellow members of Parliament. Not that there was anything racy about Little Johnny, who had married a widow at the age of forty-three. She already had four children by her first husband and now she and Lord John had a little girl of their own. ‘Five young children! How very happy you must be,’ cried Victoria to Lady John; and realised that one of the things she wanted most was to have children. Whenever Lady John was due to call, Victoria asked: ‘Please bring the babies.’ And what fun she had with them, racing up and down the corridors of the Palace.
‘Really,’ said Lehzen indulgently, ‘is this the Queen of England?’
And laughingly Victoria pointed out that one of the pleasures of being Queen of England was that in matters that did not interfere with State policy, a queen could do exactly as she wished.
The first little difference with Lord Melbourne came over the matter of the review of her troops in Hyde Park.
‘I will do so on horseback,’ she told her Prime Minister.
‘I think it would be better to do the review in a carriage,’ said Lord Melbourne.
‘My dear Lord Melbourne, I shall certainly not ride to review my troops in a carriage!’
‘I should tremble for your safety if you rode on horseback. It’s some time since you rode. It would be most unsafe.’
‘Then it is certainly time I showed you that I know how to manage a horse.’
For once her mother and Melbourne were in agreement.
‘It would be most improper,’ said the Duchess.
‘It would be most undignified for the Queen to ride in a carriage,’ retorted Victoria.
‘I’m afraid I cannot advise you to ride on horseback,’ replied Lord Melbourne firmly.
‘This is not a matter of State,’ she answered.
‘Begging Your Majesty’s pardon I consider it to be,’ said the Prime Minister.
She had held her head high and the colour was hot on her cheeks. ‘I refuse to ride in a carriage,’ she declared. ‘And if there is to be no horse for me there will be no review.’