HUNGARY WILL SOON ELECT ANOTHER KING

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 6804, 7 January 1929, Page 8

HUNGARY WILL SOON ELECT ANOTHER KING

Archduke Albrecht a Certainty

Intrigues by Rival Hapsburg Factions

With the announcement of Count I Stephen Bethlen, Prime Minister of Hungary, that Otto, son of Emperor Charles and Empress Jiita, is ineligible for the throne of the Magyars and that the country will soon hold a referendum to select a king, the climax has been reached in the interregnum which began ten years ago. During this period, Hungary has been a kingdom without a king. At different times there have been as many as half a dozen pretenders to the throne. Only two of them, however, remained in tho field. The struggle between tho two was extremely bitter and it plunged two branches of tho House of Hapsburg into a feud which reminds one of the Wars of tho Roses in England. Two royal women were the leaders in the desperate combat —Zita, Empress of Austria, Queen of Hungary and Jerusalem, who was fighting for her son, Otto, and Archduchess Isabella, wife of the Archduke Frederic, Duke of Teschcn, who, was fighting for her son, Archduke Albrecht. When Count Bethlen declared recently that Otto was eliminated from the race and that the “bond between tho nation and the dynasty which was severed must be reforgedhe settled the question of the monarchy beyond any doubt and Archduke Albrecht is as good as elected. Count Bethlen enjoys extraordinary powers in Hungary and bis word is law. A Modem Adonis. Arcliduko Albrecht, whose full name is Albrecht Francis Joseph Charles Frederic Georges Hubert Marie, is 31 years of age. In the highest set he is described as a modern Adonis. Thi3 seems to be the view also of the Italian Court, whero the young Archduke has found great favour in the eyes of Princess Giovanna. Tho proposed union of the House of Savoy and the House of Hapsburg seems to have carried much weight in the preliminary settlement of the problem of the Hungarian monarchy. It is, however, due mostly to another woman’s devoted work that Archduke Albrecht is now on the steps of tho Hungarian throne. She is his mother, Archduchess Isabella, a woman of imperious bearing and indomitable will.

Women Head Struggle. Isabella has built up a network of bureaux in the neighbouring States and in the diplomatic centres of the Continent whose co-operation has helped her to overcome the opposition of some of the chancellors of Europe. Against the powerful machine of Archduchess Isabella the efforts of Empress Zita were of little avail. Sho is poor and her family lives mostly on the contributions of their Royal cousin, King Alphonso of Spain. She has a phantom court in a small Spanish fishing village, Lequeitio, which is as far removed from the theatre of this royal battle as any place can be. It takes about three days by fast trains to reach it from Hungary. Eor diplomatic intrigues, Zita was in an exceptionally bad position. The foreign offices have not yet forgotten her adventurous schemes to put her late husband on the throne of Hungary. Her underground organisation of volunteer ambassadors in the capitals of Europe was paralysed by ever-present suspicion. Finally, her descent was a great handicap for her son. The Hungarians dislike the Bourbon-Parmas, the family of which she is a member, and the Empress had many disagreeable experiences on account of her family relations during the war. Diplomatic relations between Otto’s and Albrecht’s families were severed seven years ago, when the late Emperor Charles and Empress Zita swooped down on Western Hungary and declared that they had come to occupy their throne. Archduke Albrecht failed to report to his sovereign and relative at the time of the coup d’etat and Zita never forgave the young man for having abandoned them. Relations between the two families became more strained when Zita obtained information about the schemings of Albrecht’s mother. Pressing Problem. Numerous “rescripts” were dispatched from Lequeitio to Magyarovar calling the rebellious Hapsburg to obedience, but they were of no avail. Politicians visited Albrecht’s castle, never-ending conferences took place with high government officials, and ways were devised to stir the peasants to enthusiasm for the young Hapsburg prince. Conditions have become such in Hungary that the problem of the kingdom has to be solved without delay. It has stood in the way of Hungary’s reconciliation with her neighbours. The Succession States do not want Otto on the throne. They fear that the court camarilla surrounding Zita would never be satisfied until they regained all the territory that had belonged to the Hapsburgs. The Succession Sates have no apprehension in regard to Archduke Albrecht Isabella has made it clear from the very beginning through her spokesman that her son would be King of_ Hungary and nothing else. At his inauguration he will make a solemn declaration to this effect. Archduke Albrecht is the fourth cousin of Otto and under the old dynastic law he had not right to the succession. . His power will be derived from a referendum, a new expression of the will of the nation. The Hapsburgs are thus about to obtain a new lease of- life. With tlicir record of ruling for 800 years and being heads of the Holy Roman Empire for 500 years they have left all their royal and imperial competitors far behind.

Archduchess Isabella, Princess of Croy, is ncy 72 years of age. She is a close relative of Prince Reginald do Croy, who, in league with Nurse Cavell, bid English and French officers in-, his chateau at Mons at the beginning of the war, thereby exposing himself to the same fate that befell the martyred nurse.

The Archduchess is a vigorous woman even to-day—much more vigorous than her cousin, Empress Zita, who is only half her age. The family of the Archduchess is extremely rich —in fact, they are the only rich Hapsburgs, the estates of tho others having been impounded or confiscated—and abundance of financial means permitted her to work quickly and efficiently. Isabella has built up a network of bureaux in the neighbouring States and has set up a sumptuous court for her son in Magyarovar, in tho heart of Hungary. There their adherents, aristocrats and peasants, foregathered and planned the campaign which, judging from its result; was not less thor-ough-going than an electoral battle in America.