The Prince as a Social Leader

The influence wielded upon Society by the Prince of Wales, during nearly forty years of public life, was so marked and important as to merit extended consideration. Society, of course, in such a connection includes much more than any particular set of persons however select, or distinguished, or aristocratic; it means, in fact, all the varied social circles, high and low, which have recognized principles of etiquette and intercourse and common customs of amusement and fashion. Taken in this wide sense of the word, no personage in the history of Europe during the nineteenth century wielded so great an influence as His Royal Highness. He helped to make the unbounded after-dinner drinking of a previous period unpopular and socially un-orthodox; he encouraged in his more youthful days and always enjoyed the pleasures of dancing; he introduced very largely the popular fashion of a cigarette after dinner in place of endless heavy cigars and their accompaniment of liquors; he did much to encourage and popularize a love for music; he led the fashion in the matter of men's dress and, upon the whole, society in most civilized countries has to thank him for simple and dignified customs in this respect; he supported the race-course with courage and persistence and not only made racing more popular but helped to establish its code and operation upon a high plane of honour—by far the highest and cleanest in the world; he made charity and the support of its varied public institutions popular and fashionable; he showed the gilded youth of a great social world that work was a good thing for a Prince and a peer as well as for a peasant; he, with his beautiful wife, presented for many years a model home and family life to the nation and they, together, discouraged many of the petty vices and small faults which creep into all social systems from time to time.

LIFE AT MARLBOROUGH HOUSE

The official and social centre of this leadership in the British world was at Marlborough House—a large and unpretentious residence in the heart of London. That the place was exquisitely furnished and equipped goes without saying; that it was comfortable in the extreme is equally a matter of course to those acquainted with the taste and house-keeping capacities of the Princess of Wales. It was filled with fine engravings and paintings illustrative of the Victorian era; it teemed with mementoes and memorials of past incidents, travels and friendships in the lives of the Royal couple; it contained rooms suited for every purpose required in the exacting life and multifarious public duties of its occupants. The Prince's study, where only intimates were admitted, has been described as the room of a hard-working man of business. When at Marlborough House, His Royal Highness used to mark out his time, each day, with care and precision and even then it was difficult to fill his many and varied engagements. There were certain public functions such as the Horse Show at Islington, or the Royal Military Tournament, to which the Prince and Princess always went when in London. There were a certain number of state dinners given in place of those which, under other circumstances, would have been given by the Sovereign. Diplomatic dinners were also incidents of the season at Marlborough House as well as dinners which included the Government and Opposition leaders and great banquets held from time to time in honour of foreign guests of the nation or Royal relations visiting the country.

The dining-room at Marlborough was handsome but plain, the arrangements of the table setting an example of simplicity which society, in this case, did not always follow. The Prince of Wales never concealed his dislike for the extremely lengthy banquets which were the custom in his youth and succeeded, so far as private dinner-parties were concerned, in revolutionizing the system. To the favoured guest Marlborough House was a scene of historic as well as personal interest. It had been the home of the great Duke of that name; the residence of Prince Leopold, intended husband of the lamented Princess Charlotte, and afterwards King of the Belgians; the dower-house of Queen Adelaide; the choice of the Prince Consort for his son's London home. The general contents of the house were worthy of its history. In one room were splendid panels of Gobelin tapestry presented by Napoleon; in another were the rare and wonderful treasures of Indian work, in gold, silver, jewelry and embroidery, brought home from the Royal visit to Hindostan; elsewhere was a beautiful vase given the Prince by Alexander II. of Russia, enamelled work from the East, richly ornamented swords, trays of solid gold, tables full of presentation keys, medals, trowels and memorials of all kinds.

Socially, the drawing-room was the central feature of interest. Its general effect has been described[6] as being white and gold and pale pink, its floor of polished oak with an Axminster carpet in the centre, and with an appearance of vastness modified by pillars of white and gold. There were innumerable mirrors and the furniture was upholstered in deep red, while rare china, flowers, photographs, statuettes, and small ornaments of gold and silver and enamel were scattered in profusion upon tables, cabinets and mantels. Here the most eminent men and beautiful or clever women of Great Britain and the world have been entertained and here, or in the well-kept grounds, the intimate friends of the Prince and Princess have gathered from time to time.

The society received at Marlborough was always cosmopolitan in its variety but it was never of the kind which slander sometimes insinuated. No man has ever been more democratic, so far as mere class barriers are concerned, than was the Prince of Wales, but no one knew better than he where to draw the line in his entertainments. The Princess, for her part, was at all times a model hostess, and each knew too well what was due to the other to make the social life of the Palace anything more than a correct embodiment and representation of the social life of London. The liberality of the Prince was made evident in later years in making cultivated and representative Americans or Jews welcome at his functions. His very proper and openly-avowed liking for beautiful women encouraged at one time a social class of "professional beauties," but as soon as this patronage was found to have been misused and vulgarized in certain quarters, he and the Princess quietly dropped those who were making a trade of the Royal recognition. A story has been told illustrating the capacity which the Prince of Wales always showed for keeping people in their proper places. On one occasion, at a great charitable bazaar in Albert Hall, which he had honoured with his presence, he went up to a refreshment stall and asked for a cup of tea. The fair vendor—there was no doubt of her beauty—before handing the cup to His Royal Highness took a drink from it, saying, "now the price will be five guineas!" The Prince gravely paid the money, handed back the cup of tea and said, "Will you please give me a clean cup?"

The Royal etiquette, as to social entertainments and the acceptance of invitations to country houses, or city functions, was always very exact and was carried out along lines fixed by the Prince and Princess in their early married life. Outside of the aristocracy, or a small list of personal friends, very few hospitable invitations were ever accepted and as such acceptance meant certain admission to the higher ranks of society the pressure upon personal friends or officials can easily be imagined. The Prince always objected to the lavish and extravagant style of such entertainments and this was one important reason for limiting his circle of hosts and hostesses. At the country houses visited from time to time, or at the private dinners to which he accepted invitations, the Prince was supposed to usually see a list of the guests and to always have the right of adding names to it. The delicate and indirect task of attending to this matter was for many years confided to Mr. Harry Tyrwhitt Wilson; who also had the arrangement of details in connection with the visits largely in his hands. One incident of the visits to country houses was an effort on the part of the Prince in recent years to discourage and check the wholesale habit of tipping servants. He took the method of leaving a moderate and suitable sum for the purpose and this was distributed after he had left the place. It may be added that whenever the Prince went anywhere he was always accompanied by an equerry, his own valets, a footman to wait on him at meals, and certain other servants.

FRIENDS AND COMPANIONS OF THE PRINCE

The Prince and Princess of Wales, separately or together as the case may be, have visited most of the splendid homes of England. Chief amongst those whom they delighted to visit were the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire and Chatsworth; Hardwick Hall and Compton Place have, therefore, more than once seen most brilliant entertainments in their honour. Lord and Lady Cadogan were frequent and favourite hosts. Lord and Lady Londonderry, the Earl and Countess of Warwick, the Duke of Richmond at Goodwood House, the late Duke of Westminster at Eaton Hall, all entertained the Royal couple upon more than one occasion. Lord Alington, the late Duke of Beaufort, and Sir Edward Lawson gave the Prince frequent and enjoyable shooting. The Duchess of Marlborough and Mrs. Arthur Paget were two American ladies whom His Royal Highness counted as friends and hostesses. Several members of the Rothschild family entertained the Heir Apparent at homes which have been described as models of comfort and museums of art, while Lord Penrhyn was a Welsh magnate whom he once visited with great pleasure, and the late Baron Hirsch, in his Hungarian shootings, gave him splendid sport upon more than one occasion.

No phrase has been more conspicuous in recent years and none have been more abused in meaning and application than that of "the Prince's set." Properly used, it meant his personal friends or those who, along specific and often very diverse lines of sport, society, work, or travel, were necessarily intimate with His Royal Highness. Improperly applied, it was supposed to designate a rather fast and very "smart" set of wealthy social magnates. In this latter guise it had really no existence. Those who were familiar with the Prince of Wales' career and character knew that mere wealth was the last thing which ever attracted him, and the one thing which was a most certainly uncertain basis upon which to gain his patronage; to say nothing of his friendship. Many disappointed millionaires can speak with accuracy upon this point—if they wished to. On the other hand, honest love of racing, or shooting, or yachting; brilliancy of conversation in man or woman and conspicuous beauty or charm of manner in the latter; knowledge of the world and capacity to do the right thing in the right way at the right time were conspicuous factors in obtaining the friendship of the Prince of Wales. Achievements in art, or distinction in the Army and Navy, or great philanthropic interests and undertakings, were always elements of recognized importance.

Deer-stalking in the Highlands made friends and hosts such as the late Dukes of Sutherland and Hamilton, Mr. Farquharson of Invercauld and Lord Glenesk. During his annual visits to Homburg, for many years, and in the rest and liberty which he allowed himself there, the Prince's favourite companion, as he was his most devoted friend, was the late Mr. Christopher Sykes. Lord Brampton—the clever, witty and eccentric Judge who was better known as Sir Henry Hawkins—the Right Hon. "Jimmy" Lowther, M.P., Lord Charles and Lord William Beresford, and Sir Allen Young were also special friends of the holiday season. Admiral Sir Henry Keppel was a very old friend of the Prince and his family and this intimacy also included Mr. and Mrs. George Keppel. Lord Rosebery, Lord Beaconsfield, Lord Randolph Churchill and the late Lord Derby could all claim the Royal friendship, while Lord and Lady Farquhar were delightful and favourite hosts of both the Prince and his wife. Colonel Oliver Montagu was a very old and dear friend, and the Earl of Aylesford, Lord Cadogan, General Lord Wantage, Colonel Owen Williams, Earl Carrington, Lord and Lady Dudley and Lord Russell of Killowen ranked in the category of friendship. Lord and Lady Alington had the rare distinction of giving dances to which the Princess of Wales used to take her daughters when they were young girls.

Amongst hostesses other than those already mentioned whose entertainments the Prince liked to attend were Mrs. Bischoffstein and Mrs. Arthur Rothschild. Other personal friends were the late Earl of Lathom, the bright and witty Marchioness of Aylesbury, Lord James of Hereford and the late Sir Charles Hall. Amongst artists whom the Prince greatly favoured were Sir Charles and Lady HallÉ and the late Lord Leighton. No closer and more devoted friends of the Prince could be found than the members of his own Household, and the public was long aware of this in the persons of Lord Suffield, Sir Francis Knollys and Sir Dighton Probyn, in particular. The Prince delighted in doing honour to those whom he accepted as friends. He marked his sorrow at the deaths of Colonel Oliver Montagu and Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild by personally attending their funerals—an exception to the rule which he had set himself in this connection.

His Royal Highness frequently gave his powerful patronage to the promotion of Memorials to those who had been honoured by his friendship and who deserved honour upon national grounds. An early instance of this was the case of Dean Stanley. A later one, on July 13, 1900, was the gathering called at Marlborough House and presided over by the Prince for the purpose of erecting a national memorial in Westminster Abbey to the Duke of Westminster. In speaking, His Royal Highness said: "To me personally the death of the Duke meant the loss of a life-long friend. I had known him from his boyhood and there is no one whose friendship I appreciated more than his. In my judgment there is no one whose public services more fully deserve public recognition by his countrymen."

Fidelity to friends and appreciation of manly qualities and special abilities were always characteristic of the Prince of Wales and, combined with his tact and the unusual qualifications of the Princess as a hostess, made Marlborough and Sandringham, in different ways, the most ideal centres of social entertainment. Taken as a whole, the Prince's leadership of society was emphatically for good. His approval and patronage of the opera or the theatre, the race-course or the shooting-box, may not have been agreeable to some people, but they represented the popular opinion of the great majority. He took things as they were, enjoyed them in a full-hearted and honest way, improved the morale of the social system and the practices in vogue in many directions and left Society infinitely better and more honest than he had found it.