Her own existence came to harmonise more and more with what was around her.  Gradually, imperceptibly, Albert receded.  It was not that he was forgotten—­that would have been impossible—­but that the void created by his absence grew less agonising, and even, at last, less obvious.  At last Victoria found it possible to regret the bad weather without immediately reflecting that her “dear Albert always said we could not alter it, but must leave it as it was;” she could even enjoy a good breakfast without considering how “dear Albert” would have liked the buttered eggs.  And, as that figure slowly faded, its place was taken, inevitably, by Victoria’s own.  Her being, revolving for so many years round an external object, now changed its motion and found its centre in itself.  It had to be so:  her domestic position, the pressure of her public work, her indomitable sense of duty, made anything else impossible.  Her egotism proclaimed its rights.  Her age increased still further the surrounding deference; and her force of character, emerging at length in all its plenitude, imposed absolutely upon its environment by the conscious effort of an imperious will.

Little by little it was noticed that the outward vestiges of Albert’s posthumous domination grew less complete.  At Court the stringency of mourning was relaxed.  As the Queen drove through the Park in her open carriage with her Highlanders behind her, nursery-maids canvassed eagerly the growing patch of violet velvet in the bonnet with its jet appurtenances on the small bowing head.

It was in her family that Victoria’s ascendancy reached its highest point.  All her offspring were married; the number of her descendants rapidly increased; there were many marriages in the third generation; and no fewer than thirty-seven of her great-grandchildren were living at the time of her death.  A picture of the period displays the royal family collected together in one of the great rooms at Windsor—­a crowded company of more than fifty persons, with the imperial matriarch in their midst.  Over them all she ruled with a most potent sway.  The small concerns of the youngest aroused her passionate interest; and the oldest she treated as if they were children still.  The Prince of Wales, in particular, stood in tremendous awe of his mother.  She had steadily refused to allow him the slightest participation in the business of government; and he had occupied himself in other ways.  Nor could it be denied that he enjoyed himself—­out of her sight; but, in that redoubtable presence, his abounding manhood suffered a miserable eclipse.  Once, at Osborne, when, owing to no fault of his, he was too late for a dinner party, he was observed standing behind a pillar and wiping the sweat from his forehead, trying to nerve himself to go up to the Queen.  When at last he did so, she gave him a stiff nod, whereupon he vanished immediately behind another pillar, and remained there until the party broke up.  At the time of this incident the Prince of Wales was over fifty years of age.