SPECTACULAR WEDDING

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21365, 19 June 1931, Page 12

SPECTACULAR WEDDING

TWO “SHADOW" ROYALTIES PRETENDER TO FRENCH THRONE MARRIAGE TO DISTANT COUSIN. A Crown Prince who in all human probability will never be a king and a royal princess who will never be a queen w-ere married in the Cathedral at Palermo, in Sicily, on April 8. It was pathetically appropriate that this wedding of shadow royalties should have been celebrated in Sicily, the scene of the legendary adventures of the “ throneless monarch,” King Robert of Sicily, says the correspondent of thi Daily Express. Yet if the prince and his bride had been assured of a throne the wedding could not have been more brilliant, the guests more distinguished, the ceremony more imposing. The bridegroom was the young Prince Henri, Comte de Paris, sou of the Due de Guise, Pretender to the throne of France, and the bride Princess Isabelle d’OrleansBraganza, a distant cousin of her husband. BRILLIANT PROCESSION. The guests included European princes and princesses; Sir Ronald Graham, thd British Ambassador to Italy, represented King George, and no fewer than 800 French Royalists arrived in a specially chartered liner. By special permission of the Pope, Cardinal Lavitrano, Cardinal-Archbishop of Palermo, celebrated the wedding. Crowds lined the Via Matteo Bonello and the approaches to the cathedral square to watch the brilliant wedding procession walk over carpets from the magnificent Palace d’Aumale, for centuries the Palermo home of the Orleans family, to the ancient cathedral. Cardinal Lavitrano, in full vestments and accompanied by the assisting clergy, met the head of the procession at the entrance to the cathedral, which was cordoned off by troops and Fascist militia in full uniform. Inside the entrance a especially auginnented choir, accompanied by an orchestra, chanted hymns. The interior of the cathedral had been beautifully decorated with great masses of flowers. All the women present were in high-neckcd dresses, while the men were cither in full dress or evening dress. The witnesses for the bridegroom were the Duke of Pughie and Prince Don Carlos de Bourbon—who represented the King of Spain—and for the bride, Prince Pierre d’Orleans Braganza and Prince Adam Czartoriski. SEVEN HUNDRED AT LUNCHEON. Following the wedding ceremony luncheon for 700 guests was served in the grounds of the Palace d’Aumale, where immense pavilions had been erected. The first part of the honeymoon was spent at Palermo, and later the bride and bridegroom left for a yachting cruise along the coast of Northern Africa. Prince Henri is only 22, and, like his father, has been obliged by circumstances to live away from his native land. He is tall and slender, with clear blue eyes and brown hair. He has studied' at the University of Brussels, and has taken up agriculture as a profession.

Princess Isabelle, who is 20, and very beautiful, is descended from King Louis Phillippe’s son, the Due de Nemours. She is the granddaughter of the late Princess Isabelle of Braganza, Princess Imperial of Brazil. She was educated in a convent in Brazil.