The Savannah morning news., 1903-06-24
DRAGA'S PARIS GOWN
COST QUEEN HER LIFE


ereign and His COnsort.
Paris Correspondence Philadelphia
Ledger.
1t is said to be certain that King
Alexander and Queen Draga were
warned that they were in danger of as
sassination. Quite recently the late
King transferred through Paris bank
over 100000 francs into safe keeping
in England. He himself was only too
anxious to leave Belgrade, but it is
asserted, piece of feminine vanity
interviewed and cost his own life and
the Queens.
Queen Draga had, to use her own
phrase. nothing to go away in" She
was awaiting the consignment of a par
ticularly smart travelling dress from
one of the principal Paris dressmakers.
This failed to arrive in time, the ar
rangements for flight were deferred and
just as II happens to people who linger
in burning house, escape was at last
cut off.
The Obrenovitch dynasty is now
merely memory. Here in France the
family disputes, which have accompa-
MED the history of the Servian royal
liliiliy LOT the ldSl twenty years, nave
been constantly before the public.
King Milan. was a frequent visitor to
Biarritz both before and after the pro-
ceedings which resulted In her separa-
ton from Milan. IT was there that
saw for the first time the late King
Alexander who was then a little boy
of II with long bare legs, very short
knickerboclers and tall straw,
49, IL.
ing about like other children on the
seashore with a pail and spade, and
with his big black eyes and neatly turn
ed features was Il distinctiVely pretty
boy. He underwent various accidents
even at that early age, and was on one
occasion with difficulty saved from
drowning.
His infantine beauty quickly changed
to gawky ugliness. The big, dark eyes,
which he inherited from his mother,
converted themselves into great bull
bous shortsighted orbs, overshadowed
by thick meeting black eyebrows, and
later in his life, shortly after his mar
riage, his increasing blindness forced
him to add a sharper trait of ugliness
to his appearance by the addition of
large convex spectacles with horn rims
This last was, however, unfamiliar to
the general public here, who remem-
Der the King simply as a fascinating
but turbulent lad, hopelessly spoiled
by a mother who chung to him with
that special sort of defiant affection
which is often the favorite attitude of
divorced or separated wives.
Queen Natalie in herself was the
type of the femme fatale," dark, hys-
terical and UNNECESSARILY tactless. She
represented. as did also in a great
measure Queen Draga, the clash be-
tween Western and Oriental ideas with
respect to women. She was a figure
out of one Of Sardous melodramas,
when she ought in reality to have is
sued from the Thousand and One
Nights" She insisted upon being Fee
dora when her real role was Fatima.
SerVia is so much closer TO the East
than most people imagine that they do
not appreciate as highly as they should
the value of these distinctions
To King Milan, who was with all
his faults, one of the most accom-
plished statesmen in Europe, a dlpl-
matist without a rival, the wildcat
complications in which his spouse in
volved him were confusing and abhor-
rent beyond expression. They forced
him to abdicate the throne which he
had filled with marked ability, and so
to precipitate a fatality, involving his
entire dynasty. of which from the first
he was prophetically conscious. Queen
Natalie won adherents among the SEN
timentalists Of Europe, and even to-
day she is looked upon with profound
respect as woman upon whom fate
has exhausted every conceivable mis-
fortune.
If Queen Draga had survived she
and Natalie would have been rivals
in popular commiseration. If there is
anything in poetic justice, It is right
that she should have succumbed in
the same tragedy as her husband. like
her mother-in-hw, whose lady-in-
waiting she had been, and whose con-
fidence she had betrayed, she. too,
was the typical femme fatale" of Slav
origin. She, too, was dark, good look
ing, imperious, half savage and IN off
spring Of that turbulent borderland
which divides the East from the West.
Milan, with his experience of Natalie,
his unsurpassed knowledge of the
world and Of women in particular,
foresaw clearly what the consequences
would be Of a marriage between his
son and Nine. Maschin. His advice,
however. was disregarded. and an
other family complication befell the
royal house Of Obrenovitch. The son
would have been wiser 10 have fol-
lowed his fathers guidance.
King Milan. when he saw that the
situation al Belgrade was no longer
tenable, had the good sense 70 abdicate,
and cast ia his Ia thencefOrward with
the boulevard life OF Paris. where, Ow-
ing 90 his peculiar methods Of playing
cards. he became known AZ the rOist-
quOuere. Al the American bars be
Was habifual consumer 81 cocktails.
and there often ma Prince Alexis
KnrageOrReyltch, n cousin ~ the neN-
iy proclaimed HeTyian King 1 never
noticed that they spoke 20 one another.
bot the private detectives, Who BY Or
der ~ fbs Minister 0f Fofeign Affairs
we're generally on the trail n both "