Page:Life of Her Majesty Queen Victoria (IA lifeofhermajesty01fawc).pdf/230

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Victoria.

the Queen wanted when she felt most forlorn. He had also the strong sense of humor which so often makes the crooked straight, and the rough places plain. The Queen felt she could talk openly to him about her sorrow; he helped her to look, not down, but up. When showing him a drawing of the Prince's mausoleum, his exclamation was, "Oh, he is not there." He would lead her away from her own grief, to realize, and help to soothe, the sorrows of others. He told her of a beautiful expression of a poor Scottish woman who had lost her husband and several of her children. The poor woman had said, referring to her husband's death, "When he was ta'en, it made sic a hole in my heart that a' other sorrows gang lichtly through."

It is interesting to note that on October 3d, 1869, the Queen asked Dr. Macleod his opinion of the Marquis of Lorne. The Doctor assured her hat he knew Lord Lorne well, and had prepared him for confirmation, and thought very highly of him,—"good, excellent and superior in every way." Exactly a year from that day, October 3d, 1870, the Princess Louise became engaged to the Marquis of Lorne, and they were married on March 21st, 1871.

The Queen was greatly attracted by the simplicity and dignity of the services of the Scottish Church. She was present at the Communion Service at Crathie in 1871. The Journal says:—

"It would be impossible to say how deeply we were impressed by the grand simplicity of the service. It was all so truly earnest, and no description can do justice to the perfect devotion of the whole assemblage. It was most touching, and I longed much to join in it."

Since 1873, this wish on the part of the Queen has been gratified, and she has joined in the communion at Crathie every autumn.

Although Princess Alice's marriage in July, 1862,