The Russellville Democrat., 1880-04-15
Ex-Queen Isabella Looking Up.
 N N Wnrld

It is curious to observe the rehabilita- tion of Isabella of Spain in public opin- ion. No monarch and no woman could have been in a worse case than when she fled here across the Spanish frontier after the revolution. She was both a political and social outcast; in fact, her social enormities had entailed her po- litical ruin, but she kept her head up, and, having the wherewithal of ex- emplary patience in the shape of we'll filled purse, she has live scandal down. She goes everywhere, even, as we have seen, to Madrid, and was, moreover, about the only one of the illusterous per formers at the wedding ceremony who, as the actors say, ''got hand from the crowd" I suppose she owes much of this to certain bonhomie of manner. She has a grandmotherly way of smil- ing on everybody, which captivates the crowd. She condeseends amazingly for any Queen and especially for Queen of Spain. She takes part in public fetes of charity where money is taken at the doors, and the other day l saw her, of all the places in the world, at little fourth-rate theatre in the Rue Taitbout. 1 had gone there to see troop of Span- ish dancers, the real article from the pen insula, no Parisian imitation. and the Queen, as it chanced, had come to pat ronize them on the same evening. They had hastily extemporized a roal box by tricking out of the front of the balus- trade with scrap of fringed ,elvet not much deeper than Scetchman's kilt. Isabella was attended by the Marquis de la Puente, who looks after her palace in the Avenue du Roi de Rome, and by the Marchioness. The house took no notice of her, but she took some notice of the house, smiling round upon it in her grandmotherly way, and even nodding to some acquaintance in the audience. The entertainment was completely and sincerely Spanish in character It was all ballet, from first to last, not word was spoken, though good deal was sung in that lew, monotonus chant which is the most exciting of all accompani- ments for the Spanish dancer. In one scene a little, plump woman gave all the incident of bull fight First she dis played the darts which they stick in the bull to rouse him to fury; then she came out as picador and hurt him with her lance, getting her imaginary horse gored in return and herself hobbling of with well-feigned sprain caught in the fall. At last she appeared as a matador, ask ing permission to kill the bull. In the real arena the matador has to advance to the royal box, and as there happened to be royal box in the sham arena at the Theatre Taitbout, the actress seemed to think she might bring the Queen into the play. She accordingly preferred her reaust for permission to kill in sonorous Spanish to that most Catholic of prln- cess, and Her Majesty, liking the humor of the thing, nodded to her gentleman in attendance, who laughingly gave the word, to the delight of every Spaniard in the house. These exlles, voluntary and otherwise, much as they might hate each other at home, seemed to find common ground of patriotic reconcilia- ton in the bloody dust of the bull ring. While the imaginary bull was being finished, Isabell was the most popular Queenin Christendom-that is to say, for at least two minutes and half