KAISER'S CRUELTY.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 7, Issue 171, 24 March 1915, Page 3

KAISER'S CRUELTY.

AMAZING TREATMENT OF HIS MOTHER.

DEATHBED SCENE*. Of the barbarities practised by the German army and navy and encouraged by the Kaiser, the world knows full well. - But amazing revelations of the War Lord's cruelty towards his own mother (the Empress Frederick, eldest daughter of Queen Victoria) are given by a lady formerly attached to the German Court, in her book, 'The Secret History of the Court of Berlin." Writing of the strained relations between the Empress Frederick and her daughter-in-law, Kaiserin Auguste Victoria, she points out that the true friends of the relatives-at-war say that the Kaiserin ought to have mediated, or, that failing ought to have done her part toward bringing about and preserving amicable relations between the Neues Pala'ee and Friedrickshof on her own account. "But," continues the writer, "she did nothing of the kind. In those awful days of June, 1888, when the new Kaisaev, attended by the madman Norma nn, exploited his cruel egotism at his father's deathbed, when he made his mother and sisters quasi prisoners of State until his search for an imaginary secret testimony was completed —from 9 a.m. on 15th June, until after Frederick '§ funeral—Auguste Victoria renounced her rights of wife nad mother altogether; before William's deed of unprecedented barbarity she relinguished even her womanly feelings. If ever wife and mother ought to have stood up for another wife and mother; if ever woman ought to have thrown the halo of womanly love around another—that was the time! What did Auguste Victoria do She sent expressions of the deepest regret, and said she would come to Friedrichskron as soon as her cape gown was ready. BOUDOIRS SEARCHED.

"Meanwhile, William had declared the property rights of all the people in the palace —'his' palace—forfeited for the time being; as the feudal lord of old seized a bondsman's personal estate while the body was yet warrnj—a father's waxen face —no restraining influence over the new master. The late Emperor's, his wife and daughter's writing-desks, bedrooms, and boudoirs, were submitted to a rigid examination before the owners were allowed access again. And in the midst of the rumpus a four-horse coach brought the new Empress! Kaiserin Frederick had no patience to hear Anguste Victoria declaim. 'Send Brockdorff away,' she said curtly. And then the proud woman unbent enough to ask, nay, in'plore, her daughter-in-law to stop William's ravings. 'By all that is holy to you,' she is said to have exclaimed, 'stop that man from desecrating my home and my noble dead. I have appealed to his love, to his sense of decency, to his manliness. It is your turn now. Talk to him with the authority of a wife and mother. He must listen to you. And unless you expect to be treated by your sons as I have been treated by my son during the last two hours —restrain him, Te-establish me as mistress within my own halls, and I will be for ever grateful to you." ORDERS OF THE "GREAT I AM."

"Augusts Victoria went to the library, and returned after a few moments, her face flushed and trembling. 'I can do nothing/ she faltered out; 'Willie is here as Emepror, and I eannot. interfere with his official business.' 'Then.,have the goodness to go back to your. Marble Palace and play, with your children,' cried the widowed Empress hotly. And the hostilities. were re-opened. In the interval occa

sioneci by the now Xsisr.-in's rrc?;lion William 3fc.il inf-rnul his mother'.; officials and servants that he was the! • master now, and that they must obey no one 'a orders but his own. Thereupon the Dowager Empress said: 'Yvhoover refuses to carry out any of a;commands promptly and willingly v.']. be instantly dismissed and forfeits hiprights to pension.' Victoria had furnished her Court Marshal with a list of persons who were to be admitted t> the house in order that they might have a last look at her dead hero. Only William's personal and political friends were on the list, but William tore it up, and ordered his sentinels to admit all high army officers who called. FORCED TO LEAVE THE CASTLE Have ever such scenes occured ii the presence of death? The new lord 1 ? shrill-tenor cutting short impassioned ed speech of an outraged wife and distracted mother! Entreaties, appeals threats oa the one side; cold indifference, scorn, sneering reference to tuv status quo on the other. There was tu> peace between the reigning Hohenzollerns and the proud Guelph mother, shorn of power, ever after. . . . The Empress Frederick and Auguste Victoria had one more momentous meeting since that of June 15th; namely, in the fall of-the same year, when the negotiations for the Dowager Khjso/in 's removal from Castle Friedrich;.kron were pending. The older woman strenuously opposed her don's claim to the property—first, because she herself desired to retain the house where she had lived so long; and secondly bo cause she feared ..William would ruin himself in the possession of this castle. whose vastness and splendour offer particular temptations for establishing a Court out of all proportions to the Kaiser's revenues. Afer three'months of widowhood Empress Frederick left Friedrichskron. She was crying bitto: ly as she <vent through the parkland halls, taking leave of everything and everybody. 'Here I have spent the most beautiful days of my married life, and afterwards endured the awfullest hours woman can endure,' sheremarked to General von Lindequist then commander of Potsdam. To the officials and servants, each of whom, high and low, she shook by the hand, she said: If ever you want to see your old mistress again yon must come to Berlin, where I will make yon welcoms with pleasure. May palsy strike my foot if ever I thrust it over this threshold again.' . . . .She kept her word."