VIII.
THE PRINCESS LOUISE.
This lady, who has been for some years past our neighbor and our occasional visitor, always welcome, is the sixth child of the Queen of England. If any suppose that people who inhabit royal palaces are exempt either from the sorrows or from the apprehensions of the human lot, they have but to turn to the letters of Prince Albert in which the Prince mentions the birth of this daughter, to discover their mistake. It was in 1848, the year of revolution in Europe, when Louis Philippe of France fled across the sea, and every throne on the continent seemed tottering to its fall. There was panic in every royal abode. At Buckingham Palace, where the Queen of England was then expecting the birth of her child, if there was less alarm, there was not less grief for the troubles and perils of near and dear relations. In the midst of the political convulsion, Prince Albert received the news of the death of his grandmother, and he wrote of this sad event quite in the human style, as though he were no Prince at all.
"Alas!" said he, "the news you sent were heavy news indeed. The dear, good grandmamma! She was an angel upon earth, and to us ever so good and loving. What dismal times are these! I cannot give full way to my own grief, harrassed as we both are with the terrible present. Augustus, Clementine Nemours, and the Duchess of Montpensier have come to us, one by one, like people shipwrecked ; Victorie, Alexander, the King, the
Queen, are still tossing upon the waves, or have drifted
