"I said, 'Sir, had you not better have a glass of water?' upon which he, much out of humour, said with an oath--
"'No; I will go directly to the Queen,' and away he went.
"The Princess, left during this short moment alone, was in a state of astonishment; and, on my joining her, said--'Mon Dieu! est-ce que le Prince est toujours comme cela? Je le trouve très gros et nullement aussi beau que son portrait.'
"I said his Royal Highness was naturally a good deal affected and flurried at this first interview, but she certainly would find him different at dinner. She was disposed to further criticisms on this occasion, which would have embarrassed me very much to answer, if luckily the King had not ordered me to attend him."
Little comment is required upon such a scene. In charity, we shall suppose that the Prince at the first glance was grievously disappointed with the personal appearance of his bride--that he had formed some exaggerated estimate of her charms, and that the reaction was so strong as to create instantaneous antipathy. A more favourable hypothesis we cannot form; any other must resolve itself into preconcerted insult. Still, this is no justification for conduct which was at once mean and unmanly. There she stood--the daughter of a sovereign prince--his own near kinswoman, whose hand he had voluntarily solicited--young, and not devoid of some personal beauty. Other defects he had not time to observe, and surely, on such an occasion as this, they were not conspicuously prominent. Could any man, with a spark of chivalrous feeling within him, have permitted himself to manifest such tokens of disgust in the presence of a woman, who was to all intents and purposes his wife, and whom he then for the first time beheld? Some there were, wearing before him the princely plume of Wales, who would rather have forfeited that honour than offered insult to a female and a stranger--but the spirit of the Henrys and the Edwards was not there. An interview of a minute's duration--brandy--and an oath! Rare prospects for the felicity and continuance of the future Hymen!--Let us follow Lord Malmesbury through the subsequent scenes.
"The drawing-room was just over. His Majesty's conversation turned wholly on Prussian and French politics, and the only question about the Princess was--'Is she good-humoured?'