KING’S DEN OF HORRORS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVII, 17 November 1927, Page 8

KING’S DEN OF HORRORS

SPAIN’S RULER’S COLLECTION,

Perhaps the strangest personal collection of mementos in the world is in the private museum of King Alfonso, which contains so far as it was possible to get them, all the weapons and other objects which from time to time have been employed in attempts to assassinate him. The collection and arrangement of this museum is not, the King frankly confesses, the most pleasant and welcome task in the world. It is. however, one of fascinating interest, alberit it is one of exceptional difficulty.

Simultaneous with Alfonso’s latest arrival in Paris, accompanied by the Queen, the police discovered a' new plot to kill him. The conspirators purposes to employ in their crime a new kind of revolver, apparently designed for this crime. Though it was not possible to get the identical weapon which was to be used upon him, he obtained so exact a description of it that he was enabled to have a clever artisan make one for his tragical museum, where it forms a conspicuous object. The contents of the museum are numerous and varied. Among them is‘a jagged fragment of steel, a part of a bomb which was embedded in the framework of the King’s carriage when it was flung at him and exploded with deadly intent. Another is a nursing bottle with which it was meant to poison him in his infancy. Bombs, pistols, and knives are plentiful. But perhaps the most curious exhibit of all is the skeleton of the horse which was killed by a bomb in front of the King’s carriage on the Very day of his wedding to Princess Ena.