DETHRONED KINGS

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 24, 23 October 1917, Page 7

DETHRONED KINGS

WANDERINGS IN PAST AND PRESENT DAYS SOME CHEQUERED CAREERS History abounds in abdicated Kings, and the piesent war ' las added to the list (writes the New York "Times"). Of the unfortunate rulers who have lost their thrones, a few have been allowed to pass their declining years peacefully in their own countries. Many have been imprisoned, and 'have becorae_ insane, many ex-rulers have been exiled, and 6ome'h'ive sought refuge in England and America. Two even found safety under tho humble name of Smith. It_ is eaid that Nicholas 11, until rectntiy Tsar of all the llussias, has but 000.000 roubles left of a fortune estimated a vear ago to be greater than the Rockefeller, Slorgan, or iCfupp possessions. He furnishes an example of the vicissitudes of kings. Practically all of tho mines of Siboria were tho personal property of tho Tsar. Ho owned in his own namo 150,000,000 acres of land, upon which were mines, timber, and farms. Besides, he drew an immense salary to maintain his j palaces and defray the expenses of royal personages and dependants. The other most reeent abdicator, Constantino of Greece, did floh have such vast estates, but he had enough for n life befitting his station, and he undoubtedly ivill have muck less in future. As in the case of the Tsar, no announcement has been made about for ■the future allowances of the Greek lung, who is now residing in Switzerland with his Queen, a sister of the German Kaiser. Nicholas Petrovie-h, the old King of Montenegro, is another ruler who ; lately lost his crown, at least temporarily. He has leased a villa just outside of Paris, where ha is living with his daughter. Princess Xenia. Because Nicholas was suspected of treachery to his allies, the. Entente Powers, ho is guarded by tho Paris police, although he enjoys comparative freedom. His Cabinet Minister, who went with him when ho left his country, when the army was starving and besieged by the forces of the Central Powers, nas deserted him. But Nicholas is not alone, for he took with him his entire family, excepting Prince Mirko, who was left behind with the army, and has been mentioned as the Austro-Hungarlan candidato for the throne of a united Serbo-Croatian State under Austro-Ger-nian protection. King Nicholas Petrovich is passionately fond of poker. When he is not reading the war nows, according to reports from Paris, he gathers his old cronies about him for a game. He is the father of the Queen of Italy. Another of his daughters is Princess Pranc-is Joseph of Battenberg, and still another is a Russian Grand Duchess. Little has been heard recently of King Ferdinand of Rumania, who sacrificed his vast holdings in Austria by allying himself 'with the Entente Powers. His brother, William, fifteen months older, who was himself Crown Prince of Rumania until ho resigned all his rights in 1886, has not only expelled Ferdinand from tho family, but now has begun to call himself King. It iif certain tl»t Ferdinand's finances are in a very bad condition, and it is not likely that ho will ever regain his lost property in Austria. The older brother, William, has two sons, both of whom are generals in the German army, and his daughter by liis first marriage was wedded to Manuel 11, then King of Portugal. Peter, King of Serbia, had the distinction of being the second King to lose his crown because of the present war. His grief was probably greater than that of any other ruler who met with a similar misfortune; for Peter had spent a lifetime trying to gain the throne. His early crime—the murder of Prince Obrenovitch that he, -might take tho throne —was never quito forgotton. Then, too, Peter was not accepted into tha graces of the other European royalty on his accession to tho throne in 1903, following the murder oi' King Alexander and Queen Draga—his last step to the crown.. The sad little old man once remarked in ]

a fit of temper: "I must bo very ill today; it does not oven pleaso mo to be King." When they drove him from Serbia he went to Athens. Ho has now found an asylum on tlio Greek lslis of Euboea, in tho Aegeau.Sea. At 72 he spends much of his time walking, perhaps trying to imagine that his valour early in the war, when ho marched at tho head of his plucky army, makes yjp for his earlier acts.

Tho "King of Hedjaz," formerly Shercef of Mecca, is another recently deprived of office. But he seems to have como out on top, for tho English, French, and Italian Governments recognised the Government of Hedjaz, which ho founded. In it are the holy cities of Medina, and Mecca,

Before tho great war began there were abdications ovory little- whilo. Some of the cx-rulers are living. There is, for instance, the Princess Iviakilani, widow of King Knlakaua of tho Sandwich Isles. Having coased to be a qneen, she spent her timo travelling, and because she had a fortune, was able to keep in the limelight. She attracted notice in New York City some years ago when sha tipped a waiter 800 dollars. Her homo is in Paris.

An abdicani most unhappy was the insano King Otto of Bavaria, who was deposed, for Ludwig 111 in 1913, after a reign of twenty-soven years. Otto succeeded his brother, who drowned himself in Starnburg Lake on Juno 13, 1836, and he was possessed with tho same melancholy disposition. Throwing bric-a-brac and dishes becamo his hobby while he was a prisoner in, tho Palaco Turstenried during the last few .years of his life.

Another ex-ruler of unbalanced mind was a nervous little man behind the bars of a prison in Central TurkeyAbdul Hamid 11, once Sultan of Turkey, notorious for his frightful massacres in Armenia. Hci was deposed in 1909. He called himself the "most miserable of men," but tho people have nicknamed him "Abdul tho Damned,"

Manuel II of Portugal is now merely Manuel Braganza, After his abdication he "leased Sir Harry Maclean's villa, Abercorn, at Richmond, England. The ■villa originally cost and the four acres on which it. stands seem small for a man who once, had a kingdom.' Manuel has only a little money of his own, and the Portuguese Government gives him a small annuity. For several years he has lived quietly. He delights in the flowers and trees of the fresh English landscape. It is rumoured that he has learned a trade.

Napoleon 111 and his beautiful consort, the Empress Eugenie, also sought peace in England. After the. refugee Napoleon died, broken-hearted, at Chisoihurst,_ the ex-Empress and the Prince Imperial, Louis Napoleon, occupied Lord Harrington's castle, Egypt, on the Isle of Wight. Six years later, after the Prince Imperial fell in the Zulu War, the saddened woman took up her abode at England, and at intervals in Paris. Empress Eugenie was 92 years old last May. She has turned her Farnborough home into a- hospital* Tor British officers, and much of her time has been spent in caring' for the wounded from the battlefields of France. She foregoes some of her customary trips to Fiance sines the war. Usually she passes most of the winter at her villa at Cap Martin, on the Riviera. On her way sho spends two weeks in Paris, where sho gratifies her mania for visiting old spots and old friends, and from tho windows of tho Hotel Continental she can look out on tho Tuileries gardens, where her child used to play. It is generally known that Louis Philippe, King of 'tho French, taught in a Swiss college during his oxile 'when he was discovered to bo among the plotters against tho French Republic in 1703, Three years later he was joined by his mother and brothers, who had been imprisoned in Paris since the Terror. They set sail together for the United States, and settled in Philadelphia in an old mansion. For two years they travelled in New England, the Great Lake region, and the Mississippi Valley. The exile:! King was then reconciled with Louis XVIII, ami lived with his brothers at Twickenham, near London. Ho went to Sicily in ISO", and remained there until Napoleon's abdication. Then Louis XVIII marie him colonel-general of tli.i Hussars, and restored his estates in Orleans. Tins made him enormously wealthy, and although his attitude towards tho House of Peers cost him two years of exile, he was made regent Ixv Charles V, who was deposed. Louis Philippe then became TCinjj by "the graco of' God and the will ol the people." His alliance with the Spanish

houso caused his downfall, and he "was forced to flee with his consort to Honflcur. They found refuge in & gardener's cottage. "Mr. and Mrs. Smith" were a. bedraggled couple.: without any property save the clothing they wore, when the English Consul smuggled thorn into Now Haven. Yet "Mr. and Mrs, Smith' were once King Louis Philippe and his Queen. Victoria took pity on them, and placed a castle at their disposal, and they settled at Claremont as Count and Countess of Keuilly. "Prince Jaime/'' «

"Don Jaime/' his cronies of the caves and tea-rooms, of Paris oall a prim, bewhiskered little man who is a bookkeeper by profession, but is abiding his time until ho shall become ICing of France by "the grace oi' God end the will of the people" #He is James 111 of the Bourbon line, and is a third cousin of Alfonso of Spain. He might be on perfectly good terms with his reigning cousin wore it not for the awkward circumstance that James thinks that ho himself should be; King of Spain. grandfather Bat on the Spanish throne "until the opposing branch of tho Bourbon family took title. Unique among the abdicants of tho seventeenth century was Queen Christina of Sweden, daughter of Guetavus Adolphus. The "Madcap Queen/' -as she becamo known, came to the throne in her eighteenth year. She showed remarkable ability, but < was headstrong, and incurred tho opposition of her Chancellor and Ministers. When they urged a marriage with her cousin she refused, and abdicated in his favour. She left Stockholm in masculine attire tinder the name of Count Dohria, and lived at the varices European capitals until her fortune was exhausted. She tried to regain the throne several times. In 1869 Christina died—old, forlorn, and miserably poor— in Home. I, Emperor of H-omo and JunjT of Spain, passed his last years at his villa" at Yste, in Estremadura, after his abdication for Ferdinand. There he dictated his commentaries, cultivated flowers, and delighted in a largo collection of "birds. Ferdinand I of Austria, who abdicated in favour of the late Emperor Francis Joseph of Austria, his nephew, 6pent the remainder of his life in prison in Olmutz. Philip. V, founder of the Bourbon dynasty, abdicated for his son, Louis XV, v;ho died a few months later. Philip resumed the sceptre and tried several times to abdicate, only to be pre-. vented by his ambitious wife, who kept liim in confinement until his death. The King of Sweden, "who spurned the Russian Grand Duchess Alexander, granddaughter of Catherine 11, was dethroned and transported to Germany with his entire family. Gustavus IV left Germany for St. Gal, Switzerland, where ho died in loneliness and indigence.' His body was brought to Sweden for interment in the royal burial place, Biddarholmskyrka. Of all exiled monarchs, Napoleon the Great suffered the bitterest exile—confinement and death on the rock of bt. Helena.