The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1891-11-13

few, restricted almost entirely Go men wne
have been relieved from their active duties
in connection with royalty and permitted
to retain the dignity. They are styled
"extra" lords, grooms or equerrles In
waiting.
With regard to the ladies in waiting
much the same rule prevails. Thus the
czarina has large number OF honorary
ladies in waiting or danes d'honneur,"
and also maids of honor, who rarely, If
ever, appear at court, who have no duties
to perform, and whose connection with the
empress is limited to their right of wearing
her medallion portrait attached by rib
bon to the left shoulder of the dress. In
Austria every lady of noble birth and IN
blemished character. whose ancestry is free
from plebeian contamination, is able to Sc
cure on application diploma which en-
titles her to describe herself as ''palast
dame" or lady of the palace" to the EN-
press. At the court of Berlin there are no
honorary Offices of this kind for ladies, and
the title of dame d'honneur or maid OF
honor is restricted to those actually in at
tendance on royalty.
In Italy three or four of the leading la
dies of the nobility in each of the principal
cities of the kingdom have received per
mission to describe themselves as ladies IN
waiting to Queen Marguerite, although
they are never called upon to perform any
duties in connection with the office, which
is one of a purely honorary nature. Among
their number are two American girls who
have married members OF the Roman arls-
tocracy.
Queen Victoria has only about dozen
ladies, including the Dowager Duchess OF
Bedford and the Dowager Countess OF
Mayo, whose connection with her house
hold is of an honorary nature All the
others may be described as being in active
service. They bear the title, not OF Ia
dies in waiting, 4" but Of ladies" and WON
en-" of the bedchamber, while the young
unmarried girls in attendance on her
majesty are described as ''maids of honor"
and are authorized to prefix the word
honorable before their Christian names.
Thus, Miss Mary Adeane, although not
the daughter of peer, is addressed not as
Miss Adeane," but as ''the Honorable
Mary Adeane."
Although an excellent, motherly and
kind hearted woman, the queen Is an ex-
ceedingly exacting and capricious mistress
to her ladies. She is apt TO take sudden
and unaccountable dislikes to the faces and
appearance of those about her, which ne
cessitates the Withdrawal from court of
those 10 whom they belong lean recall to
mind an instance of this in which the vic
tim was not lady but man. He Is well
known in the United States, having mar
ried Boston girl The late prince consort
appointed him to the post of groom in
Rn% Tho the end of hIa
fifth or sixth wait" conceived dislike
Of his appearance She complained that
his body was too long for the extremely
abbreviated legs, and that the latter vera
moreover DETECTED in such manner as to
give them an exceedingly ridiculous aspect
when encased in knee breeches and silk
stockings
The queens favorite lady is Lady
Churchill, wko must not be COMPOUNDED
with the American wife of Lord Randolph
Churchill. 1t is Lady Churchill who is
par excellence her majesty's confdant
since the death of the lamented Marchion-
ess of Ely 1t is she who is charged with
the dsagreeable duty of conveying to
those who have incurred the royal dis
favor the intelligence that they have
ceased to please and that their presence
is no longer desired 1t is she. too, who
reads the queens letters and newspapers
to her, who advises her majesty with ref
erence to the court appointments, and
who in short transacts all those duties Of
a companion and amanuensis which do
not enter the domain of the queens pri-
vate secretary and keeper of the privy
purse, General Sir Henry Ponsonby.
AN EX-DIPLOMATIsT