Christopher Hibbert - Edward VII - The Last Victorian King

Extravagantly generous with her money, handing out cheques and cash to anyone who seemed in need of help, or pressing a pair of gold cuff-links into the hand of an unhappy-looking footman, she was not in the least discriminating, giving her nieces presents which were nearly always ‘inappropriate’. Often thoughtless, sometimes obstinate and always unpredictable, she could also be distressingly inconsiderate, particularly to her maids of honour, most of whom had cause to feel at some time during their service that the Princess paid little heed to their own welfare, and one of whom was seen to receive a sharp blow from her mistress’s long, steel umbrella for some offence during a drive in an open carriage. Utterly unimaginative, she was also in no sense clever, although her deafness, which grew progressively worse after her illness, occasionally made her seem more stupid and less interesting than she really was, especially when she attempted to conceal it by a continuous stream of talk which allowed of no comment or reply. Her deafness also prevented her from enjoying many of those social activities in which, in company with her husband, she had formerly delighted. After the onset of middle age, they spent more and more time apart.

She never became the least bitter, though, and never displayed any jealousy she may have felt when her husband, who, in the later years of their marriage, treated her always with the greatest courtesy and respect, made it obvious to the world that he preferred the company of ‘his other ladies’ to that of his wife. She sometimes referred to them disparagingly. The lovely American debutante, Miss Chamberlayne — with whom Edward Hamilton, in the summer of 1884, saw the Prince ‘occupying himself entirely’ at a party at Mrs Allsopp’s — she nicknamed ‘Chamberpots’. But she was always perfectly polite to her when she met her. And when her husband, having finished flirting with ‘Chamberpots’, embarked upon a much more serious affair with Mrs Edward Langtry, the Princess sensibly accepted the situation and raised no objection to his new inamorata’s being invited to Marlborough House.

The Prince had first met Lillie Langtry on 24 May 1877 while the Princess was in Greece staying with her brother and convalescing after an illness. The meeting took place at a small supper party given especially for the purpose by the Arctic explorer, Captain Sir Allen Young, an unmarried friend of the Prince who had a house in Stratford Place. The Prince was immediately captivated by the tall, graceful, glowingly voluptuous woman who had recently established herself as one of the most celebrated and sought-after beauties in London. The daughter of the Revd William Le Breton, Dean of Jersey, she had been married three years before, at the age of twenty-one, to Edward Langtry, a widower of twenty-six whose family had made money as shipowners in Belfast and whose yacht, his bride later confessed, interested her more than its owner. Edward Langtry was, indeed, a rather nondescript character, kind and amiable but indecisive and suggestible, the victim of moods of deep despondency — no match, in their frequent differences, for his wilful and determined wife. Persuaded to move to London he set up house in Eaton Place where, though he had sold his yacht, his income was insufficient for the kind of life his wife proposed to lead. He was like a fish out of water, Mrs Langtry said; and consoled himself by drinking while she set about making their entry into society.

She experienced no difficulty in doing so. Helped by Lord Ranelagh, whom she had met occasionally in Jersey, where he had a house, the Langtrys were soon introduced into the kind of drawing-rooms where she wished to be seen and where her beauty, her confident bearing and her deliciously proportioned body could not fail to be admired. Lord Randolph Churchill met her at Lord Wharncliffe’s and told his wife, ‘took in to dinner a Mrs Langtry, a most beautiful creature, quite unknown, very poor, and they say has but one black dress’.

Within a few months Mrs Langtry was quite unknown no longer. She was painted by Millais and Edward Poynter, by Whistler and Edward Burne-Jones, one of whose portraits of her was bought by the young Arthur Balfour. Photographs of her were to be seen everywhere. And, once her intimate friendship with the Prince of Wales became common knowledge, crowds gathered to stare at her whenever she went shopping or rode in the park on a horse which had been given to her by another admirer, Moreton Frewen. ‘It became risky for me to indulge in a walk,’ she recalled with pride. ‘People ran after me in droves, staring me out of countenance and even lifting my sunshade to satisfy their curiosity.’ The young Margot Tennant saw ‘great and conventional ladies like old Lady Cadogan and others standing on iron chairs in the park to see Mrs Langtry walk past’.

The Prince took no trouble to disguise his love for her. He let it be known that he would like her invited to certain country houses where he was going for the week-end; he took her to Paris where he was reported to have kissed her on the dance floor at Maxim’s; he was often to be seen with her at Ascot; he arranged for both her and her husband to be presented to the Queen. She became, in fact, almost maîtresse en titre; and felt quite secure in that position even when Sarah Bernhardt, with whom the Prince often dined in Paris, came to London in 1879 and was invited to Marlborough House. ‘London has gone mad over the principal actress in the Comédie Française who is here, Sarah Bernhardt — a woman of notorious, shameless character,’ wrote Lady Frederick Cavendish disapprovingly in her diary. ‘Not content with being run after on the stage, this woman is asked into people’s houses to act, and even to luncheon and dinner; and all the world goes. It is an outrageous scandal!’

The Prince himself once arranged for a supper to be given for her by the Duc d’Aumfile ‘at which all the other ladies present … had been invited at [his] request.’ But it was ‘one thing to get them to go,’ observed Charles Dilke, one of the male guests, ‘and another thing to get them to talk when they were there; and the result was that, as they would not talk to Sarah Bernhardt and she would not talk to them, and as the Duc d’Aumfile was deaf and disinclined to make a conversation on his own account, nobody talked at all …’

Other evenings arranged by the Prince for Sarah Bernhardt were, however, more entertaining than this. And after one summons to Marlborough House she sent a note to the manager of her company: ‘I’ve just come back from the P. of W. It is twenty past one … The P. has kept me since eleven.’

When asked what exactly was the relationship between the Prince and Sarah Bernhardt, her granddaughter replied, ‘They were the best of friends.’ Others supposed them to be occasionally lovers as well. But, in any case, Mrs Langtry displayed no jealousy and thus retained his fond affection, so that when her alleged affairs with other men, the birth of a daughter (fathered by Prince Louis of Battenberg), rumours of her impending involvement in what the scandalous weekly magazine, Town Talk, referred to as ‘about the warmest divorce case’ ever likely to come before a judge, all contributed to Mrs Langtry’s name being crossed off their invitation lists by many hostesses, the Prince did his best to save her from total ostracism.

Gladstone was induced to visit her, much to the distress of his secretary, who was already deeply concerned by his habit of walking the streets at night and talking to prostitutes. Mrs Langtry ‘is evidently trying to make social capital out of the acquaintance,’ Edward Hamilton wrote in his diary after Gladstone had presented her with a copy of his ‘pet book’, Sister Dora. ‘Most disagreeable things with all kinds of exaggerations are being said. I took the occasion of putting in a word [as Rosebery also did] and cautioning him against the wiles of the woman whose reputation is in such bad odour that, despite all the endeavours of H.R.H., nobody will receive her in their houses.’ But Gladstone paid no attention. He told Mrs Langtry that she might write to him, enclosing her letters in double envelopes which, as Hamilton said, secured them from the ‘rude hands’ of his staff; and she made much use of this privilege.