River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1878-11-14
QUEEN CHRISTMAS LOVE.



fianzares aud spanish Grandee.
Queen Christina of Spain, may not be
altogether forgotten, though she has been
dead a month so, as she was Partisan
celebrity, send you few notes on her
life and character. l have had TO wait
for their completion, as my principal IN
formantant has but Just returned 10
France He tells me that the obituary
notices In the journals have missed the
main point in deyoting but few lines to
the subject of her union with Rianzares.
They should have begun with this man
and ended with hin, for she did nothing
after his death, and very little before she
met him. The story of her passion for
the young Spanish private soldier, Rian.
zares, is as wild as anything in Spanish
romance. She picked him out of the
gutter to share her throne. He was the
first man she ever loved and the last She
was young widow, the mother of two
princesses the future Queen Isabella be
ing one of them) when she first cast her
eye on this most fortunate
of subjects. Three years be-
fore that she bad been imported from
Naples (she was the daughter of the King
of the two Sicilles) to Madrid. to marry
the triply- widowed King of Spain.
Ferdinand VII. Love for Ferdinand was
out of the question, SO she fond poor
substitute for it III the qualification of
ambition by getting all power IN her
hands. The King, to do HIM justice, was
not exacting, and, as We have seen, be was
ob.iging enough to get himself gathered
| to his fathers within very short period
after their union. A bare quarter of a
year from that time, or ''ere those shoes
were oidn with which she followed Ferdi-
nand to the grave, she was secretly
married to Rianzares. He was then
known as Munoz, name bearing about
she same relation to his subsequent title
as Stodge docs 70 Montmorency. She had
chosen him in tue most curious way. She
was driving one day TO Buen- Retro with
the Court, when she dropped her glove
out of tie window of her carriage 1t
was picked up by young private soldier
of the guard. He handed it 10 her and
was falling back into his place, wien she
told him to romain by the carriage door.
He was han jsome and -proporioned,
a typical soldier of a corps d elite. The
Queen liked the look of him, and IN Spain
the look goes very geat way in
commencing men to the notice
of the other sex. The Span
ish women are either more simple OF
more sincere than their sisters of other
Nations, ard they never pretend TO ig-
more shapeliness Of body in favor Of mere
shapeliness of mind. Christina com
manded the young soldier 10 talk TO her
for her evident wish to enter into con
vcrsation with him was, OF course, an or
der. Any other man, under the stimulus
OF that golden opportunity, might have
talked his best. This one perhaps, aid
the same thing, but his best would have
made but poor worst Tor all but him
self. He was as shy as country clod.
His comrades, who saw what was going
on, thought he had missed his chance,
but they were wrong. Christina com
manded him to be always placed near
her, and promoted him on the spot. She
had determined to like him, or perhaps
that she had been long enough in the
trammels of Spanish courtly etiquette to
find a supreme charm in the very way
wardness of her tastes. There was every
reason why she should not deign TO cast
on Munoz the eye Of royal favor. He be-
longed, by birth, to the very lowest OF the
| peOpie his sister was washer|oman of
Tarancon. There was nothing to be said
for him, and, as we have seen, he had not
even anything to say for himself. Yet
in spite of this. Christina made him her
pick of all the world. The grandees
shrugged their shoulders, but made no
fuss; they take most things quietly in
Spain.
No man ever had moro splendid
chance. Her wish was law in the PENN
sula, his wish was law with her The
powers of miracle was offered to him; he
might have made the Government honest
or taught the people to work. But moth
ing of the kind ever came into his head.
For him, apparently, the chief effect of
the marriage on his fortunes was that 1t
improved tho quality of his cigarettes.
Every body laughed at him, with one ex-
ception-his wife. A clod for everybody
/ else, he was still hero for her. The case
was not altogether without precedent
| According to the poets, certain Queen,
| Consort, contemporary with Theseus, had
once loved in much the same way. Only
Titania's illusion lasted barely night.
and Christmas lasted lifetime. Her
passion transformed all the defects of
Munoz into qualities. His heaviness
was sincerity and simpleness of nature,
his bluntness of the barrack-room was the
honesty of second infant Washington
who could not lie. He certainly never
went cut of his way to try to seem other
than he was; and perhaps that was her
best excuse for loving him. He was al
ways Christopher Sly in the Dukes
/ chamber, dazed and more than half GUS
pecting that it was all dream, but think
ing it best to keep his own counsel while
waiting for developments. She advanced
his fortunes in every way, and he was
passive as clay in the hands of the potter,
He went on smoking cigarettes. She
made HIM grandee of the first class
cigarettes. She gave him the Golden
Fleece cigarettes again. And by Louis
Philippe created him Duke Of Montmor-
OF Christina had already made him
Duke of Rianzares) and decorated him
with the Grand Cross of the Legion of
Honor. This was to mark the citizen
Kings gratitude Tor Christmas plisncy
to French views on the question of the