In episode seven, Victoria is desperately afraid that she will die during childbirth as her cousin Princess Charlotte did.
She is asked to choose a regent to rule in her place in the event that she dies and the baby survives.
Victoria names Albert as her choice, much to the anger of the Tories.
Albert is heartened and takes an interest in building a new railroad, which Victoria discourages as she worries that he could undermine her rule.
“Power must be seen to come from me,” she tells him.
After experiencing the railway for herself, Victoria gives her permission and agrees that Albert can share some of her duties while she is pregnant, but tells him: “Softly, softly, catchy monkey”.
Many viewers in both the UK and US were confused by the saying, which is an old English proverb meaning “don’t flurry, patience gains the day” – in other words, be patient.
Some accounts trace the phrase back to the founder of the Boy Scouts, Lord Robert Baden-Powell, who picked it up while he was in Ghana.
In his diaries, Lord Baden-Powell wrote: “If it were not for the depressing heat and the urgency of the work, one could sit down and laugh to tears at the absurdity of the thing, but under the circumstances it is a little “wearing.”
“But our motto is the old West Coast proverb: ‘Softly, softly, catchee monkey’.”
The season one finale of Victoria airs in the US as part of PBS’s Masterpiece schedule on Sunday February 19 at 8/9C.
Victoria season two starts on ITV later this year in the UK.
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