GREECE AND SWEDEN.

Taranaki Daily News, 2 April 1918, Page 7

GREECE AND SWEDEN.

A PARALLEL THAT MAY PROVE S DEADLY." The parallel between the royal houses of Greece and Sweden is somewhat striking. If it is carried much further it may become, for King Gustavus, a "deadly" parallel (remarks the Cleve"Plain Dealef"). Both Gustavus Van£ ex-King Constantine are men of ability and foreefulness. Before the outbreak of the war the Swedish monarch exercised large authority in the government of his nation, and was far more assertive than the usual run of twentieth-century 4 constitutional kings. Instead of acquiescing silently in governmental policies which were distasteful to him, Gustavus dismissed Governments which declined to do his biding, and the people of Sweden rather admired his temerity.- Like Constantino, whose father was a Danish prince, Gustavus is the scion of transplanted royalty. His father was grandson of Marshal Bernadotte, a French civilian, who was arbitrarily chosen king ?>y the Swedish Parliament. Gustavus has a German wife. She is Victoria, daughter of tlie Grand Duke of Baden. Since the beginning of the war Queen Victoria has made no secret of her German sympathies. As Constantino's Sophia, the Kaiser's sister, was the most malign influence in the Greek royal household so Victoria of Baden may be the evil genius of Gustavus. In Sweden, as it was in Greece, the pro-German seritiment is strongest in the king's coterie. The Swedish people, like the people of all civilised nations, look with horror on the German crimes. Neither the kin" nor his Prussophile Cabinet would attempt to force the nation into war as Germany's ally. It would be too dangerous an undertaking. ' The most that can be done is to maintain a malevolent neutrality toward the .AHias, and to aid Potsdam .as far as possible without setting caught at it. It has not as yet ■been made clear that the king himself is the head of the pro-German cabal at Stockholm, but he cannot escape responsibility either for the policy of his Ministers or for the utterances of his wife. This is especially true since it is well-known that Gustavus is no weakling, but a vigorous and aggressive personality;