of Sir Robert Peel (which is always valuable) is accepting the post". When no delegation came on Saturday, and instead only a letter confirming the result and that an official letter of invitation would follow, the Prince's Private Secretary Colonel Phipps wrote to the Vice-Chancellor gently to encourage him to send a formal delegation. He also included the reply drafted by Peel which stated "I have resolved to accept the trust which the University is willing to confide to me". The official letter was traditionally in Latin and had to be approved by the Senate; the Rev Thomas Crick, the Public Orator, who wrote it, was a strong supporter of Powis and found it difficult to compose something friendly. When finished on 2 March it was sealed and taken to Buckingham Palace to be presented to the Prince who simply replied "and here is my answer". After the delegation had gone, Albert read the official letter and noticed that a minor mistake had been made in the Latin. The Prince was formally installed as Chancellor of the University of Cambridge in a ceremony at Buckingham Palace on 25 March 1847. He invited Powis to the ceremony, but Powis replied that as the preceding day had been announced by the Queen as a "day of Prayer & Humiliation", he would be spending the time with his family instead. Notes References Daphne Bennett, "King without a crown: Albert, Prince Consort of England, 1819-1861", Heinemann, 1977. Charles Henry Cooper, "Annals of Cambridge", vol IV, Metcalfe & Palmer, 1852. Elisabeth Leedham-Green, "A Concise History of the University of Cambridge", Cambridge University Press, 1996, at page 148. Theodore Martin, "The Life of His Royal Highness the Prince Consort", 3rd ed., Smith, Elder & Co., 1875, vol I. "Philo Patria", "A Few Plain Truths, or the Late Proceedings at Cambridge Reviewed", Effingham Wilson, London, March 1847. This anonymous pamphlet written by one who claimed to have "no connection with the universities", contends that the national honour was "tarnished by the late obsequious proceedings at Cambridge" and is critical of the Prince's conduct. Robert Rhodes James, "Albert, Prince Consort", Hamish Hamilton, 1983. Peter Searby, "A History of the University of Cambridge", vol III 1750–1870, Cambridge University Press, 1997. D.A. Winstanley, "Early Victorian Cambridge", Cambridge University Press, 1940. See also List of chancellors of the University of Cambridge 1847 1847 elections in the United Kingdom 1847 in England