Albert’s older brother Ernest, to whom he was very close, is depicted here with his wife Alexandrine and others outside his hunting castle near Gotha. Victoria and Albert stayed at Reinhardsbrunn in 1845; the queen thought it ‘a lovely place’. The Black servant in green livery serving drinks, prominently placed at the centre of the composition, may be Maximilian Leon Wilhelm Philipps, whom Victoria singled out in her journal for being ‘so attentive’ to her and Albert during their visit.