Thrones Without Tenants

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXIV, Issue 6, 8 February 1906, Page 4

Thrones Without Tenants

1 It) is a privilege,' wrote Disraeli, a good many years ago, " to live in this age of rapid and brilliant events. It is one of infinite romance. Thrones tumble down and crowns are offered like a fairy tale ' ; and one is reminded by the fact that Norway has after some difficulty secured a king, that our own generation is no whit behind its predecessors in this feature of romance. When Disraeli wrote the.se words it was the crown of Greece that was going a-begging. Greece was thoroughly sick of Otho and his pampered Bavarians, and determined to have a King who understood at least the elements of fair government. Otho was dismissed, and the choice of his successor fell on Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, to whom the crown was offered. But the three protecting Powers, England, France, and Russia, had bound themselves not to allow anyone connected with their ruling families to become King of Greece, and the Prince was thus obliged to decline the alluring bait. The Greeks then transferred Their Offer of Sovereignty to Lord Stanley, son of the great statesman and brother of the E>arl of to-day. 'It is a dazzling adventure for the house of Stanley,' wrote Disraeli at the time , ' but they are not an imaginative race, and I fancy they "Will prefer Knowsley to the Parthenon, and Lancashire to the Attic Plains. . . 1 think he ought to take the crown, but he will not. Had I his youth I would not hesitate, even with the earldom in the distance.' But the young lord refused to be tempted ; and after further refusals a King was found for Greece in Prince William of Schleswig-Holstein, second son of the King of Denmark, who as King George I. is reigning to-day. A generation earlier still the Grecian throne was refused by Prince Leo-pold of Saxe-Coburg, father of the present King of Belgium. When Isabella 11. was driven from the throne of Spain it was almost literally hawked round Europe in search, of a Prince willing to sit on it. It wai? offered first to one scion of Royalty and then to another— only to be declined by all. Its offer to Leopold of Ho-henzollern-Sigmaringen was the cause of the terrible war between France and Prussia ; and it was only when Amadeus, second son of the King of Italy, was approached that 'an occupant was at last found, in 1870. Amadeus, however, found the crown too burdensome for his tastes ; and he resigned it thankfully after having worn it for three years, when it was accepted by Alfonso XII., the y e oung son of the exiled Isabella. In 18b"iO, when Prince Cuza, a man of odious character, was forced to abandon the throne of Roumania, it was with the utmost difficulty that A Successor was Found. Prince Jerome, who had an eye to that much more valuable prize, the crown of France, would not even look at it, in spite of the pleading and pressure of his^ exalted relatives; other polite but decided refusals fol-" fowed, until it "began to seem probable that the crown would never get a head to wear it. At last, however, Prince Charles o/ l-lohenzollern wavered and yielded and was proclaimed Hospodar of Roumania in April 1866

fifteen years later he was promoted to a kingship and wore a crown made, from the captured cannon of the Plevna redoubts. The crown of Bulgaria has also suffered the indignity of refusal on more than one occasion. When Prince Alexander of Battcnberg, after his brief and troubled tenure of the throne, was compelled to resign it, it was offered to Prince Valdcmar of Denmark., brother-in-law of the Czar, who declined it with thanks, whereupon a deputation went on a tour of the capitals of Europe with the object of iinding a Prince who wouldn't mind accepting a crown. The journey was fruitless ; but finally, in 1887, the perseverance of the Grand Sobranye was rewarded, when Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Cobairg-Crotha signified his willingness to take the despised emblems of sovereignty. These are but a few examples of crowns that have gone .a-begging, only to have the cold shoulder of refusal turned on them ; one of the most recent cases being that of the Dukedom of Saxe-Coburg, . Avhich was refused by the Duke of Connaught for himself and his son before it was accepted by the youthful Duke of Albany