to
maintain the Union inviolate by all the means in her power.

There can now be no harm in saying--what when both parties were alive
was naturally kept in the background--that the relations of the Queen
with Mr. Gladstone were usually of a very painful character. She had
personally not much to complain of. The skill and firmness with which
Mr. Gladstone resisted the attempts to diminish the parliamentary
subsidies for her family were fully and gratefully recognised by the
Queen, but the main course of his politics, both foreign and domestic,
filled her with alarm, and she never appears to have experienced the
attraction which his great personal gifts exercised over most of those
with whom he came in immediate contact. The extreme copiousness of his
vocabulary, the extreme subtlety of his mind and reasoning, and the
imperiousness of temper with which he seldom failed to meet
opposition, were all repugnant to her. To those who have experienced
the sustained emphasis of language with which Mr. Gladstone was
accustomed in conversation to enforce his views, there is much truth
as well as humour in the saying which was attributed to the Queen, 'I
wish Mr. Gladstone would not always speak to me as if I was a public
meeting'; and a little episode which is related by Sir Theodore Martin
illustrates the irritation which Mr. Gladstone's methods of business
must have caused to a very busy and overworked lady who always loved
few words and simple and direct arguments.[53] At all times the Queen
had decided political opinions, and the experience of a long reign had
given her a large measure of not unjustifiable self-confidence. Few
persons had studied as she had during all those years the various
political questions that arose, and she had had the advantage of
discussing them at length with a long succession of the leading
statesmen of England. Under such circumstances her opinions had no
small weight, and although in the Liberal Government she gave her full
confidence to Lord Clarendon and Lord Granville, she looked with the
gravest apprehension on the policy of Mr. Gladstone.

It was a painful and irksome position, but it did not lead the Queen
to any unconstitutional course. No public act or word ever disclosed
her feelings. It was indeed in most cases very slowly, and in small
circles and through private channels, that the convictions of the
Queen became known.

At the close of the second Ministry of Mr. Gladstone she at once