ROYAL DIVORCES.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 12082, 10 August 1917, Page 7

ROYAL DIVORCES.

In Russia the Orthodox Church, unlike the. Roman Catholic, allows divomofi in certain circumstances 10 tt.b members, and the Imperial Family of Russia have apparently availed themselves somewhat freely of this privilege. The three Grand Dukes whose names have come specially before us in connection with the revolution have all heen married to divorced ladies. The Grand Duke Michael Alesandrovitch was lone exiled from Court, as we have all been recently told, on account of his marriage with the Countess Brassov, who had already been the wife of two husbands. His first cousin, the Grand Duke Cyril Vladimirovitch, married his cousin the Princess Victoria Melita of Coburg after she had divorced another of her first cousins, the Grand Duke of Hasso, the only brother of the CY«ritza. This marriage, secretly contracted, gave much offence to the Russian Court, but strong outside influence—bo it is alleged—caused the Czar to allow the bride and bridegroom to an to Russia, in spite of the fact that they were cousins—for marriages between first cousins are wholly prohibited by the Gresk Church. The third Russian Grand Duke, Nicholas Nicholaievitch, late Command. er-tn-Chief. married tlie Princes? Auastasia, daughter of King Nicholas uf Montenegro. She had been divorced hy her first husband, George Ma\iuiilianovitoh, Prjncm Romanovsky. a descendant of Prince Eugene Bepuharnais, the son of the Bmuress Jose-

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