CHIT-CHAT ABOUT ROYALTY.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume xxix, Issue 7350, 3 December 1907, Page 1

CHIT-CHAT ABOUT ROYALTY.

It is not often that the, divinity hedging a king allows a British journalist to write of a monarch as an ordinary man, but Sir Edward Russell, the veteran editor of one of the most important English provincial organs, who has been at Cowes as a guest of the Royal Yacht Squadron, where, he says, the members treat royalty with less reverence than at any other club in the world, gives interesting details of the personal side of the reigning family. Ho writes :—

"'lt is a serious thing that tho popularity of the Prince of Wales does not increase. Year by year the King is more loved and more admired. Year by year his son grows more reticent and reserved. No other prince has shown so complete "a transformation from exuberant and cheery youth into his present middle-aged taciturnity. "No one can say that he is stupid or that he is a bad man of business, and I should say that he makes as good a speech as his father could; but as an individual ho seems to have shrunk into himself. He does what he has to do with obvious effort,-which takes off al! the pleasure which he probably intends to confer. .

"The geniality of the King is worklrenowned. I defy anyone to have tho privilege of five minutes' conversation with him, as I had recently, without feeling personally drawn to him. The only difference grows less distinct and tis Teutonic accent more guttural year by year. If you do not apprehend the drift of what he is saying he gets very put out.

•"An odd thing is that his curious delivery is particularly audible to deaf people, possibly because of his long association with his wife. When they are alono with their attendants and children the King often forms his hands into a . trumpet and shouts through them to his wife. Her amazing tact aiid sweet deportment effectively conceal from the public how deaf she really is. "It is not generally known that with advancing years the Queen suffers much from depression. She :has never been able to fill the gap left in her maternal heart by the death of her elder son. Moreover, the uncertain health of her two elder daughters is a source of much trouble. She also confessed to x very old friend not long iisto that since she became Queen she volt she was less needed. The King fills the foremost place on the European stage, and his friends, both male and female, have different, more lively, mental standpoints than the wife to whom he invariably shows such marked respect."