ROYAL XMAS CARDS

Taranaki Daily News, 18 December 1929, Page 8 (Supplement)

ROYAL XMAS CARDS

POPULARITY UNDIMINISHED Nowhere to-day has the Christmas card more loyal and enthusiastic adherents than in our Royal family. In fact, it was the late Queen Alexandra who first established its popularity more than sixty years ago. It is calculated that she alone sent more than twenty thousand cards, each a delightful work of art, to her relatives and friends, ranging from kings and queens to the humblest cottager of Sandringham and Windsor. - ■ - Queen Alexandra’s love of the Christmas card has been shared by every other member of our Royal family, and by none more than, by King George and Queen Mary. "Their Maj'esties,” a Court official told the writer, "take great pains in the selection of the pictorial congratulations that they send to their friends every Christmas. Special designs are submitted for their approval, and when the final choice is made the cards are prepared with exquisite finish. Permission is usually granted for the subjects of the preceding year to be< reproduced and sold to the public in the new season.” Some years ago Queen Mary introduced an innovation in the form of the art-pendant card. Each card is practically a picturepanel, but when lifted it discloses the leaflet, greeting and verse of the regular Christmas card, fixed by a ribbon, which acts as a hanger for the picture-panel. Perhaps the most beautiful of the Queen’s cards was one which pictured “Bonnie” Prince Charlie taking leave of Flora MacDonald on his escape from Scotland, thanking her for her heroic assistance and regretting that he had not a MacDonald to go with him to the end.

Another of their Majesties’ notable Christmas cards was one specially designed for circulation in India. The case in which it was enshrined was of pure white kid bearing the Royal monograms, with the,Prince of Wales’ feathers in each corner on one side, and a representation of the Star of India on the reverse side. The interior was gorgeously lined with moire antique picked out with gold, the whole forming a resplendent greeting in keeping with the country for which it was designed.