TURBULENT REIGN
ALFONSO'S CAREER. Charmed Life Spared from Many Would-be Assassins. INTENSELY HUMAN FIGURE. No crown has ever proved a more dangerous ornament for its wearer than that of Alfonso XIII., according to George Slocombe in the "Evening Standard." No ruler has ever worn it more easily. In the 44 years of his reign—for the posthumous child of Alfonso XII. was born a King—the Spanish Sovereign has' successfully emerged from conspiracy after conspiracy, plot after plot. He has borne a charmed life. As long ago as 1905 he escaped his first assassin. Riding with President Loubet through the streets of Paris, he was fired at by an Anarchist, who missed his aim. In the same year, on the day of his marriage to Queen Ena, Queen Victoria's granddaughter, a bomb was thrown at the young Sovereign. Again he escaped unhurt. After the murder of the Spanish Premier, Canalejas, Alfonso followed the coffin on foot through a hostile crowd that repeatedly broke through the barriers of police and troops. But he faced them coolly, and almost insolently. In 1913 the King was fired at no fewer than three times, but each time miraculously escaped. What wonder that in superstitious Spain l.is luck seems providential and his courage legendary? Intensely Human. At 44 Alfonso is still a paradoxical, a picturesque and an intensely human figure. On the throne of the only autocratic monarchy surviving in the world, he combined the impulsive personality of a medieval ruler with the democratic and easy habits of an English country gentleman. Not even the ceremonial and gloomy traditions of his own Court—the stiffest in the world —have been able to repress the simplicity of his manner and the unaffected directness and gaiety of his temperament. He has friends everywhere—in London, Paris, and New York, and with hie intimates he talks frankly and freely and insists on an equal freedom of speech in return. For years the solemn diplomatic clubs of Europe were slightly scandalised or hugely diverted by the intimacy of the friendship which existed between the Spanish Sovereign and the late Mr. Alexander Moore, formerly the American Ambassador to the Court of.Spain. It was an open secret that Mr. Moore, a bluff Republican in politics, who had had no previous experience of diplomacy, came to Madrid prepared to treat the Monarch with a sturdy democratic independence. Before a week was over he had been completely charmed by the personality of Alfonso. ' And, to the amazement of Madrid, Ambassador and Sovereign were soon addressing each other familiarly as "Alec" and "Alf."
Any spring or summer night when the Court is in residence in Madrid Alfonso may be seen bareheaded and wearing a. dinner jacket, with a gay carnation in his button-hole, driving a little open two-seater through the streets of his capital. In Seville during Holy Week he is an even more democratic figure. He is a sportsman to his finger-tips. He plays polo and tennis with a reckless vivacity. He is a first-class horseman and an excellent shot. The illustrated Press of his country is full of photographs of the King in the most unconventional of clothes and in the most unaffected of attitudes. The Liege Lord of all the grandees of Spain and the Sovereign of the medieval Order of the Golden Fleece founded by the Emperor Charles V. is most frequently photographed in tennis flannels or bareheaded and in short on a picnic with friend's during a' shooting party in the mountains.
Lover of England. His slim, jaunty and smiling figure is as familiar in the Rue de la Paix as in Bond Street, in Deauville as in Sail Sebastian. At least once he left the Casino at dawn, took the wheel of his powerful touring car, and drove all day at top speed towards the Spanish frontier in order to preside over a Cabinet Council. Alfonso has always loved England and the English, and he has often declared to his friends that if he were forced to abdicate he would buy an estate in that country. He never abandons a friend, as was shown when he offered the Premiership to General Berenguer, who had been disgraced and who narrowly escaped being shot at the orders of Priino de Rivera four years before. But if Alfonso is a warm friend he has been an uncompromising opponent. He lias fought the Republicans in Spain in the open in full knowledge of the risks he ran, and always prepared to pay the price of defeat with his crown. It is now known that he was personally responsible for the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera. Overnight he transformed that bluff and genial soldier of somewhat second-rate military reputation into the most powerful personality in the realm. But wheiij just after a year ago, Primo de Rivera sought to placate the opposition by offering to revise the constitutional rights of the Monarchy, Alfonso took his courage in both hands and abruptly dismissed him. The Dictator had attempted to save himself by sacrificing the King. But his Sovereign retaliated by sacrificing the Dictator. Alfonso XIII. has always been one move ahead of his enemies. If his luck at last deserts him, however, and' he loses the. next round he will abandon his throne smilingly and without grumbling. He will be a game sportsman to the end.
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Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 88, 15 April 1931, Page 7
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888TURBULENT REIGN Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 88, 15 April 1931, Page 7
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