DUKE AND DUCHESS OF YORK

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20706, 2 May 1929, Page 6

DUKE AND DUCHESS OF YORK

VISIT TO BERLIN. A CHANGED GERMANY. . (From Odh Own Correspondent.) LONDON, March 19. On their way to attend the wedding of the Crown Prince of Norway, the Duke and Duchess of York spent a day in Berlin. They were met at the station by Sir Horace Rumbold, the British Ambassador, and drove straight to the Embassy in the Wilhelrastrasse. It is the first time the Duke and Duchess have ever visited the German capital, and it is the first time that any members of the British Royal Family have visited Berlin since the war. They showed a keen interest in everything they saw (writes the correspondent of the Daily Express). They made the most of their day in Berlin. The morning was spent in a walk through the Unter den Linden on their way to the great castle of the ex-Kaiser, which has now been converted into a' Republican museum. They stopped for an instant to look into the public library and the quadrangle of the university. The castle itself greatly interested them, and their guide pointed out the marks of machine gun fire still visible on the facade and also the famous balcony on the first storey, which was blown to pieces by the artillery fire of the Socialist troops who were trying to eject the Spartacists at Christmas, 1918, The afternoon was spent at Potsdam exploring the wonders of Sans Souci. Fortunately, there was bright sunshine, and the Duchess was charmed with the quiet dignity and beauty of this dream palace of Frederick the Great. No official cognisance was taken of the visit by the German Govfrnment, this being in accordance with the desire of the Duke and Duchess for privacy and the observance of strict incognito during their passage across Germany. The Duke left his card on President von Hindenburg at the Presidential Palace, says Reuter, and the President immediately returned the courtesy at the Embassy. A HAPPY IDEA. “It was a happy idea which led the Duke and Duchess of York to pay an unofficial visit to Berlin,” says the Daily Chronicle, in a leading article. “No member of our Royal Family had preceded them there since the war; nor while war memories still rankled, would such a visit have been in place. But British opinion towards Germany—and in a large measure German opinion towards Great Britain—has reached tile stage of wishing bygones to be bygones; and it should be as natural for a British Prince to visit the chief city of the German Republic, as to call in at Paris or New York. “ Of course, there are still Monarchists in Germany, and so long as unemployed members of the old Prussian officer class survive in. large numbers (and often in hard circumstances), there will continue to be. But their disappearance seems only a matter of time. No living current turns their mill wheel; all the young movement of Germany is flowin'* strongly the other way. The interests of a peaceful'modern society—industry trade, sport, athletics, art, science' literature—are now everywhere on the top; and the military idea, which down to 1914 dominated Berlin society to a degree almost inconceivable, has passed nearly, out of sight. NATURAL AFFINITIES. “The consequence is that the British and German minds, which have always had much in common, are now, almost without knowing it,' developing natural affinities. Wc believe closer Anglo-Ger-man friendship (which is nothin the least opposed to Anglo-French or AngloAmerican) to be vital for the progress of civilisation and for peace in Europeand we welcome any episode which points towards it.”