THE MYSTERIES OF HISTORY

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 11251, 1 July 1922, Page 11

THE MYSTERIES OF HISTORY

The above Pamela is often spoken of as the reputed daughter of Philippe Egalite. the Duke of Orleans, who figured so badly and so tragically in the days of the Revolution. It is one of tho many mysteries created when tho streams of scandalous gossip darken tho waters of history. The name of this same Orleans wa9 carried into mystery many times by streams of the gossip which his career provoked. For examplo, was his son, Louis Philippe, who reigned in Franco before tho Second Empire, really his son, or tho son of the Italian, Cliiappini ? and was his real daughter not Marie Stella,

Lady Newborough, the children having been changed in Italy ? Turning to the general mass of mysteries, one asks who was the man of the Iron Mask, the Masque-de-Fer of so many romances? .Who was “Junius”? Was Napoleon 111. the son of Napoleon’s brother Louis, King of Holland, or of the Dutch Admiral Badinguet, whose name tho mobs hurled at him in Paris before he set out for Sedan and Wilhelmsliohe? Was George IV. married to the beautiful Mrs Fitzherbert? Did the poor little Dauphin really die in the prison, or wander abroad into some vagabondage, whera pious Royalists are now seeking his descendants? Can we he 6ure that Nioholas 11. and his hapless Czarevitch were murdered by those hideous assassins, or dragged away to some hut or monastery, to live under the protection of some faithful mujik or loyal Lord Abbot? For pretenders under these circumstances there is hopeful warrant in the story of the false Demetrius, who, long before the day of the Romanoffs, personated the murdered son of Ivan the Terrible, obtained an army from King Stanislaus of Poland, invaded Russia, secured the fealty of many nobles, made an end of tha usurper Borisoff, had himself proclaimed Czar by acclamation of a wildly exultant people, and reigned a whole year in the manner customary for Czars in those days. Jtfe was unmasked after that year, and died fighting like a mail. But if he had reigned in a manner not customary, it is probable that he would have come down tha ages as a great and beneficent Sovereign.