The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1901-08-09
A WISE AND COOP EMPRESS.

The untmely death of the Emperor Frederick H. the
beloved "Unser Fritz the German people, prevented
his wise learned and altogether admirable wife from
coming into the natural fruon of her powers and that
dignity and distinction worlds eye which were hers
By right of personal qualities well through birth
and marriage In the and retirement of her widow
hood with other ideas and Influences than her
mating the country which became hers by adoption
helper and coworker. the Empress Frederick has at
Tacted little attention for princess who de-
cared by unusually good judges the educated
abIest woman Europe.
The world closed to narrow proportions for her in
1885, when her noble and broadminded husband sue
cumbed to the dreadful maady cut short
her life Her son. the reigning kaiser was never in
such harmony with her as her husband had been for
before his brief period Of power couneos
her taste have held his confidence to the exclusion
Of his mothers advice and views.
In Germany such conditions left the widow of Freder
lex little choice between unseemly opposition futile
at best to her own and retirement from public life
The latter inevitable for Of her character
and devotion to her husband and his memory
But those who have anything of the family in
fuences and affairs Of the German court have understood
that the Dowager Empress possessed such strength Of
mind such nobility Of purpose such learning sympathy
with the spirit of progress and freedom such great
knowledge Of current affairs that she could i'll be spared
active force in the life the German nation It
viii always be source Of deep regret to many welIn-
formed Observers the worlds changes and movements
that Unser Fritz" and his wife have ruled Ger
many together in their liberal calm farseeng way
at least twenty years.
that had been possible the history of the past quar-
ter of century might have been different in its spirit of
development of popular government if not in the outward
course of international affairs Under such conditions
the good whose dseasedarkened and bereaved life
ended this week might have rvaled the career of her
mother Queen Victoria hardly in the Importance of her
personal work but in the impression would have made
upon the world by her breadth of view her nobility of
character and her devotion to high standards of living
The Empress Frederick was only eleven years Of age
when she first met her future husband who was visiting
London at the time of the famous of 1851 At
fifteen she betrothed and her marriage came when
she had hardly reached the age seventeen She was
mother at eighteen and bore eight children before she
was thitytwo At fortyseven she became empress and
three months later was a widow
Sue had seen much Of life in its weighties phases
her family were senng fast and her great learn
ng had rpened into wisdom She was at the very ne
dan Of ner in the funess of opportunities for
good 1t was asc great misfortune that she should then
be forced into retirement that death seems now the
echo Of an earlier tragedy.
But such a life is never lost or lived in vain. Wise
and good women too seldom expresses even for a
brief space of time. The world will always be better for
the troubled bghed and yet unevent career of Victoria
Adelaide eldest child Of Queen Victoria of the sec
ond emperor of the Germany, mother Of the most
picturesque and strenuous Of European sovereigns Kaiser
Wilhelm t.