No more would she reign in that royal heart and those royal halls.
No more, watching from a window at Windsor, would she follow her pupil and her sovereign walking on the terrace among the obsequious multitude, with the eye of triumphant love.

Returning to her native Hanover she established herself at Buckeburg in a small but comfortable house, the walls of which were entirely covered by portraits of Her Majesty.

The Baron, in spite of his dyspepsia, smiled again: Albert was supreme.
IV The early discords had passed away completely--resolved into the absolute harmony of married life.

Victoria, overcome by a new, an unimagined revelation, had surrendered her whole soul to her husband.
The beauty and the charm which so suddenly had made her his at first were, she now saw, no more than but the outward manifestation of the true Albert.

There was an inward beauty, an inward glory which, blind that she was, she had then but dimly apprehended, but of which now she was aware in every fibre of her being--he was good--he was great! How could she ever have dreamt of setting up her will against his wisdom, her ignorance against his knowledge, her fancies against his perfect taste?
Had she really once loved London and late hours and dissipation?
She who now was only happy in the country, she who jumped out of bed every morning--oh, so early!--with Albert, to take a walk, before breakfast, with Albert alone! How wonderful it was to be taught by him! To be told by him which trees were which; and to learn all about the bees! And then to sit doing cross-stitch while he read aloud to her Hallam's Constitutional History of England! Or to listen to him playing on his new organ 'The organ is the first of instruments,' he said; or to sing to him a song by Mendelssohn, with a great deal of care over the time and the breathing, and only a very occasional false note! And, after dinner, to--oh, how good of him! He had given up his double chess! And so there could be round games at the round table, or everyone could spend the evening in the most amusing way imaginable--spinning counters and rings.' When the babies came it was still more wonderful.