THE SPANISH QUEEN.

New Zealander, Volume 3, Issue 131, 1 September 1847, Page 4

THE SPANISH QUEEN.

There are confident rumours Prom Madrid, that Queen Isabella is determined to call in the liberals to her councils, Jo cancel her marriage, and to undo all that the French have done. There must certainly be something serious. The Queen is estranged from her Moderado Minisrm', the Duke de Sotomajor, and hai summoned him to resign, which he, having learned the principles of Constitutionalism in France, sternly refuses. The Minister suspects that [in this display of furious will and liberal leaning, the Queen has been influenced by jthe Infanta's family, and by General Serrano, that Liberal chief, who took such a prominent part in ousting Esparteio, and who now as prominently regrets it. To get rid of such opponents, the Duke of Sotomayor has employed, or sought to employ, Christina's favourite scheme of leltre de cachet or order of banishment, tie has exiled seveial ladies of the family of the King Consort, and he has passed the same decree against Serrano. The women were frightened and obeyed, but Serrano refuses to budge. And the Queen refuse* to sanction liis arrest or prosecution.

Meantime Christina and Count Bresson have fled to Paris, to demand immediate intervention, while Senor Isturitz has come to London, with the strong recommendation in favour of his good reception there of his having insulted the British envoy in Madrid, to cover his sate of his Queen and his country to Fiance. The species ofinleivention that Christina demands of Louis Phillippe is said to be the return of the Montpensiers to Madrid. Without that, she declares, they will be set aside. And if, as was rumoured, the Duchess of Montpensier be enc&nte, it \\ ould be advisable for her to give birth to the Cut ore heit to the Spanish throne at Madrid, and not in Paris. Then comes the delicate question of— is the Duchess of Montpensier enriente or not ? One is quite astounded to hear such things made political questions of, even whilst they are but in" posse," and rneiely " coining events which cast their shadows befoie." But that royal marriage-monger, the King of the French, has so built and blended up boh marriages and empires together, that the obstetric and diplomatic sciences are at present very much identical and intermingled. How Christina's embassy will fare is yet nnuncertain. The young Duchess of Montpensier is said to have great influence with her ro\al sister, an influence not unexercised in the aifair of the double marriage. This influence might be useful at present. But the King of the French hesitates to trust his hope of future kingdoms to the risk and danger of an abode in the Spanish capital. Moreover, one of the arguments used hy the Fiench King to the English Queen was, to represent the Duke and Duchess of Montpensier as henceforth strangers to Spain, quite withdrawn from exercising any influence there. So speedy a return would be a manifest contradiction, and could but widen the breach. The Court of France thus remains in doubt, as to whether it were best to endeavour to keep Queen Isabella by fair means in the true Moderado, Afrancesado path, or to abandon her to her Liberal inklings, which could not fail, byputting the army and the Moderado and French inflnence against her, to bring about, perhaps, her dethronement. In order to diminish the number of his enemies on the Spanish question, M. Guizot has gratified Austria by persuading the Pope to suspend the libetty of the press at Rome, an event which will give rise to much disappointment and contest in Italy. The King of Piedmont was meditating some constitutional measures, but Austria is collecting troops, and menacing the Court of France, for which France ha» withdiawn its support. This will bring matters to a crisis' in Italy, where popular effervescence, supported by two native sovereigns, may burst out into indirection, which the sympathies of the Fiench people will not allow their government to suppress or betray .—Examiner*

A Post Mortem Coronation — Charle" raagne ordered his body to be buried in a royal position, and in the attitude of a monarch encircled with his regalia. Tn Aix-la Chapelle he built himself a splendid mausoleum, where his Jifelets corse was placed, according to bis request, on a throne, the gospels on his knees, his celebrated sword at his side, his crown upon his head, and his shoulders covered with the royal mantle. Thus hit body remained 180 jears. when " one of his successors resolved to see how Charlemagne looked, and what had become of the riches that adorned his name. Nearly a thousand years after Christ the tomb was opened by the Emperor Otho. The skeleton form of the body was found there, dissolved and dismembered ; the various ornaments that I speak of were all there too } but the fmme had sunk into fragments, the bones had fallen disjointed and asunder, and there remained nothing but the ghastly skull, wearing its crown Mill, and nothing to signify royalty, but this vain pageant of death in its most hideous form. The various relics were taken up, and are now preserved at Vienna ; and they have often since been em* ployed in the coronation of the Emperors of Germany, in order to signify their greatness, and their being successors to Chailemagne."