The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-06-05

| The Duchess of Alba, the first lady of
/ the land, after the queen and the royal
pTincesses, is the type of the Crande
dame of modern Spain. Proud, without
being naughty, but proud OF her de-
scent as King Philip was of his Span
lards- she Is descendant OF Fernan
Nunez. They tell a story of the duchess
which IS characteristic. When she
made her entree into Madrid society, a
graceful girl still in her teens. she was
| soon surrounded by many suitors fiut-
tering in the smiles of the rich heiresS.
She would have none of them. II will
only marry the bluess blood of Spain,'
she said to friend, and she kept her
word. She married the Duke of Alba.
The duchess is not a striking beauty,
and, like all Spariards, she is deeply
religious; in fact, something of a
bigot; but is a good, sensible, practical
mother, who educated her children
simply. Her eldest daughter, Donna
Sol, is a simple, unaffected, studious
school girl, not yet in society.
The Alba boys" are the most init
mate Dlaymates of the young king,
and ii is known that Queen Christina
is almost insanely particular as 10
whom she allows to associate with her
son. Like her husband, the duchess is
devoted to sport. She hunts, rides and
drives, and during the holidays, on the
family estates, near Seville, she dons
the tight-fitting suit, and broad
brimmed sombrero of the torreo, and
riding into the enclosure where the wild
steers are confined, takes part in the
excitement of teasing them with her
lance, and then sepa rating them from
the rest of the herd. She is a good sailor
and last year cruised in the Mediter-
ranean with her aunt, the eX-EmDresS
Eugene, on board the yacht Thistle.
One of the most prominent reDresen-
tativeS of the money aristocracy, in the
society world of Madrid, is the Mar
chioness of Manzanedo. No long line
of proud ancestors looks down upon
her; no ancient escutcheon bears her
armorial quarterings, but if beauty,
grace and elegance create a title of
nobility of their own, then nature has
abundantly endowed her with such a
title, and as this nobility is thickly
covered with riches, the Madridians
have welcomed this marchionesS to
their innermoSt circles.
The father of the Marchioness of
Manzanedo was a hatmaker; her hus-
band was a banker. Both amassed
great fortunes and the hatmaker be-
came Duke of Santona and Marquis of
Manzanedo. The dukedom he be-
queathed to his daughters eldest SON
in Spain one leaves a title where one
whistle lesser honors passed by
father the Marchioness took up her
residence in Paris and remained there
many years, where she became almost
more French than Spanish. But one
thing she could not eradicate from her
nature-the passion for the bull ring
and no big bul, fight found her absent
from the ringside.
In Madrid she occupies an old palace,
hidden among many big trees, on the
Paseo de Recoletos; in Paris she owns
a home near the Madeleine. All the
rooms are furnished with every known
modern luxury, and decorated with ar
tistic taste, and the proud Duchess of
Alba is one of the most intimate friends
of the "hatmaker's daughter"
Both the Marchioness and her eldest
daughter Maria, stand upon the edge of
"women's rights" they approach with
tact the equality of the sexes, and
when such topics as ancestry, old fam
lilies, and ancient lineage are preached,
they dismiss it with a jest and say:
"Ohl but that was so long ago." When
she goes to the country seat, Santona,
near the Bay of Biscay, she becomes