feel as if her death will have consequences in and for this country that no man can foresee,’ he wrote from the Reform Club. ‘The Queen’s magnificent duration had held things magnificently – beneficently – together and prevented all sorts of accidents. Her death, in short, will let loose incalculable forces for possible ill. I am very pessimistic.’2 He was not reassured by the reputation of the man he derided as ‘Fat Edward – E. the Caresser’.3 The King’s infidelities were, he considered, a bad omen. For James, Victoria had been ‘a sustaining symbol – and the wild waters are upon us now’.4
