They could win her into the sunshine even on the sacred
anniversaries. One of them said to her, 'I thought you would like to be
here (a bright and favoured spot) on his birthday.' The good Christian man
'being of opinion,' writes the Queen, 'that this beloved day, and even the
14th of December, must not be looked upon as a day of mourning.' 'That's
not the light to look at it,' said he. The Queen found 'true and strong
faith in these good simple people.' It is pleasant, to note that by-and-by
she kept the prince's birthday by giving souvenirs to her children,
servants, and friends.
She who years before, during a short separation from her dear husband, had
written, 'All the numerous children are as nothing to me when he is
away--it seems as if the whole life of the house and home were gone,'
could enter into the spirit of Dr Norman Macleod's pathetic story of the
old woman who, having lost husband and children, was asked how she had
been able to bear her sorrows, and replied, 'Ah, when _he_ went awa', it
made a great hole, and all the others went through it.'
As we have already said, the Queen was a genuine ruler, and while at
Windsor she had not only a regular array of papers and despatches to go
through, but many court ceremonies. In the morning there was a drive
before breakfast, and after that meal she read her private letters and
newspapers.
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