if he became selfish, a selfish set of flatterers would truckle to him and
ruin him, while caring only for themselves. He thanked me for all I said,
and wished me to travel with him to-day to Aberdeen, but the Queen wishes
to see me again.'

In his Journal of May 14, he wrote: 'After dinner I was summoned
unexpectedly to the Queen's room. She was alone. She met me, and with an
unutterably sad expression which filled my eyes with tears, at once began
to speak about the prince. It is impossible for me to recall distinctly
the sequence or substance of that long conversation. She spoke of his
excellences--his love, his cheerfulness, how he was everything to her; how
all now on earth seemed dead to her. She said she never shut her eyes to
trials, but liked to look them in the face; how she would never shrink
from duty, but that all was at present done mechanically; that her highest
ideas of purity and love were obtained from him, and that God could not be
displeased with her love. But there was nothing morbid in her grief. I
spoke freely to her about all I felt regarding him--the love of the nation
and their sympathy; and took every opportunity of bringing before her the
reality of God's love and sympathy, her noble calling as a queen, the
value of her life to the nation, the blessedness of prayer.'

On the Monday following the Sabbath services, Dr Macleod had a long
interview with the Queen. 'She was very much more like her old self,' he
writes, 'cheerful, and full of talk about persons and things. She, of
course, spoke of the prince. She said that he always believed he was to
die soon, and that he often told her that he had never any fear of
death.... The more I learned about the Prince-Consort, the more I agree
with what the Queen said to me about him, "that he really did not seem to
comprehend a selfish character, or what selfishness was."'