Princess Louise, Duchess of Argyll to Louise's youngest sister, Beatrice. Louise and Beatrice were now neighbours both at Kensington Palace and Osborne. Upon Queen Victoria's death, Louise entered the social circle of her brother, the new King Edward VII, with whom she had much in common, including smoking. She had an obsession with physical fitness, and if she was sneered at for this, she would retort by saying: "Never mind, I'll outlive you all." Meanwhile, Louise's husband, 9th Duke of Argyll since 1900, took his seat in the House of Lords. The Colonial Secretary, Joseph Chamberlain, offered him the office of Governor-General of Australia that
Princess Beatrice of the United Kingdom had been performed in succession by her sisters, Alice, Helena and Louise. However, to these the Queen soon added more personal tasks. During a serious illness in 1871, the Queen dictated her journal entries to Beatrice, and in 1876 she allowed Beatrice to sort the music she and the Prince Consort had played, unused since his death fifteen years earlier. The devotion that Beatrice showed to her mother was acknowledged in the Queen's letters and journals, but her constant need for Beatrice grew stronger. The Queen suffered another bereavement in 1883, when her highland servant, John Brown, died at Balmoral.