In the Public Eye EX-KING ALFONSO. MR. G. BROCKHURST.

Evening Post, Volume CXVII, Issue 18, 21 July 1934, Page 26

In the Public Eye

EX-KING ALFONSO.

MR. G. BROCKHURST.

lathe event of a Monarchist restora-t tion'in Spain, which even its advocates admit is remote, Don Alfonso XIH, and not Ms youngest son, Don Juan, expects to be placed, on the throne. The former King has just made this quite clear in a letter addressed to all his supporters from-his exile at Pontainebleaii, near Paris.- , • . ■ ..•'■'. ■ 4IAs long as I live lam disposed to fulfil-to-the end my obligations and duties to Spain," Alfonso wrote. "These, obligations and duties cannot be renounced. In this attitude I am loyally; seconded by his Royal Highness Prince Juan, who, in his turn, will fulfil loyally all his obligations to Spain. Prince Juan.is fully aware of the irrevocable conditions of the! law of ■' dynastic .succession and will loyally abide by them."

This letter was in reply to one addressed to Alfonso by. Deputy Antonio Goicoechea, the Jeader of the Alfonsist Alonarchist Party in Parliament. It l(ad. been insistently rumoured that niany; Spanish Monarchists wanted their deposed. sovereign to surrender his claims in- favour of his third son, the twenty-one-year-old Infante Juan, now in the British Navy. . ' ; ■ . Although assuring Alfonso tha:t he was still the inspiration of their cause, Senbr Goieoeehea frankly admitted that one .faction;.of. -his party bolieved the former King's public renunciation of his ; rigtit;s : would greatly help thoir efforts to,restore ithe monarchy.

: .'.'l, /considered it my duty," Scnor 'Goiijqe<shea stated in an interview with this/..correspondent;, "to inform Don Alfpnso that the existenceof ill feeling jigainst him iii Spain should be taken Tnto ;aecount; My party, while holding!' to its programmo for. the restoration,:of the monarchy and the renovation- of Spain on anti-Parliamentary and anti:demoeratie lines', follows Don Al-fonso-faithfully. .. ■ •■','"■ ■ ■ i

-■'"But- should he- abdicate, we would follow the person he names as his heir. Thevlrifante Juan would receive all our adherence, as well as that of the Carlist?or. Traditionalist Monarchists. \Vith "the : Carlist line extinct on, the deathiof-the, aged, pretender. Archduke Alfonso, Garlos,-who lives in Vienna', the''Traditionalists would accept the Infante; Juan "aY King." ■ ■; fAfter-makingsarcastic -references to Alfbfaso^s "tardy acknowledgment of his^ obligations to; Spain," Madrid's republican Piess concludes editorially that J Senbr Gbicbeehca 'a letter': ,tb Pon-'twn^bleaUiTira.s4n-.th£!''iiiatiire.;-oifva^trial balloon. The.former King's reply deiiriedi clearly his attitude towards abdication in favour of his.youngest son. The publication of the 'correspondence between Sfenor. Goicoeehe'a\ and Don Alfonso } also revealed that the former King had been abandoned by a section of ;his supporters and showed that Monarchist ;• opinion unanimously favoured Juan's candidacy for the throne.

•Commenting editorially, on tho correspondence, ;the'. newspaper ABC, which-is owned by the MarquesLuco dc Tena, a close friend of the former King, said:— ... ' , .

: c'We-are Monarchists, but it is our Opinion that the restoration of -the monarchy, wheh'it comes, must bo personified .in a.Princo who, like. Don Juan Of Bourbon, is:ina'position to continue the; history of Spain without prejudice to who/ is. above discussions and' disputes, and has had no part in the-quarrels'of. the past."

: The: Duke, of Miranda, onco chief ste\yard of-the Koyal Palace, who has ahar,ed,Alf onso.'s; exile at Pontainebleau for ; the past three years, recently was allowed to visit his family, in Madrid. While "there; lie advised' tho. Spanish Monarchists to .concentrate on propaganda for the restoration of the. old regime instead of worrying about who would be King if their cause ever succeeded. ;

Dr.-A. O. Edwards. ■ <Dr. Alfred George Edwards, Archbishop of Wales, has announced his intention of resigning ; both the,; Bishopric of St. Asaph and the Archbishopric.' ' ■■""' -. .

The resignation will have to be placed before the Bishops of Wales and other \ officials, and it is not expected that \ it will take effect until the'.cnd of this month. -■ " ■ • Dr. Edwards, who is eighty-five, has been-known for years as "the fighting Bishop,?:': probably because1 of/his ener-

geiiq; leadership'-1 o& the opposition to disestablishment of the Church in Wales. When his-efforts proved fruitless"many* of "his admirers expected that-he would leave Wale's'and,accept an English --see;' But "tho ..fighting Bishop"rxefused to desert the with which he had been associated so long, and/set to work to build up the separated*; Church. - ...:'.." ' ■

Tie passing-of certain legislation was followed by the formation of the Province of and the enthronement of Dr. Edwards as the first Archbishop of Wales .--in1920. .Ho .hag the distinction of being the oldest. Bishop -itr the country, both in service and in age. ; /During his campaign against dis-. establishment,' Dr. Edwards came into : conflict \wij:h Mr. Lloyd George, but despite ,their\differences, the two, re tamed. a firm respect for one another, !and-afcthe luncheon following the Archbishop's ~ enthronement, Mr. Lloyd George' paid a warm tribute to him as "a redoubtable foe.and a true friend."

; One of I>r. ISdwards 'a best stories concerns ■ a'meeting of Nonconformists which .Mr. Lloyd. George was to address. The, chairman, an. ean%st Welshman, treated' his audience to a bitter denunciation of the Archbishop, describing Mm as "the worst liar in Wales." "But, thank God," he added, "we have with us here, tonight, one who is more than a match for him—Mr. Lloyd 6jsorge." ;

■. :Dr. Edwards was consecrated Bishop St. Asaph in 1889. He f was formerly, for ten years, headmaster of Llandovery College. -He has recently had a houso built, near the Bishop's Palace, in which, to take ,up his residence after his "resignation." Dr. Edwards has been-.married three times..

' Probably the most highly-priced painter today is Gerald Brockhurst, who also is little known to the public. He is a complete recluse, paints very few pictures (never more than six a year), and gets a thousand pounds for each of them. Except .for his funny little round, fiat hat, you could easily niistake:hiin for a chartered accountant. Primarily, of course, he is a" marvellous draughtsman, and is better known as an etcher than as a portrait painter. He has a studio in Kensington, a Basque wife, and a retreat in Dieppe.- His portraits very seldom come into the market, aDd he is that rare bird—a painter who never has a picture on his hands. In the Academy this year he is represented by " Jeunessc Doree," which was promptly snapped up for the regulation thousand pounds by Lord Leverhuline. .He,is one of the most reticent of men also. The publication "Who's Who," when it sought information about him, obtained only the statement of the date on which he was made, an A.E.A. (1928) and his address, Milton House, Fernshaw Eoad, Chelsea. President Cardenas. .^Nearly eighteen years of revolutionary campaigning' and military life, interspeTsed with brief periods of eiviloffice holding, is the "background which Division General Lazarb Cardenas will bring to the Presidency of Mexico for which he was chosen this month. ; Now only, thirty-nino years old, the nomrneo of the governing National Bevolutionary Party will assume the post-of chief executive on December 1 as Mexico's youngest constitutional President. Ho will bo tho youngest of all-the. nation's forty-five chief executives^with the exception of Francisco Madero. , Madero was' thirty-eight when he took office in 1911 after heading the uprising which ousted Poffirio Diaz. Born in the village of Jiquilpan, Michoacan, on May 30, 1895, of parents whose blood "was a mixture of Spanish and Tarascan Indian, Cardenas* attended school until he was eleven and then went to/workin the Tax Collector's office to support his /widowed mother and seven brothers ahd^sisters. Later he became a printer and the tb-\vn' gaoler, but, becoming aware of the social currents sweeping the. country, he stole away one night ito be a soldier. , ■ A -year later, at nineteen, Cardenas was made captain of cavalry, and from then on he, rose steadily to become General in 1920. He fought against Zapata and against Villa, and with Generals Caranza, Obrcgoh, and Calles, all .three of whom subsequently were Presidents of the v Bcpublic. Four times he was near death, twice from wounds, once by drowning, and once by : a fall from a horse which permanently injured his left arm. ■ After a sliort term as provisional Governor of Michoacan in 1920, he spent nine, 3'cars as military commander in various. States. In 192S ho was elected Governor of Michoacan. He left the Governor's post for various intervals to combat the Escobar revolution and to, serve as Minister of tho Interior, president of tho National Eevolutionary Party, and Minister of War,; from which position ho resigned to become Presidential candidate. He is tall and robust, with a wide forehead and thick hair. Ho dresses simply, shuns publicity and social life; seldom, drinks, and never smokes. iMr. P. Wilson Steer. ; ■There has been held in London an exhibition of-water-cblours by P. Wilson Steer, one of the greatest living English artists,' who —although, in the opinion of many critics, he is England's greatest landscape painter since Turner, and.has received,the high honour of the Order of Merits —is little known, eveb by name, to the man in the street. A-leader of independent aTt in England for half a century, Mr. Steer's selfrpor.trait hangs in the .TJffizi .Gallery beside portraits of Baphael, Velazquez, and Reynolds. Mr. Steer lias always remained aloof from the Eoyal Academy and has been ono of the pillars of the New English Art Club, where ho still exhibits. Ho was given the rare honour, to a living artist, of an exhibition of his works at the National Gallery. A close friend of Mr. Steer said: "Steer's personality and the atmosphere surrounding Mm wero' admirably captured in paint by his life-long friend, Professor Henry Tonks, the [former'.Slade professor. In a series of | three pictures painted in Steer's Chelsea ;ropms, ho showed hi in, with his familiar .baggy clothes, seated before his fire, serving tea to his circle of intimates, including-tho lato GeorgeiMoore and Walter Siekert. All of Steeri's cifclejknew Mrs. Eayues, the artist's old nurse. Sho had looked after him when he was v boy, ancMn later lite she was his housekeeper. ; Steer had tho greatest admiration for ..'the old lady, and in her later years nursed her as faithfully as she had .once nursed him. Indeed,, one of tho Tonlts pictures to which'l have referred shows Steer giving 'tea/to the old nurse amid the respectful'circle of cronies, for the old lady took a-keen interest iiv, artistic matters and used to express hnr opininu vigorously.. One of Steer's finest portraits.' was a half-length '-of-1- Mrs. Baynes, herself. .Slow-of speech; contemplative,. aloof from social distractions, Steer' has a sharp Wit. Once he visited an exhibition ;of post-impres-sionists. In silence ho examined the works, in silence left the • gallery. At the door he • paused. 'I suprcpso they have private incomes, 3 lie observed." The artist, who is in his 75th year, is in the Islo of Wight recuperating from a severe -illness. ' ■

. Four air expeditions are bfinjr organised by 'the Soviet Research Institute of Forest Aviation to survey the immense forests along the Obi, one of the largest Siberian rivers, ami in the basin df the Pechora River. Besides these a forest area of 24,000,000 acres is to be surveyed in Eastern Siberia.