never knew a man in whose
truth and justice I had a more lively confidence, or in whom I saw
a more invariable desire to promote the public service. In the whole
course of my communications with him I never knew an instance in which
he did not show the strongest attachment to truth; and I never saw
in the whole course of my life the slightest reason for suspecting
that he stated anything which he did not believe to be the fact."
The Queen writing to her uncle said that "Albert . . . felt and feels
Sir Robert's loss dreadfully. He feels he has lost a second father."

As a statesman it was said of him that "for concocting, producing,
explaining and defending measures, he had no equal, or anything like
an equal."

By far the most interesting person who acted as both friend and
adviser to the Queen and her husband was the Baron Christian
Friedrich von Stockmar, who had been private physician to Prince
Leopold, and afterward private secretary and controller of his
household. He took an active part in the negotiations which led to
his master becoming King of the Belgians. Long residence in this
country had given him a thorough knowledge of England and the English,
and he claimed friendship with the leading diplomatists both at home
and on the European continent.

In 1834 he retired to Coburg, but later was chosen, as we have seen,
to lend his valuable advice toward bringing about a union between
Prince Albert and Queen Victoria, both of whom he knew and admired.

Immediately before Victoria's accession King Leopold had sent him
to England, where his counsel, judgment, and thorough knowledge of
the English Constitution were placed at the service of the young
Princess. He accompanied Prince Albert on a tour in Italy, and again
returned to England to make arrangements for the Prince's future
household.

All that he did during this period was done quietly and behind the
scenes, and though he was a foreigner by birth, he worked to bring
about the marriage for the sake of the country he loved so well. He
looked upon England as the home of political freedom. "Out of its
bosom," he stated, "singly and solely has sprung America's free
Constitution, in all its present power and importance, in its
incalculable influence upon the social condition of the whole human
race; and in my eyes the English Constitution is the foundation-,
corner-, and cope-stone of the entire political civilization of the
human race, present and to come."