GRAND DUKE'S LOVE STORY

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 202, 15 May 1918, Page 5

GRAND DUKE'S LOVE STORY

GERMAN SELF-DETERMINATION SQUABBLE.

It is now possible to give a full account of the oircumstances lending iip to the recent suicide of the. Grand Duko Adolphus Frederick, the last German heir of Meoklonburg-Stfelitz (states the Hague correspondent of tho Daily Mail"). Adolphus in his younger days made a sort of agreement with his younger brother, Karl Borwin, that the latter should maTry a princess of equal rank and raise a family to oontinue the succession; while Adolphus, who was a mystic and dreamer, should nominally rule when the time came, but actually should devote himself to encouraging art, and not be under obligations regarding tho succession. However, during Karl Borwin's lifetime Adolphus met and married a lady whose name was not mentioned, but who was not an equal in rank. The childreti, if any, coula therefore not inherit the CiTand Duchy. This mesalliance was overlooked as long «s Karl Borwin lived, but ho was killed some years ago without leaving legal heirs.' Pressure was then put steadily and incessantly on Adolphus to divorce tho lady lio had married, and to marry a German princess, whoso children could continao the succession. Very reluctantly, Adolphus, who had bccome Grand Duko, was brought to consent, and tho triumphant intriguers seb to work to buy off Aaolphus's legal but not equal-born wife. But, much to the surprise of officialdom, this lady raised strong and apparently legally insuporablo objections, and flatly doclined to bo divorced, or, if tho Court version is correct, to release the duko from his promise k> marry. A statement issued by tho Grand Ducal Court Chamberlain asserts that the final blow to the duke's sanity was given by tho apparent impossibility of his realising his "ardent desire" to espouse a German princess in view of the "obligations" incurred by tho former attachment. All tho people in Strelitz appoar to bo violently opposed to tho accession of tho Gorman Croivn Princess's brother, tho Grand Duke of Mecklen-buTg-Schworin. Under tho existing law of inheritance, which dates from 1700, when tho Mecklenburgora wore still serfs in tho literal feudal sense, the country has to be handed over, despite its protests, to Schwerin. Tho Strelitz people are insisting that charity begins at homo, and that solf-dotermimition should also.