The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1874-12-03

5 We have all been told many times how
f eccentric the present King of Bavaria is.
/ tie is the elfaRte terrible of European
; court life. Whenever the royal and i'm
perial majesty of the Continent feels it in.
cumbent upon itself to be especially dig
| nified and reserved in demeanor, Young
Louis will be sure to cut some fantastic
caper which sets all the folk to laughing.
and convinces them that royalty Is capa-
be of quite as great absurdities as those
which dlsfigGre the plebian order. 1t is
true that Louis of Bavaria has good taste
and reasonably fair habits he is not a
morbid debaucher, nor an impairment
youngllng, always assuming upstart airs
toward the kingiy people who are stron-
ger and richer than he. But he is
queer and very unworldly. He seems to
; imagine that his kingdom will take care
OF itself, and that as he had the luck to
be born in the purple his privilege is to
amuse himselfby the qualification of such
whims as pass through his sprightly young
head.
King Louis subject had an idea that he
would settle down and become staid and
tranquil; that possibly he might turn out
a statesman, and even give Bismarck "a
point or two. But the more years King
Louis gets the less he seems to care for
the present century, and all that concerns
it. The only thing in which he is really
! consistent in his profound respects and
his firm support of Wagner and his mu-
steal enterprises. Nothing can check the
young royal patrons enthusiasm over the
operas, which he so much delights in that
he is said sometimes to call the singers
together at midnight in his own private
theatre, and to sit listening unweariedly
to them until dawn. He hates the noise
and glare of his capital he evidently be-
lieves in Goethe's maxim, ''On every
height there lies repose," and spends
much of his time among the mountains.
When he is wanted in the kingdom for
some imposing ceremony, at which his
presence is absolutely necessary, he is
sure to be missing, and a week or two of
vigorous search may perhaps result in
the discovery of the King in some forest,
or mountain top, where, surrounded by
musicians and painters, in some rustic
villa, he is amusing himself with his back
turned resolutely on the world.
Yet he is far from being averse to rich
ness of display and luxury of costume
He revels in architecture {; he is passion
ately fond of planning vast palaces and
| parks of reviving ancient court dresses
and formulas, and in every manner sepa-
rating the court as much from the world
as possible. He has recently led his peo-
| pie to complain little of his extravaganza
| by the announcement of one of the most
extraordinary projects that ever entered
/ young kings head
/ 1t may be remembered that King Louis
/ paid a visit to Paris sometime since He
| went in his usual fashion, pell- NELL, with
/ cut reflection, and did not even ask the
gentlemen Of his bed-chamber to put him
up change OF linen. Away he went,
post haste, clad in an English travelling
suit aud wearing a wide-awake hat with
a feather in it. The courtiers did not
miss him until they found that all the
Partisan Journalists had gone mad over
the arrival OF the ''most encentric" of
monarchs, who walks with a stage-stride
on the bouievards, and chatted promiscu-
ously in the crowds which he threaded by
I day and night. Back to Bavaria he
presently came, his soul afame with the
project which had prompted his visit to
France. lie proposes to copy the palaces
and parks Of Versailles within his own
dominions ; in word, although he now
has thirty chateaux, some of which are
among the finest of European regal dwell
ings. he has announced his intention of
duplicating and reviving, on an island,
in one OF the largest of the Bavarian lakes,
all the magnifcence of the times of Louis
XIV. The island commands a superb
view of the BayariaD Alps, eliminating
at the beautiful and wild series of gorges
aud passes near Salzburg. His people
stand aghast at the mighty expenditure
which he is to undertake, particularly
since he has just relinquished the idea of
completing Felsenburg, gorgeous series
Of palaces on which his architects have
been at work for several years, and which |
has already cost many million francs. |
But Louis has a fancy that a return to
the rich costumes and the splendid salons |
and gardens of Louis XIV's time would |
much crafty him and those who surround |
him, and he has vowed to reproduce |
Versailles IN toto, if he lives long enough |
We are told that nowadays, in the privacy |
of his palaces, he and his courtiers wear |
the costumes of the Grand Monarque I
and that when the young King walks
abroad, a bevy of pages dresser in the gala
garments of bygone centuries precedes
him.
Ofcourse, his erratic fancy will suggest |
improvements in the new Versailles which /
he is to build, and we may expect strue- |
ture which will set critical Europe at once |
to wondering and laughing. Young
Louis may perhaps some day regret that |
he did not expend the money which he
has beea lavishing on chateaux and parks
in securing the prosperity of his subjects, |
and thus endearing himself to them. He |
cares little for such reflections. 1t is idle |
to tell him that palace is often transit
tory JOY, and that even the noblest of
Louis XIV's palaces, Mary the Grand,
has long ago been leveled to the earth,
and the fields has long ago plowed above
its site. But, he neither builds nor lives
for the future, but for his royal, fantastic,
impetuous, wilIful SELF He means to
make his own artificial world; to live in
it, and to die in it. The purple curtain
shuts out from his vision all common and
vulgar things.
speeches ON the Election.