have helped to render so dear the Queen's own beautiful sea-side home,
Osborne House. I remember a pretty little story, told by a tourist, who
happened to be stopping at the village of Brading during one of those
visits to the lovely island. One afternoon he strolled into the old
church-yard to search out the grave of Elizabeth Wallbridge, the sweet
heroine of Leigh Richmond's beautiful religious story, "The Dairyman's
Daughter." He found seated beside the mound a lady and a young girl, the
latter reading aloud, in a full, melodious voice, the touching tale of
the Christian maiden. The tourist turned away, and soon after was told by
the sexton that those pilgrims to that humble grave were the Duchess of
Kent and the Princess Victoria.

I am told by a Yorkshire lady another story of the Princess, of not quite
so serious a character. She was visiting with her mother, of course, at
Wentworth House, the seat of Earl Fitzwilliam in Yorkshire, and while at
that pleasant place delighted in running about by herself in the gardens
and shrubberies. One wet morning, soon after her arrival, she was thus
disporting herself, flitting from point to point, light-hearted and
light-footed, when the old gardener, who did not then know her, seeing
her about to descend a treacherous bit of ground from the terrace, called
out, "Be careful, Miss; it's slape!"--a Yorkshire word for slippery. The
incautious, but ever-curious Princess, turning her head, asked, "What's
slape?" and the same instant her feet flew from under her, and she came
down. The old gardener ran to lift her, saying, as he did so,
"_That's_ slape, Miss."

There is nothing remarkable, much less incredible, in these stories of
the young Victoria, nor in the one related by her music-teacher, of how
she once rebelled against so much practice, and how, on his telling her
that there was no "royal road" in art, and that only by much practice