On rare occasions her indignation got the better of her—­once, notably, when, owing to careless delay on the part of the Ministry, General Gordon perished at Khartoum, a rescue party failing to reach him in time.  In a letter to his sisters she spoke of this as “a stain left upon England,” and as a wrong which she felt very keenly.

Her style of writing was as simple as possible, yet she always said the right thing at the right moment, and her letters of sympathy or congratulation were models of their kind and never failed in their effect.

Few, if any, reigns in history have been so blameless as hers, and her domestic life was perfect in its harmony and the devotion of the members of her family to one another.  She possessed the ’eye of the mistress’ for every detail, however small, which concerned housekeeping matters, and though her style of entertaining was naturally often magnificent, everything was paid for punctually.

After the visits of King Louis Philippe and the Emperor Nicholas of Russia, Sir Robert Peel acknowledged that “Her Majesty was able to meet every charge and to give a reception to the Sovereigns which struck every one by its magnificence without adding one tittle to the burdens of the country.  I am not required by Her Majesty to press for the extra expenditure of one single shilling on account of these unforeseen causes of increased expenditure.  I think that to state this is only due to the personal credit of Her Majesty, who insists upon it that there shall be every magnificence required by her station, but without incurring one single debt.”

When one remembers that the Queen had to superintend the household arrangements of Buckingham Palace, Balmoral Castle, Osborne, and Windsor, and that the latter alone gave employment, in one way and another, to two thousand people, it can be realized that this was a tremendous undertaking in itself.  Method and neatness, first instituted by the Prince Consort, were always insisted upon in place of the disorder and waste which had reigned supreme before the Queen became head of the household.

[Illustration:  THE VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM, SOUTH KENSINGTON]

Before her life was saddened by the untimely loss of her husband the Queen was the leader of English society, and her influence was, as may be imagined, thoroughly wholesome and good.  She was all her life a deeply religious woman, and though her observance of Sunday was strict, she never allowed it to become a day of penance.  Her religion was ’humane’—­indeed, her intense sympathy with all sorrow and suffering was one of her supreme virtues, and her early upbringing made her dislike all elaborate forms of ceremony during the service.  When in the Highlands she always attended the simple little Presbyterian church, where the congregation was, for the most part, made up of the inhabitants of the neighbourhood.