THE PRINCE IMPERIAL.
Those persons who ate superstitiously inclined can find ample scope tor the exercise of c'-Ar imagination in connection with liui extraordinary mortality of
the last year amongst crown oil princes, and statesmen. It is now little more than 12 months since Europe was startled by the death of Victor Emmanuel, the first King of united Italy, quickly followed by those of King George of Hanover, Pius IX., and Mercedes,- the girl queen of Spain. Since h ave seen Princess Alice and" Stare Ali, .Ameer of Afghanistan, pass away, and have received intelligence of attempts upon, the lives of the German Emperor, tjhe Czar of Russia, the Kings ofltaljTreSi Spain, «nd Prince Bismarck. Quite recently the cable informed us of the decease "of the libertine Prince of Orange, whose death, is productive of so little grief to the people over whom he might, had he lived, have been called to reign some day. The character of this prince is notorious all over the Continent 'of Europe, and in Paris, where he lived chiefly, he had fallen very low in the estimation of nearly everyone. During his whole life he did not show one princely.quality, unless it be that of making debts. It is a curious fact about him that.he never professed the slightest desire - but just and had actually made pyevfSfees to his father and :~ncle\_.-ihe present heir presumptive to ' the Dutch throne, whereby he sought to relinquish his claim to the succession for a monetary consideration. So far he was honest, and if all heir-apparents whose tastes are similar to his own would relinquish their claims for a like compensation, no doubt the world at large would be greatly benefited, As may be easily imagined, the King of Holland and his son were not on the very best of terms, and, though both agreed in passing much of their time in Paris, they rarely met. In Paris the Prince was seldom spoken of otherwise than by his nickname "Citron," theiFrench for lemon, and scarcely a month passed without some fresh adventure of Citron circulating on the Boulevards and in the cafes. The first time I saw him was at Maisons Lafitte, a favourite boating-place on the Seine, about 12 miles out of Paris ; he was having a stand-up fight with a couple of Parisian " calicos" who had fouled his boat. He thrashed his men, and was about to be escorted to the nearest gendarme station as the fruit .of his victory when the lookers-on, some of whom knew him by sight, interposed. As a proof of his Bohemian habits, I may mention that the invitations sent him from La Hague to be present -at the marriage of his uncle, Prince Henry, were returned with "Address not known" written across them ; it w*s only by means of the police that they at length reached the hands of him" for whom they were destined ; he was found living in a small town in the south of Fiance. His death cannot be considered as otherwise than fortunate for Holland, for although the Prince of Bohemians had declared his determination never to take upon "himself the cares ot State, matters would, without doubt, have become very complicated. Few of his people will regret him, though he leaves many of the sincerest of all mourners —creditors to bewail his premature decease. Very -mVike him was the unfortunate young Prince who has just lost his life in the South African struggle. What ever may be advanced against the Bonapartist party, we know nothing but good of the Prince Imperial. It is true that he was very young ; nevertheless, far as people could judge, he was credited with a better disposition and franker nature than any other member of his family. His desire to see active service in the field did not first declare itself, as many suppose, when the news of the Isandula disaster reached England, but at the commencement of the RussoTurkish War, when he was only deterred from following the operations of the Army of the . Danube by important political considerations. Later on, he was desirous of serving with the Austrian army in Bosnia, but Sirajero fell, before he'had overcome the objections of M. Soulier to the proposed step, and the campaign was practically at an ,end. In connection with this a very curious incident occurred. The Prince sent a telegram in cypher toM. Rouher, which greatly puzzled the Minister of the Interior. After an immense amount of trouble in order to make out the subject of the.telegram, he succeeded in reading it as follows: —"Send me my uniform without delay for my first attempt.—Louis Napoleon." The French Minister was stupefied by very audacity of the telegram, and though feeling certain that any endeavour to follow the Boulogne and Strasbourg examples of Napoleon 111. would, in the then state of France, be completely •unsuccessful, he was rendered sufficiently uneasy to think that the best step to take was to see M. ■Soulier. That veteran statesman soon explained the ■matter. Sad as the untimely end of the Prince Imperial is, there is no doubt but it has dealt a severe blow to one of the many political parties that distract France. Nevertheless we must be very cautious in stating that the. Bonapartist party is annihilated by the event. Similar statements were made when! Napoleon II died, and nothing occurred for many years to make them at all donbtfull :' notwithstanding, Prince Louis Napoleon, after leading a sort of vagabond life in the United States and elsewhere, succeeded in pushing himself into the purple. The Bonapartists do not call themselves only Bonapartists in France ; their political name is the Group of the Appeal to the People they are in fact those who advocate a plebiscite. . Bonapartism which was at a very low ebb indeed at the conclusion of the Franco-German War, has been gradually obtaining more favor
amongst the French, and the proof of this lies in the fact that there were only four Bonapartist deputies in the first National Assembly after the war, whereas over 96 were returned by various constituencies in 1877. The party contains a very large proportion of men who are actuated rather by a desire to further their own interests than by any particular personal devotion , to the Napoleonic dynasty. It is ' not, therefore, very probable that they will throw up their hands whilst there is a single stone unturned which could possibly be conducive to the advancement of their so ardently prosecuted hunt for fortune. We must therefore look with great suspicion on all telegrams which reach us descriptive of the disappearance of the party that has played such an important role in France since the earlier part of the present century. Prince Bonaparte has. made himself distasteful to the majority of the group of the Appeal to the People. He has, however, a few staunch supporters who will not fail to try and turn the present state of affairs to the ad. vantage of their chief, |and it is by no means impossible that the Bonaparte of democratic tendencies .will be accepted by nearly all Bonapartists as the head of the party, now that they have lost their young Prince. If, however, the party "break up, it will not do so in a day, political liquidation being iuvariably an exceedingly lengthy operation. In the event of such an occurrence the . probabilities are that the Bonapartists will go conditionally over to the Legitimists and Orleanists. If this is the case, it will be most fortunate for France, as it will make the Sight, or Conseivative party, have one definite aspiration in view, and not, as it has been heretofore, the alliance of two parties representing two antagonistic regimes for the purpose of resisting the tide of Sepublicanism which has set in of late years in France. Though we have mentioned the probability of the survival of Imperialism, we cannot avoid expressing the hope that our prognostications will not eventually prove to be true, and that France may soon be in the full enjoyment of a limited monarchy, and delivered of the semicomedy of the French Eepublic. To call the Republicans in France united would be a departure from the truth ; they comprise elements as diametrically opposed to one another as can well be. There are no less than six different groups in the Left representing various gradations of opinion, from moderate and tolerant republicanism to ultra-communism. The Bonapartists have ever been the most rabid|opponents of the Republicans; it is therefore necessary to await the confirmation of the cablegram; published in New Zealand papers a day or two ago, announcing that several prominent Bonapartist Deputies had gone over to the Republicans. In all things the safest course to take is to wait until advices from Europe put us in possession of reliable information relative to the exact extent to which the French will be affected by the tragical end of the Prince Imperial. We shall then be able to quit the somewhat treacherous region of surmise for one of certainty. Leaving on one side the supposed political benefit resulting from the Prince's death no one can help feeling for the bereavement of the ex-Empress Eugenie. Her lot has.been a sad one since 1870, and there can be little doubt but that, like our own Queen, she will go sorrowing to .the grave.
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Temuka Leader, Volume 2, Issue 158, 2 July 1879, Page 2
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1,563THE PRINCE IMPERIAL. Temuka Leader, Volume 2, Issue 158, 2 July 1879, Page 2
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