The New Zealand Spectator and Cook’s Strait Guardian, Wednesday, March 19, 1862
[Editorial regarding the death of Prince Albert, The New Zealand Spectator and Cook’s Strait Guardian, Wednesday, March 19, 1862]
The intelligence received of the death of Prince Albert will occasion unfeigned regret throughout her Majesty’s dominions. While the nations on the Continent of Europe have been convulsed by revolutions and discontent, during her Majesty’s prosperous reign each year has increased the feeling of loyalty and devotion which her subjects have entertained towards her. Their constitutional loyalty for the office of Sovereign has been strengthened by a feeling of personal attachment and regard towards the individual who has so worthily discharged its duties and who has exhibited to her subjects so bright an example of all the domestic virtues. To her Majesty has been granted the rare felicity, not often permitted to sovereigns, of having been united to the husband of her choice, and of having for more than twenty years enjoyed all the happiness which such a union is capable of conferring. That union is now dissolved by death, and her Majesty’s subjects will deeply sympathise with her in the irreparable loss which she has sustained. The personal qualities of the Prince Consort will greatly contribute to enhance these feelings of sympathy and regret. From his first arrival in England Prince Albert has always prudently and carefully abstained from taking any part in politics, and in his public life has been known to the British nation chiefly for the deep interest he has taken in the advancement of the fine arts, and in the promotion of all those questions that in any way tended to increase the social welfare and happiness of her Majesty’s subjects. To refer to one only of the many subjects with which the name of the late Prince Albert was intimately identified, the Exhibition of the Crystal Palace in 1852, which has exercised so beneficial an influence on the arts and manufactures of the mother country, owed its origin to his suggestion and influence, and the building which is now rising after an interval of ten years for the same object, but which he has not lived to see completed, is mainly to be attributed to the personal interest which he took in its erection. In the prime of life, in the midst of a career which could gratify the highest, the noblest aspirations, he has died universally lamented and regretted for his amiable qualities, and for the manner in which he discharged the duties of his exalted position.