Through the mingled formalities of Court etiquette and filial duty, she could never penetrate to Victoria.

She was unable to conceal her disappointment and her rage.

"Il n'y a plus d'avenir pour moi," she exclaimed to Madame de Lieven; "je ne suis plus rien." For eighteen years, she said, this child had been the sole object of her existence, of her thoughts, her hopes, and now--no! she would not be comforted, she had lost everything, she was to the last degree unhappy.

Sailing, so gallantly and so pertinaciously, through the buffeting storms of life, the stately vessel, with sails still swelling and pennons flying, had put into harbour at last; to find there nothing--a land of bleak desolation.
Within a month of the accession, the realities of the new situation assumed a visible shape.

The whole royal household moved from Kensington to Buckingham Palace, and, in the new abode, the Duchess of Kent was given a suite of apartments entirely separate from the Queen's.