Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1882-05-22

A Report that Princess Beatrice IL
TO Marry Prince Frederick Will
liam.

youngest daughter, ana frlnce FREEZER
lex William, eldest son of the Landgrave
of Hesse.
Beatrice, the last and youngest of the
Queens daughters, falls into the hands
of the gossipers, as there are no more to
marry. The Berlin telegram affirming
her engagement to the dull young Prince
of the dissolute old Landgrave of
Hesse may be regarded with good deal
of distrust. First, because Beatrice, who
has a will of her own, has declined all
suggestions of mating while her widowed
mother lives, and, second, because the
Prince to whom she is assigned has none
of the characteristics that the Queen
exacts in her son-in- laws. At Hei-
delberg the young man was not only dis
solute, as all Princes are, but he was
unusually dull even for Prince, and
whatever else may be said of the present
brood of the House of Hanover, no one
can call them dull-specially the later
groop of women folk. Beatrice is the
ideal of Princess. In the bloom Of her
life-born in 1856-the Princess has been
the unspoiled darling of the town and
court since her big brothers and sisters
scattered to the various duties that are
now assigned royalty. Her christening
assembled great retinue of royalties, in
Guiding her sister Victoria, then just
married to Frederick William, the King
of Prussia's eldest son, and the great
uncle of the young man now set down
to be her affianced husband. The nam
ing of the infant was left to the Duchess
of Kent, her grandmother; but the
Queen selected the first of the
three names bestowed upon the
Princess, Beatrice, and the others in honor
of her kinsfOlk. Prince Albert was fool
ishly proud of the new baby by all odds
the handsomest child the Queen had
borne him. His letters to German rela-
tives were filled with rapturous descrip-
tions of baby blue eyes and Saxon fea-
lures. Long before the Queen was able
to be about, the Prince had a daily rol-
lick with his little ''Trix." Her educa-
ton since the death of her father has
been carried on by ''royal governors" in
the Queens household. and Beatrice. like
Louise, was said in 1877 to have set her
heart upon a charming young fellow
who had made his modest and manly
character known in drawing and poetry.
He was switched off suddenly to India
in the train of Lord Lytton, and
has since come to distinction as
preacher Canon Duckworth was
also accredited with a nearer and
dearer place than religious instructor in
the young Princess heart. The most
remarkable episode of all in the Princess
life was the famous courtship of young
Louis Bonaparte, the luckless son Of
Eugene. killed by the Zulus. The youth
and maiden had known each other as in.
timately as royalties ever come 10 know
each other. during the occasional visits
of the Queen to France, when Beatrice
and LOUIS played hide and seek in the
fragrant parterres of st. Cloud, and pro.
badly made mud pies under the spray of
the fountain under the discreet indul-
gence of their several escorts. When
the imperial exiles took up their resi-
dence at Chiselhurst, near London, the
Queen and Beatrice were frequent visi-
tors at the widows palatial hearth,
and Eugene and her son were
not less frequently at Windsor.
During his four terms at
Woolwich Prince Louis was always well
coined at Windsor for his holidays, and
the Princess Beatrice was always one of
the party 1t was announced semi Off
cially in 1878 that the Queen was seri-
ously considering the union of the two
favoring it, first, because it would keep
her daughter near her, or, if not, the
union would be beneficial to the two
countries should the Bonapartes ever
reach the throne again. But against it
was the act of Parliament against mem
Der of the reigning family marrying a
Catholic, and the inveterate hatred of the
Queens relatives-the Orleans family. 1t
was confidently claimed in Tory circles in
London at the time the Prince went to
Zululand that he was going to win the
hand of Beatrice. 1t is certain that
Beatrice went into mourning, and was
like a daughter to the unhappy Empress
during the miserable weeks intervening
between the massacre and the arrival of
the body at Chiselhurst. A portrait of
the Princess was among the effects re,
moved by the valet from the dead
Princes body. Perhaps the most con-
vincing evidence of the engagement was
the formal protest of the Ambassador of
the French republic, of which Lord
Beaconsfield never took the slightest no
tice.
No end of husbands have offered them
selves for the young ladys considera-
ton. Oscar of Sweden would have made
her heiress to that throne. The beautiful
and melancholy Amadeus of Savoy,
sometime King of Spain, brother of the
King of Italy, was willing to allure the
faith of his fathers and lay his widowed
heart at the charming girls feet. She
could have married the adventurous
nf Da4fo,o
berg, whom the Gear put upon
the Bulgarian throne; but had
she been willing her brother, the
Prince of Wales, would never have con-
sented, that disreputable reprobate
having practiced his Berlin Barrack man.
ners among the Maids of Honor at MARI
borough House, and run the risk of get
ting his nose pulled or his ears cut off by
outraged British brethren and husbands.
The Queen, it was said, would have seen
her daughter married to the widower of
the Princess Alice had not the law
against marrying deceased wife's sister
stood in the way.
English grumbling has been for the
last six or seven years loud and piquant
at what is called the seclusion of Beat
rice. In summer she is immured at Bal
moral with no companions but the un-
canDy neighbors of the glens and the
few guests that the Queen invites to her
favorite retreat. In the winter she keeps
with the Queen on the Isle of Wight or
Windsor, and when she comes to London
it is only for an hour or two on the spe-
cial pleading of her brother, the Prince
of Wales, whom she adOres. But it may
be doubted whether she considers her
life gloomy one. She is gifted intellec,-
tually and shocks her mother by an
irrepressible fondness for not only
the most radical thinkers, but
an enthusiasm for Thackeray,
which all his abuse and sarcasms of her
ancestors, the Georges, cannot diminish
a whit. She has herself written many
charming children's stories with illustra-
tions. She draws well, paints with grace
recites with unusual power, and in fact
would be called an accomplished woman
in any rank of life. A writer in the
London Truth said of her recently: "The
Princess inherits the musical instincts of
her race, and is able to make the talent
tell in company. The public know her
only by sight; her pretty cold face ap-
pears photographed in every shop win
dow, and is familiar to all Windsor peo-
pie, for she drives, rides and walks in
the immediate neighborhood of the castle
constantly. Reserved and proud in tenn
permanent, she can scarcely be called
favorite, yet many stories of her filial de-
votedness are told. She has the reputa-
ton of being the cleverest member of the
royal family in fact, it may be doubted
whether there be any unmarried Princess