ROYAL ROMANCE

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 845, 13 December 1929, Page 9

ROYAL ROMANCE

KING OF SPAIN’S WOOING ORANGE BLOSSOM GIFT Seldom has a Queen been wooed so romantically as was the young English Princess who afterward became the Queen of Spain. In a new, authorised book on her life—“ The Queen of Spain,” by Mr. Evelyn Graham and published recently —it is related that the King was first attracted by her photograph, which a matchmaking godmother had sent him. But, as Mr. Graham points out, ‘The young Princess Ena of Batteuberg lost little of the excitement of real romance through the exalted and public position of her Royal suitor. King Alfonso was an impulsive lover, whose wooing was inspired by the spirit and zest of an original personality." We are told that in the days of their engagement he would write to her every day, and sometimes twice a day. He made the most charming gifts. Once, during a visit to San Sebastian, .she mentioned that she liked the exquisite oranges which, sent from the South of Spain, appeared on the Royal table. When she went later to Versailles the King wired to the Spanish Embassy in Paris to meet a certain train because he was sending some oranges to the Princess. An official was duly dispatched provided with baskets large enough, as he thought, to hold the most generous consignment; the man’s astonishment was great, therefore, when he saw lifted from the train, not baskets or even boxes of fruit, but a full-sized orange tree in a tub, its branches laden with the golden fruit and making a brilliant splash of colour on the dingy platform. The Princess was charmed with tlie gift, as any woman would have been under the circumstances, and she kept the tree long after she h3d plucked the oranges and until the branches themselves were withered and bare. Another time they were walking in a garden, and the Princess was telling him the names of some of the flowers. “You do not pay great attention,” she is reported to have remarked; ’ are you not interested in flowers?’’ “Only in one flower just now,” came the quick answer. “And that?” “Orange blossom.” replied the King. The Royal couple first met at a ball at Buckingham Palace, and the attraction was mutual and instantaneous. They danced together, talked together, and danced again. During the next few days—King Alfonso was on his first State visit to England and his time was fully occupied with official ceremonies and entertainments-—they met frequently, and the attraction increased. At another State ball at Buckingham Palace the King learned that the Princess was not averse to his suit. The next day he left England with the assurance that his affection was returned. After the marriage, the Queen was asked by the townsfolk of Badajoz to persuade the King to pardon a man sentenced to death. She read the details, and going to the King told him if he wanted to give her a weddirg 1 present that would please her above , all others, he would grant a reprieve. The man was pardoned. The Queen was the daughter of , Princess Beatrice, who intended to call her Eva. But Princess Beatrice s j handwriting on the documents was so | illegible that the baby -wa3 christened ■ Ena by mistake.