RUSSIA AND HER GRAND DUKES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLI, Issue 12663, 17 September 1904, Page 5 (Supplement)

RUSSIA AND HER GRAND DUKES.

£3,200,000 A YEAR FOR ROYALTY. Among other things, the war has brought to the knowledge of the general public in Europe and America that the Tsar is not the only Royal personage in Russia. It has revealed the. existence of a whole batch of Grand Dukes who were previously almost unknown to people outside of Russia. The male relatives of the Tsar consist of his infant son a born recently, one brother, four uncles, four first cousins, ten cousins of the second degree, thirteen cousins of the third degree, and one great-uncle. His brother, his great-uncle, his uncles and his cousins of the first and second degree are all Grand Dukes, with the prefix " Imperial Highness," while the cousins of the third degree are only Princesof Russia with the prefix "Highness." This makes a total of thirty male members of the Imperial house in addition to the Tsar himself, who are a serious burden on poverty-stricken Russia, for each of them receives as his birthright an income of one million roubles a year from the moment he sees the light of the world till the hour of his death. The present sums paid to the Grand Dukes and Princes of the Russian Imperial house thus amount to a total of £3,200,000 per annum. As a matter of fact, however, the Grand Dukes have no need whatever of feeding on public taxes, for in the course of time, like most other Imperial and Royal families, they have contrived to accumulate immense estates all over the country. Between them( these thirty-three Grand Dukes and Princes of, the Russian Imperial house own 6000 square miles of land, or about one-fortieth part of the entire territory in European Russia. Besides these vast estates they possess no less than 325 palaces and castles, and employ some 20,000 domestic servants, flunkies, and retainers. It is a traditional rule that every male member of the Russian Imperial, house shall be trained as an officer in the army or navy, and that he shall serve in one or the other of them. MIGHTY FEESONAGE3. The Grand Dukes enjoy many legal and social privileges in Russia. They cannot bo arrested, they cannot be sued in a public Law Court, nor can they be subpoenaed to give evidence in a public trial If anyone desires to bring an fiction at law against a Grand Duke he must lay his case before a special tribunal constituted exclusively for the purpose of dealing with litigation in which members of the Imperial family are involved. If the evidence of a Grand Duke be required in a public trial a commission of judicial officials must wait upon him in his private residence and take down hits testimony there. The Grand Duke is not required to swear to the truth of his depositions, but his simple signature gives the evidence the same weight and value as statements made on oath by ordinary folk. On the other hand, the Grand Dukes have to submit to certain disadvantages and drawbacks arising from their high rank. The, Tsar has absolute* power over them, so that with all their rights and privileges they really live in a condition of gilded bondage. They cannot choose their own place of residence, they cannot leave Russia on a tour of pleasure, and they cannot marry without the consent of the Tsar. If tliey disobey and defy the Tsar's wishes he can imprison them, confiscate their estates and banish them from the country, according to his unrestricted Imperial pleasure. ' ■ REBELLIOUS HEIR TO THRONE. Nevertheless, there are' rebels in the Imperial family, for at present there are seven or eight Grand Dukes who have either married in opposition to the Tsar's wishes or who desire to be wedded to women of whom the Tsar disapproves. Foremost among these is the Grand Duke Cyril, the Tsar's eldest cousin of the first degree. Grand Duke Cyril's matrimonial intentions possess a special importance, owing to a possibility of succession to the throne. At the present moment four lives stand between him and the crown—those of the Tsar, the newly-born Tsarevitch (heir apparent),' the Tsar's brother and Cyril's own father, Grand Duke Vladimir. Now the Grand Duke is anxious to marry the divorced Grand Duchess of Hesse, who before her marriage was Princess Melita of Saxe-Coburg-Gciha, niece of King Edward of Great Britain. ALL SORTS OF OBSTACLES. Grand Duke Cyril had made no secret of his admiration for the Grand Duchess Melita before her divorce, and no sooner had: she left her husband's home and" gone back to live with her mother at Coburg than Cyril made her a formal offer of marriage. This was accepted conditional on the Tsar's consent, which, however, . was emphatically refused. " » ■■'■:":' * Grand Duke Cyril was informed that if he persisted in marrying Melita the Tsar would, first of all, declare the marriage to be invalid in Russia; secondly, degrade Cyril from his rank as an officer; thirdly, confiscate all his estates ; fourthly, banish him from Russia for ever, and, fifthly, deprive him of his right of succession to the Russian throne. •

GRAND DUKE PAUI/S LOVE STORY.

One of the Tsar's uncles, Grand Duke Paul Alexandraviteh, has been in exile two years because he contracted a marriage in opposition to the Imperial wishes. :, Grand Duke Paid was a widower and 42 years; of age when he married a second time, in 1902. The lady of his choice was 37 years old, and had had a varied career. Her maiden name was Karnovitch, and she was the daughter of a prosperous lawyer in St. Petersburg. She was a girl of striking beauty and manifold fascinations, and at the age of 21 she became the wife of a mid-dle-aged engineer named Pistolkovs, who was more than twenty years her senior. This marriage was evidently a failure, for after three years a divorce was granted and Madame Pistolkovs soon afterward became Madame Valerianovna, the wife of a landowner in the • province of Volhynia. She left St. Petersburg for some years, and returned only when the death of M. Valerianovna had left, her a widow. Quite by chance she attracted the attention of the Grand Duke Paul when she was walking in the street and His Imperial Highness made inquiries regarding the identity of the beautiful, fascinating, stylishlydressed lady. He communicated his intention to the Tsar, who threatened him with the usual list of dire penalties if he persisted in his intention. Grand Duke Paul left Russia and took Madame Valerianovna to Livorno, in Italy, where he was wedded to her. The Tsar's response was a decree expelling his uncle from the Russian army, in which he held the rank of a lieutenantgeneral, confiscating his Russian estates and forbidding him ever again to set foot on Russian territory. Grand Duke Paul lives in Paris now. Grand Duke Michael Michaelovitch, a cousin of the second degree to the Tsar, was 29 years of age when, early in. 1891, he asked permission of the late Tsar Alexander 111. to marry a girl well known in good society in St. Petersburg. She was not of. noble birth, but her father was a State official, and the famous diplomatist, Ignatieff, was her uncle. Alexander 111. had no sympathy with the Grand Duke's romantic inclinations and, promptly prohibiting the match, His Majesty sent Michael Michaelovitch away on a foreign tour to forget his folly. Almost the first place at which the Grand Duke stopped on this tour was Wiesbaden, where he became involved in another romantic love affair. He was walking near Wiesbaden when a horse came rushing toward him bearing on its back a woman who had lost all control over the animal and who was in imminent danger of. death. The Grand Duke placed himself in front of the runaway horse, and at the risk of his own life seized the reins and, aftei being dragged for a distance, succeeded in bringing it to a standstill. The lady whom he thus rescued was the young and beautiful daughter of Countess Natalie Meremberg, the morganatic wife of Prince Nicolas of Nassau, a brother of the reigning Grand Duke of Luxembourg. Within a week or two the Grand Duke made the. yotfng Countess Meremberg his wife. The Tsar ignored the fact that the countess' father was a Royal Prince, and remembered only that her mother was the daughter of the Russian poet, Pushkin, and the divorced wife of a plain Russian citizen named Dubelt. He issued an Imperial decree declaring the marriage of the Grand Duke to be null and void, but he was afterwards induced to withdraw this decree by the intervention of th'i Grand Duke of Luxembourg, an uncle of the bride, and of the Queen of Swedes, her aunt. The Grand !

Duke of Luxembourg conferred on the bride ' the title of .Countess Torby. Grand Duke Michael Michaelovitch and his morganatic but legitimate '-wife, Countess Torby, are most popular members of fashionable society in England and Prance. King Edward is their close friend; and has often visited them at their beautiful country estate in England. Anothei uncle of the Tsar, the Grand Duke Alexis, got into trouble when a, young man by marrying one of the ladies-in-wait-ing of his mother, the Empress Maria, Alexandrovna. The bride was a Miss Joukoffsky, and the young couple contrived to keep their marriage secret for three years. When the secret became known the Tsar was extremely angry and took prompt steps to put an end to the romantic union. . He declared the marriage to be null and void, and expelled Miss ifoukoffsky from Russia for ever. The priest who celebrated the marriage service was banished to Siberia for thirty years and died in the eighteenth year of his exile.