something smooth and smug about them; he was tall,
but he was clumsily put together, and he walked with
a slight slouch. Really, they thought, this youth
was more like some kind of foreign tenor than anything
else. These were serious disadvantages; but the
line of conduct which the Prince adopted from the
first moment of his arrival was far from calculated
to dispel them. Owing partly to a natural awkwardness,
partly to a fear of undue familiarity, and partly
to a desire to be absolutely correct, his manners
were infused with an extraordinary stiffness and formality.
Whenever he appeared in company, he seemed to be surrounded
by a thick hedge of prickly etiquette. He never
went out into ordinary society; he never walked in
the streets of London; he was invariably accompanied
by an equerry when he rode or drove. He wanted
to be irreproachable and, if that involved friendlessness,
it could not be helped. Besides, he had no very
high opinion of the English. So far as he could
see, they cared for nothing but fox-hunting and Sunday
observances; they oscillated between an undue frivolity
and an undue gloom; if you spoke to them of friendly
joyousness they stared; and they did not understand
either the Laws of Thought or the wit of a German
University. Since it was clear that with such
people he could have very little in common, there was
no reason whatever for relaxing in their favour the
rules of etiquette. In strict privacy, he could
be natural and charming; Seymour and Anson were devoted
to him, and he returned their affection; but they were
subordinates—the receivers of his confidences
and the agents of his will. From the support
and the solace of true companionship he was utterly
cut off.
A friend, indeed, he had—or rather, a mentor.
The Baron, established once more in the royal residence,
was determined to work with as wholehearted a detachment
for the Prince’s benefit as, more than twenty
years before, he had worked for his uncle’s.
The situations then and now, similar in many respects,
were yet full of differences. Perhaps in either
case the difficulties to be encountered were equally
great; but the present problem was the more complex
and the more interesting. The young doctor who,
unknown and insignificant, had nothing at the back
of him but his own wits and the friendship of an unimportant
Prince, had been replaced by the accomplished confidant
of kings and ministers, ripe in years, in reputation,
and in the wisdom of a vast experience. It was
possible for him to treat Albert with something of
the affectionate authority of a father; but, on the
other hand, Albert was no Leopold. As the Baron
was very well aware, he had none of his uncle’s
rigidity of ambition, none of his overweening impulse
to be personally great. He was virtuous and well-intentioned;
he was clever and well-informed; but he took no interest
in politics, and there were no signs that he possessed
any commanding force of character. Left to himself,