The evening tribune. (Pawtucket, R.I.) 189?-190?, 1897-05-07
IT MIGHT OFFEND US.
Why FRANCE WILL NOT TAKE PART
IN vlCToRIA's JUBILEE.

- President Feure Were Invited. Presi-
dent Mckinley Must Be Asked ~ Well.
Complications That would Ensus-Puz-
sling Question OF Precedence.
1t is all owing to President Mckinley
that President Faure has not been in.
vited to attend the jubilee festivities in
London next month. Great pressure was
brought to bear upon the queen and
upon the government with the object of
getting President Faure asked. The
newspapers were full of the matter, and
the project was everywhere greeted with
the warmest expressions Of approval.
But all of a sudden it was intimated
In the highest quarters that it would be
impossible to invite President Faure
without inviting the president of the
United States, and for some reason or
other an impression got abroad that, al.
though the chief magistrate of France,
who is famed for his bonhomie and who
was brought up III England, would
make no difficulty about precedence
and. in fact, create no fuss, willing, in
deed, TO accept with genial indulgence
all the arrangements made for his re-
ception, yet that it would be necessary
TO be much more punctilious and in
every sense Of the word more particular
with the president of the United States.
The opinion was expressed that capi-
tai would be made in America if Major
Mckinley appeared to be treated even
with the faintest suspicion of less con-
sideration than the emperor of Russia
or Of Austria, and that therefore his
participation in the festivities might in
the end prove productive of more i'll
will than of friendly feeling.
This was the view taken in official
and foreign circles. 1t is said to have
been confirmed by private letter from
the British embassy at Washington. and
accordingly, as it was held impolitic
under the circumstances to invite the
president of the United States, it was
resolved to abandon the idea of asking
President Faure.
1t is impossible to deny that this de-
cision has proved source of keen re-
gret to the people at large in England,
for there is no doubt that if the chief
magistrates of the two greatest repub-
lies in the world had been invited and
had accepted, their presence at the cele-
bration would have constituted the most
picturesque feature of the ceremonies.
BY virtue of their position as rulers they
would have preceded all the foreign
princes and princesses of the blood who,
to the number of more than 100, are to
figure In the grand procession on the
anniversary day.
The only hitch that there would have
been would have consisted in the pres
ence of the kings of Belgium and of
Saxony, both OF whom, according to
present arrangements. are to come to
London for the jubilee, for, while on
the one hand it would be preposterous
to expect that the rulers of two such
great powers as the United States and
France should follow meekly in the
wake Of couple of kings of third or
fourth rate who are classed under the
head of "petty sovereigns," yet it may
safely be taken for granted that these
two anointed of the Lord would have
been borrifed at the notion of yielding
the "pas'' to couple of men whom
they regard as of plebeian birth, who
have no royal blood in their veins and
whose dignity is merely ephemeral and
due to the maneuvers of some political
caucus. -Marquise de Fontenoy in Chi
cago Record.