EX-SULTAN’S LOVE STORY.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLV, Issue 101, 30 March 1925, Page 11

EX-SULTAN’S LOVE STORY.

HIS LATEST MARRIAGE

♦THE GARDENER’S DAUGHTER

Under tlio heading “The Last Marriage of the Last Sultan,’’ a Turkish newspaper prints a picturesque account, which reads like a page from the “Arabian Nights,” of the marriage of Mehmed VI., the Sultan who was dethroned in November, 1922, with the young daughter of one of his palace gardeners. The tule is signed by one Selah-ed-Din Boy, who states that he heard it from a Palace official. The name of the gardener’s daughter, says the bey, is Nevzad. She was 15 and a marvel of beauty. The Sultan was then 61. One day, when she was dusting the Sultan’s apartments, he noticed her and designed to speak to her. “It’s a long time since I saw you, little one,” he began. Nevzad confessed to the slaves that night: “His Majesty has deigned to speak kindly to me.” Next day there wAa great activNext day there was great activity at the palace. The word went round that the' Sultan was going to marry, but no one knew who the favoured one was. It was the gardener’s daughter. “CANNOT LIVE WITHOUT YOU.” Two days afterwards she was taken to the splendidly furnished apartments provided for her. To the outside world it was announced that, “in accordance with tradition, His Majesty took to wife a young and beautiful maiden.” From that moment the Sultan spent more time than ever in the harem. He developed a distasto for official ceremonies. Political events irritated him. He became invisible for days at a time. Then came the downiall of the Greeks and the train of unhappy events leading to his flight at dawn from the palace and his embarkation in a British warship. Ho took only the first and second wives with him. In his exile in Switzerland his wives soon noticed his depression and inquired the cause. One day he revealed it with tears. A short while afterwards a letter reached Nevzad in Constantinople, saying, “Come to me, Nevzad. Don’t fail. I cannot live without you. Then one of the Sultan’s attendants came he::’© to take her back to him. Nevzad hesitated. She reviewed her situation, saw that she would be obliged to sell her jewels little by little to live, like the other palace women who had been abandoned, and—she went. Selah-ed-Din Bey vouches for the truth of the story, and says that he can produce the exiled Sultan s lettei. He adds that the fact that Nevzad lias not returned shows that the girl is happy in this strangely assorted union with an elderly and homeless monarch.