PAGE 2
The Jubilees Of Queen Victoria
by
It was in far-off India, of which Victoria had been proclaimed empress ten years before, that the first note of rejoicing was heard. The 16th of February was selected as the date of the imperial festival, which was celebrated all over the land, even in Mandalay, the capital of the newly-conquered state of Upper Burmah. Europeans and natives alike took part in the ceremonies and rejoicings, which embraced banquets, plays, reviews, illuminations, the distribution of honors, the opening in honor of the empress of libraries, colleges and hospitals, and at Gwalior the cancelling of the arrears of the land-tax amounting to five million dollars.
The fiftieth year of the queen’s reign would be completed on the 20th of June, but in the preceding months of the year many preliminary ceremonies took place in England. Among these was a splendid reception of the queen at Birmingham, which city she visited on the 23d of March. The streets were richly decorated with flags, festoons, triumphal arches, banks of flowers, and trophies illustrating the industries of that metropolis of manufacture, while the streets were thronged with half a million of rejoicing people. A striking feature of the occasion was a semi-circle of fifteen thousand school-children, a mile long, the teachers standing behind each school-group, and a continuous strain of “God Save the Queen” hailing the royal progress along the line.
On the 4th of May the queen received at Windsor Castle the representatives of the colonial governments, whose addresses showed that during her reign the colonial subjects of the empire had increased from less than 2,000,000 to more than 9,000,000 souls, the Indian subjects from 96,000,000 to 254,000,000, and those of minor dependencies from 2,000,000 to 7,000,000.
There were various other incidents connected with the Jubilee during May, one being a visit of the queen to the American “Wild West Show,” and another the opening of the “People’s Palace” at Whitechapel, in which fifteen thousand troops were ranged along seven miles of splendidly decorated streets, while the testimony of the people to their affection for their queen was as enthusiastic as it had been at Birmingham. Day after day other ceremonial occasions arrived, including banquets, balls, assemblies and public festivities of many kinds, from the feeding of four thousand of the poor at Glasgow to a yacht race around the British Islands.
The great Jubilee celebration, however, was reserved for the 21st of June, the chief streets of London being given over to a host of decorators, who transformed them into a glowing bower of beauty. The route set aside for the imposing procession was one long array of brilliant color and shifting brightness almost impossible to describe and surpassing all former festive demonstrations.
The line of the royal procession extended from Buckingham Palace to Westminster Abbey, along which route windows and seats had been secured at fabulous prices, while the throng of sightseers that densely crowded the streets was in the best of good humor.
As the procession moved slowly along from Buckingham Palace a strange silence fell upon the gossipping crowd as they awaited the coming of the aged queen, on her way to the old Abbey to celebrate in state the fiftieth year of her reign. When the head of the procession moved onward and the royal carriages came within sight, the awed feeling that had prevailed was followed by one of tumultuous enthusiasm, volley after volley of cheers rending the air as the carriage bearing the royal lady passed between the two dense lines of loyal spectators.
With a face tremulous with emotion the queen bowed from side to side in grateful courtesy to her acclaiming subjects, as did her companions, the Princess of Wales and the German Crown Princess, who had returned to her native land to take part in its holiday of patriotism.
Six cream-colored horses drew the stately carriage in which the royal party rode, the Duke of Cambridge and an escort accompanying it, while a body-guard of princes followed, the Prince of Wales being mounted on a golden chestnut horse and sharing with his mother the cheers of the throng. Preceding this escort and the queen’s carriage was a series of carriages in which were seated the sumptuously appareled Indian princes, clothed in cloth of gold and wearing turbans glittering with diamonds and other precious gems. Prominent in the group of mounted princes was the German Crown Prince Frederick, who succeeded to the throne as Emperor Frederick III. in the following March and died in the following June, in less than a year from his appearance in the Jubilee. But there was no presage of his quick-coming death in his present appearance, his white uniform and plumed silver helmet attracting general admiration, while he sat his horse as proudly as a knight of old and was covered with medals and decorations significant of his prowess in battle. A gorgeous cavalcade of natives of India completed the procession, than which none of greater brilliance had ever been seen in London streets.