“ROYAL DESCENDANTS” IN AMERICA.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume IV, Issue 1032, 27 August 1883, Page 4

“ROYAL DESCENDANTS” IN AMERICA.

■;TfW£Ahiericari Republic is riot' in; ‘danger it isnotbecause of any lack of claimants to Royal descent among its; citizens. According to an insignificant! looking book, which is being secretly' circulated among the upper classes in New York, the descendants of kings literally > swarnf in the Empire City*Hbwevef Republican may be the spirit of the New Yorkers in the abstract, many of them take intense interest in ascertaining whether they belong to the Atttetf&ns'iif Royal descent,” whose genealogy is ( giyen. in a volume with that title privately published by Mr Browning, himself a descendent of William the Conqueror. The little volume, which is constructed somewhat oh the plah'bf dTailway guide, possesses an air; of reality and truthfulness, although its revelations are of’ a most startlingcharacter,,, Satisfactory as it may be to "khfanv tiiaVdne descends from a portly Dutchman who “loved gold in special,” there is yet a high satisfaction —nay, glory—in the, thought that the stouthear§edhe’s3 > of: a Robert Bruce, the goodness of a King Alfred, and the gaagnaniipity of ! a Charlemagne, ; have all something to do with the qualities of the Van Coltlandts,' the Rutherfurds, and the Lawrences, of the present time. Van~ Cortlandts, as Mr Browning has discovered, is a corruption fbr M'Cortiandts, and as only two generations ago, a Miss Barclay marrying aMr Van Cortlandts brought the Royal blood of James I. and Robert Brace ‘into the family, all the Van Cortlandts of New York are lineal descendants of the hero of Bannockburn. The family of Rutherfurd, after some indecision as to whether they were “ furds ” or “ fords,” happily adopted the “ u,” which now entitles them to ' regard-themselves as descendants of Charlemagne, to say nothing of Scotch kingSj EhghsH lords, and French dukes, whose glittering splendor adorns tbe fafnfly tree of the otherwise prosaic Rutherfurd. The Lawrences: are shown to have descended from Alfred the .Great, the Clarksons claim descent from 'St. ’ Louis, the Hydes and Edward ' 111. The Lloyds trace their jtedteree back to the husband qf Lady oq^a,‘arid the Latnsons come in a straight line from Queen Thereare so many “kings’ children” ih :New; York that if the Royal races should die out in the effete old world thefe will be no difficulty in supplying the deficient yield of kings, as of breadstuffs, by importation from across the Atlantic. Mall Gazette.