THE QUEEN’S HOUSEHOLD.

Dunstan Times, Issue 1101, 1 June 1883, Page 3

THE QUEEN’S HOUSEHOLD.

Star’s London Correspondent. It is a sign of the times that the expenses of the Royal Household are this season being most rigorously looked into and our tailed. The chief fault tinder, moreover, is not as most people would imagine a “ a pestilent ra lical,” hut the youngest son ot England’s most Conservative Duke, Lord Randolph Churchill. During a recent debase Lord Randolph was a vigorous as the sternest economist of the Manchester school in his attacks on the Palace items, and certainly without explanation they do seem preposterous. Surely the nation ought not to supply the Royal Family with coals and green-grocerv as extras. “We shall soon,” says the Referee, commenting on the matter, “have a Royal Highness ordering a bottle of soda-water at his club and telling the waiter to put it down to the nation.” This may sound a mean way of lo iking at the question ; but really it does not seem right • for an immensely wealchy prince like the Duke of Elinbuigh to •‘sponge” on the country' even for bis coals. ....... . Thp society-papers publish obituary notices hf late.Jjphn;,Brown, which are the reverse of flattering. The following, from Truth , is said to have created a terrible stir at Windsor, and. caused. Her Majesty'to '.vow alll’ sorts of -.rash things. The' statements; are certdnly -very daring. Mr Labouhhere says :—“ It had for some time been |lrodieted by persons who. knew John a Brown that his first serious illness would . kill him. The fact is he died of his pros- ' polity, For the first forty years of his life he existed principally in the open air, and took an efiormons amount of exercise, while his manner of living was not luxurious. Of.late, however, he had taken little or no excicise.and every whim hail been indulged', so that ho was not in a condition to resist the malady with which he was attacked. If he had remained a gillie, or a keeper, he would probably have lived to be a very old man ; lint the enervating life which he had led for several years was about as suitable to him as would he.the sand of Arabia to a reindeer, or the snow of Lapland to a darnel.’ A brougham, a dog-cart, and a riding-horse were always at John Brown’s disposal. He had. his own snipe if rooms at Windsor, Oshtfriie,.,anil Balmoral; a separate table was kept for him, and he was w,aited.6n by obsequious Servants appointed for that service. He had the exclusive right of shooting in the extensive, well stocked covers on the Qsborue estate; ho could shoot at Windsor and Balmoral when disposed thus to amuse himself and The salmon fishing on the Queen’s water on the Doe was also under his dominion. In the Queen’s household John Brown's word was law, and from Sir John Cowell down to the housemaids it. was the primary object of every official or servant to stand well with him, or at least to keep clear of offending him. For any one that fell under his displeasure was sure to come to grief. If a servant, hia promotion was stopped ; and if an official, he was worried and hurried, aud evers’thmg that he did was wrong. Except by his own friends aud his parasites, John Brown was exceedingly disliked ; indeed one might use a stronger word. This would be the case with almost any magnified menial, hrt John Brown did not conciliate. The fortiter in re was the only method with which he was familiar, and he was both truculent and tyrannical. The manner in which lie spoke to the ‘ ladies and gentlemen’ of the Court was frequently most offensive; but it was hops'eas for anyone to resent his freedom Indeed, as Major Pendenuis, from living so much wirii dukes, came at last to feel like one, so ‘ J B.’ had quite the air and sentiments of a royal peraon ago of say 101) years ago. In his love for strong language he greatly rescinded the late revered George 11. One of his 1 fads’ was a violent hatred of the Press. John Brown was at various rimes employed by the Queen to conduct inquiries of a confidential nature, and hia knowledge of the private affairs of a number of distinguished personages might at some future period have proved exceedingly inconvenient. He was treated with the utmost consideration by all the members of the Royal Family, with the exception of the Duke of Edinburgh, who made him no presents, and who always appeared to regard him with infinite disdain—a feeling which probably arose from His Royal Highness having been ordered to apologise to him for having shot in a deer forest specially reserved for his use. The Crown Princess, of Prussia’s resbnf rrient at the prominent position occupied by Brown led to a series of differences between Her Royal Highness and the Queen. Lord Beaconsfield always shook hands with this faithful and powerful retainer, and addressed him as ‘-'My good friend,’ invariably treating him with Oriental courtesy. The detailed notices of John Brown, winch have appeared in the daily papers, are simply-for the most par a farrago of nonsense. He was a faithful . servant, and. a discree - , sagacious man ; but nevertheless he was exalted out of his own proper place in a very preposterous way. Of ad men that ever live!, the Prince Consort would least have approved of this sort of thing, as his idea of the relation between master and servant was so intensely German Court-hke that, ‘unlessowing to special circumstances,’ he rarely sp ike to any domestic except through au equerry or other attendant, the only "exception to this rule being his German valet, who is now in the Queen’s service.”