Цитаты из книги Victoria

“You do not view him as a possible husband, then?” “I would rather marry Robert Peel!” Melbourne raised an eyebrow. “I wonder what Lady Peel would say to that?”

“If only your poor father could have lived to see this day.” The Duchess looked up at the life-sized picture of the late Duke of Kent, standing with his hand resting on a cannon, that hung behind them. “But Mama, even if he hadn’t died when I was a baby, he would never have seen me become Queen now, would he? The only reason I am Queen is that he is dead.”

“Mein kleines mädchen ist die Kaiserin.” Victoria pulled herself away. “No more German, Mama. You are the mother of the Queen of England now.”

“I believed something that was not true because I wanted to believe it, and I did you a great injustice.” Flora closed her eyes. For a long, awful minute, Victoria imagined that she would not open them again, but then the red-rimmed lids parted. “Your subjects,” Flora gasped, “are not dolls to be played with.” She stared at Victoria with great intensity. Lifting her head with an agonizing effort, she said, “To be a queen, you have to be more than a little girl with a crown.”

“How rude you are being to Sir John, Drina”—the Duchess was tearfully indignant—“when all he is being is your friend.” Victoria turned to face her mother. “Oh no, Mama, you are mistaken. He is your friend, not mine.”

Melbourne shook his head. ‘It is always easier to give advice, Ma’am, than to take it.

From their brief meeting, she knew that he would lecture her instead of trying to educate her without making her feel stupid, as Melbourne did.

He was the kind of Scotsman who never used two words when he could use twenty.

‘I come for the rooks, Ma’am. They are sociable animals. A gathering like this is called a Parliament. But they are altogether more civilised than their human equivalent.

They were regrettably prone, as the English put it, to wear their hearts on their sleeves.

There is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood leads on to fortune.

‘For me this is not a marriage of convenience.’Victoria leant back to look at him. With a flash of queenliness, she said, ‘No, I think it will be a marriage of inconvenience.’She leant in so that her lips were next to his. ‘But I have no choice.’Albert picked her up by the waist so that she was looking down at him, and said with joy, ‘Neither do I.’

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Замужество - это небезопасно.