The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-07-18
CLIPPINGS OF INTEREST
 TO WOMEN AND MEN
A Good Story to Fill Space.

y+ 4. astouisbing to note the amount
 nsce that has been filled in the napers of the United States oy ne Story of Sophia Adelaide. the woman who died in New York a snort .ilno ago. having claimed all her ne pne that she was the daughter or Vueen Victoria and Prince Albert, anu enes she was changed at her pirtn TOT .ns s;s child of the Prince Consort and ms Morcanatic wife, the Countess de Reuss. This astonishingly improoapie, if not impossible, story. has been iooo for sensational readers at frequent ln- teryals during the past twenty years. According to 1t the Dowager Empress of Germany, mother of the present Emperor. instead of being the daughter of Queen Victoria, is really the daugn- fer of Albert and the Countess oe Reus. whom these foolish newspaper accounts choose to term his morganatc wife. the existence of whom history fails to record. I
 In the first place. the writers or tnIs ridiculous story of, pernaps. a povs deluded old woman. who had peeh toiu of her resemblance to the Queen until her feeble brain became fixed in the conviction that she was her daugntef, fail to understand what morganatlc marriage is A morganatic marriage in England is a marriage which IS ap- solutely legal, but in which the con- tracting parties simply make an agree ment that the offspring of the mar riage shall not inherit the throne or title of the father. The marriage IS as perfect as marriage can De, and no other marriage can be contracted ny either party without death or divorce sets them free. Therefore this mon- .-kn marriage of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert was null and void, he having wife living at the time.
 All the space filled by this poor old woman's story, is, therefore. devoted to the task of proving that Prince AL bert was a bigamist.
 There was for many years an inmate of the Insane Asylum at Tuscaloosa, Mrs. Shepherd, who thought she was Queen Victoria herself, and the hallu- cination was perhaps the result of a wonderful resemblance to the Queen. A resemblance to which her attention could have been told of her. What a sweet morsel to the good story gath erers this would have been, and not one whit more improbable than that of Sophie Adelaide" 1t is surely no less hard to believe that the Queen was changed for another, than that her first born was; and charged by the Prince she thought her husband for the child of the wife he had married mor- ganatically.
 Beautiful story this for credulous America. A story which makes poor, lone woman. who was picked up, i'll in front of grocery store a Queens daughter. born to wear the purple, and makes Queen Victoria only the mis- tress of Prince Albert and her children illegitimate.
 And yet this story has been tele- graphed abroad over the whole United States and has been the subject of col umns of writing in the most prominent dailies.
 If the writers and sellers of the in- congruous stories which get abroad do not see the facts and figures which wont fit. at least the readers should protect themselves by a little thinking, which might disclose the incongruities. For example. there is a dear old wo- man in Montgomery who claims to be 11s years old and her claims are sus- tained by her children with one of whom she lives
 After calling on her once and getting fine story" of how she lived when born. when married, what her habits and life had been to bring about this goodly turn of years. etc.. etc. a few little facts-stubborn facts-discovered at the latter end of the conversation. threw a damper over the buoyant spir- it's of the news-gatherer Some of the misfits were: She vas 113 years old. her youngest son was 40 years old. her only husband had been dead 50 years. The misfits were not chronicled and the story" went we'll There are some things more wonderful than being 1l3 old