part us, and would let us grow old together (though he always talked of the shortness of life)—is too awful, too cruel!" The tone of outraged Majesty seems to be discernible. Did she wonder in her heart of hearts how the Deity could have dared?
But all other emotions gave way before her overmastering determination to continue, absolutely unchanged, and for the rest of her life on earth, her reverence, her obedience, her idolatry. "I am anxious to repeat one thing," she told her uncle, "and that one is my firm resolve, my irrevocable decision, viz., that his wishes—his plans—about everything, his views about every thing are to be my law! And no human power will make me swerve from what he decided and wished." She grew fierce, she grew furious, at the thought of any possible intrusion between her and her desire. Her uncle was coming to visit her, and it flashed upon her that he might try to interfere with her and seek to "rule the roost" as of old. She would give him a hint. "I am also determined," she wrote, "that no one person—may he be ever so good, ever so devoted among my servants—is to lead or guide or dictate to me. I know how he would disapprove it . . . Though
