Towards the other European storm-centre, also, the Prince’s attitude continued to be very different to that of Palmerston.  Albert’s great wish was for a united Germany under the leadership of a constitutional and virtuous Prussia; Palmerston did not think that there was much to be said for the scheme, but he took no particular interest in German politics, and was ready enough to agree to a proposal which was warmly supported by both the Prince and the Queen—­that the royal Houses of England and Prussia should be united by the marriage of the Princess Royal with the Prussian Crown Prince.  Accordingly, when the Princess was not yet fifteen, the Prince, a young man of twenty-four, came over on a visit to Balmoral, and the betrothal took place.  Two years later, in 1857, the marriage was celebrated.  At the last moment, however, it seemed that there might be a hitch.  It was pointed out in Prussia that it was customary for Princes of the blood royal to be married in Berlin, and it was suggested that there was no reason why the present case should be treated as an exception.  When this reached the ears of Victoria, she was speechless with indignation.  In a note, emphatic even for Her Majesty, she instructed the Foreign Secretary to tell the Prussian Ambassador “not to entertain the possibility of such a question...  The Queen never could consent to it, both for public and for private reasons, and the assumption of its being too much for a Prince Royal of Prussia to come over to marry the Princess Royal of Great Britain in England is too absurd to say the least. . .  Whatever may be the usual practice of Prussian princes, it is not every day that one marries the eldest daughter of the Queen of England.  The question must therefore be considered as settled and closed.”  It was, and the wedding took place in St. James’s Chapel.  There were great festivities—­illuminations, state concerts, immense crowds, and general rejoicings.  At Windsor a magnificent banquet was given to the bride and bridegroom in the Waterloo room, at which, Victoria noted in her diary, “everybody was most friendly and kind about Vicky and full of the universal enthusiasm, of which the Duke of Buccleuch gave us most pleasing instances, he having been in the very thick of the crowd and among the lowest of the low.”  Her feelings during several days had been growing more and more emotional, and when the time came for the young couple to depart she very nearly broke down—­but not quite.  “Poor dear child!” she wrote afterwards.  “I clasped her in my arms and blessed her, and knew not what to say.  I kissed good Fritz and pressed his hand again and again.  He was unable to speak and the tears were in his eyes.  I embraced them both again at the carriage door, and Albert got into the carriage, an open one, with them and Bertie...  The band struck up.  I wished good-bye to the good Perponchers.  General Schreckenstein was much affected.  I pressed his hand, and the good Dean’s, and then went quickly upstairs.”