she was left in loneliness on the throne, a widow separated by her
queendom from many of those supports which others find near them,
but from which she was deprived by her position. "Fourteen happy and
blessed years have passed," she wrote, in 1854, "and I confidently
trust many more will pass, and find us in old age as we now are,
happily and devotedly united. Trials we must have, but what are they
if we are together?" In God's wisdom that hope was not to be
realized, and in 1861 the stroke fell, and it fell with crushing
power.

It is not for us to lift the curtain of sorrow that fell like a
funeral pall over the first years of her widowhood. For many a day
it seemed as if the grief was more than she could bear, and although
she was sustained through it all by God's grace, and supported by
the sympathy of the nation, yet it was naturally a long-continued
and absorbing sorrow. Other blows have fallen since then. The tender
and wise Princess Alice, and the thoughtful and cultured Duke of
Albany, have also been gathered to their rest; and the queen has had
to mourn over one after another of her most faithful servants taken
from her. But the hallowing hand of time, the soothing remembrance
of unspeakable mercies, and the call to noble duty, have done much
to restore the strength, if not the joy, of former days. Her people
rejoice, and the influence of the Crown is enormously strengthened,
when in these later years the queen has been able once more to
mingle with the nation.

When we touch on the third period of her life--which may well be
termed that of sorrow, although brightened by many happy events in
the domestic life of her children--we reach times that are familiar
to every reader. These have been years in which the cares of state
have often been exceedingly burdensome. The days of anxiety during
the Crimean War and the Indian Mutiny have more than once had their
counterpart. Afghanistan, Zululand with its Isandula, and the
Transvaal War with its Majuba Hill, Egypt, and the Soudan, brought
hours of sore anxiety to the sovereign; but they were probably not
more harassing to intellect and heart than the months of difficult
diplomacy which the threatening aspect of European politics
frequently laid upon Government.

I may say in passing that no portrait of her appears to me to be
quite satisfactory. They usually have only one expression, that of
sadness and thoughtfulness, and so far they give a true
representatio