The Prince had
loved him like a son, and this fresh disaster told so severely upon
his health that he began to suffer much from sleeplessness. The
strain of almost ceaseless work for many years was gradually wearing
him out.
He had never been afraid of death, and not long before his last
illness he had said to his wife: "I do not cling to life. You do;
but I set no store by it. If I knew that those I love were well cared
for, I should be quite ready to die to-morrow. . . . I am sure, if
I had a severe illness, I should give up at once, I should not struggle
for life."
On the 1st of December the Queen felt anxious and depressed. Her
husband grew worse and could not take food without considerable
difficulty, and this made him very weak and irritable.
The physicians in attendance were now obliged to tell her that the
illness was low fever, but that the patient himself was not to know
of this. The Ministers became alarmed at his state, and when the news
of his illness became public there was the greatest and most
universal anxiety for news.
In spite of slight improvements from time to time, the Prince showed
no power of fighting the disease, and on the evening of the 14th
December he passed gently away.
It is no exaggeration to say that the death of the Queen's beloved
husband saddened every home in the land; it was a sorrow felt equally
by the highest and the lowest. He died in the fulness of his manhood,
leaving her whom he had loved and guarded so tenderly to reign in
lonely splendour.
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