Soon after the funeral of the Duke of Albany the Queen was recommended by Sir William Jenner to go to Germany, and she thus resolved to visit her son-in-law and grandchildren at Darmstadt, where the marriage of the Princess Victoria of Hesse with Prince Louis of Battenberg was to be celebrated at the end of the month (April). Sir William believed that the change of scene and surroundings would do the Queen more good than a mournful sojourn at Osborne, where everything must recall reminiscences of her dead son. Her Majesty accordingly left Windsor on the 15th of April for Port Victoria, whence she embarked on the _Osborne_ and arrived at Flushing next morning. Therefrom she went by rail to Darmstadt, arriving early on the morning of the 17th. The voyage was unpleasant, and the weather between the Nore and the Scheldt so heavy that the Queen had to remain in her cabin during the greater part of her journey. Only the Grand Duke of Hesse and his daughters were on the platform to meet her Majesty, who had desired her reception to be as private as possible. Ere she left England she forwarded to the newspapers through the Home Secretary a letter expressing her gratitude to the people for their loving sympathy with her and the Duchess of Albany in their bereavement.
On the 30th of April the marriage of the Queen’s granddaughter, the Princess Victoria of Hesse, with Prince Louis of Battenberg, was solemnised in the small whitewashed Puritanical-looking chapel at Darmstadt, which was thronged with a brilliant crowd of specially invited guests, among whom the Queen, in her sombre mourning, was one of the most striking figures. With the Queen there were present, besides the family of the bride and bridegroom, the young Princess of Wales. The German Crown Prince led in the Princess of Wales, and the German Crown Princess was escorted by her brother, the Prince of Wales; Prince William of Prussia led in the Princess Beatrice, and the dark, Jewish-looking Prince of Bulgaria (brother of the bridegroom) escorted with obsequious gallantry the Princess Victoria of Prussia. The ceremony was short, simple, and touching; but the sermon on the duties of marriage which the Court preacher delivered was long and prosy. The Queen, after the ceremony was over, retired to the Palace, and did not attend the wedding banquet in the Schloss. The weather, which had been cold and bleak when the Queen arrived, suddenly became fine and mild, and she was, therefore, able to amuse herself in the public gardens. She had gone to Darmstadt rather reluctantly, but was now glad that she had taken Sir William Jenner’s advice. By her own wish she was lodged in the Neue Schloss, which she had built, at a cost of nearly £25,000, as a palace for the Princess Alice and her husband, and in the beautiful grounds of this place she drove about every morning in a pony-carriage with the Princess Beatrice. She took long drives every afternoon, and visited Auerbach (the chief country seat of the Grand Duke) and his shooting-lodge at Kranichstein. The ex-Empress Eugénie had offered to lend Arenenberg (a charming villa near Constance) to the Queen, but she did not desire to extend her tour beyond Darmstadt, and so the offer was not accepted. Accompanied by the Princess Beatrice, the Grand Duke, and the Princess Elizabeth of Hesse, her Majesty returned to Windsor on the 7th of May.