PRINCESS LOUISE

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 19806, 23 May 1934, Page 12

PRINCESS LOUISE

A ROYAL SCULPTOR. The King’s aunt, Princess Louise. Duchess of Argyll, celebrated her 86th birthday recently. This remarkable old lady is active and vigorous, and still carries out her full share of the public duties which are expected from members of the British Royal Famil/. This month, for instance, she opened a new ward unit in the Kensington Hospital for children, which is named after her, and last week she paid an official visit to the Kensington Occupational Centres for the unemployed. She frequently visits charitable insti- i tutions, art shows, and public gatherings of various kinds. The Princess lives in Kensington Palace, and takes the keenest interest in the doings of all her wide-flung family circle. She is the eldest survivor of Queen Victoria’s nine children, and her relations are legion. Her marriage to the Duke of Argyll was a love match, and she was the first English lady for many centuries to marry outside Royal circles. She was also the first of the English Royal ladies to preside over a vice-regal court, which she did when her husband, the late Duke of Argyll, was appointed Governor-General A Canada. Princess Louise is a sculptor of considerable ability. Her statue of Queen Victoria in Kensington Gardens is a well-known example of ho:* skill with the chisel, and another example is to be found in St. Paul’s Cathedral in the form of a memorial to the officers and men from the Dominions who died in the Boer War. One idiosyncracy of the Princess* which goes to confirm the “Colonel’s-lady-and-Judy O’Grady” theory, is her fondness for visiting the “Nothing-Over-Sixpence” stores in London. Accompanied by her lady-in-waiting, she delights to go incognito to these stores and make various little purchases, rejoicing in her bargains like any suburb housewife!