Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-06-16
THE FORTUNES OF KINGS
Bv T. c. OMahonev

at stroke both his wealth and his regal
position, his entire private fortune is invested
IN the banks and securities of foreign countries.
King George is not the only European SOW
erelgn who is mindful OF the fate of Louis
Philippe, whose property confisCated by
the French revolutionaries when they expelled
him from the State in IS4S. The Gar of
Russia finds so much similarity between his
present position and that of the French Kings
before the revolution that he has intrusted
small portion of his private savings to the
national banks of England and France. Among
the other foreign securities in which his personal
fortune is invested are the stocks and bonds of
the Pennsylvania Railroad. 1t is interesting
to note in this connection that the Car derives
a large proportion of his income from the sale
OF wines made from grapes grown upon his
private estates in the Crimea
The savings of Christina, the Queen mother
of Spain, are also invested in the Bank of
England, as were those of the late King
Humbert of Italy. The late unfortunate
Empress of Austria was very economical, and
laid aside two-thirds of her annual income
in the same institution. The governors of
the bank had no little trouble after her death
account of the fact that the benefciaries
OF her will refused to pay the succession duties
required by British law. The Sultan of Turkey
IS another prudent ruler who refuses to trust
the banks of his native land and like the Others
sends his savings across the English Channel.
A Sad Lesson
EEWif any of the monarchs of oden times were
L as thrifty as those of to-day. 1t was hard
for them to learn that conditions have changed
and that they no longer control the resources
of the world The memory of their former
power made them spenders rather than savers,
and it was difficult lesson for them to realize
that they would enter into competition with
their subjects if they desired properly to
support their status. So strong was the
feeling on the part of the nobility that useful
work meant degradation, that in times gone
by in France any nobleman who desired to
enter business had to surrender all the rights
and privileges of his rank and deposit in the
parliamentary archives all the papers and
documents bearing on his title and position
But revolutions, and the accompanying cur
tailment of the revenues of royalty and the
nobility, and the unwillingness of the people
of modern days to submit to taxation for the
purpose OF supporting in idleness the great
host of titled persons with their poor relatives.
have forced the strictest economy upon the
regal houses of Europe.
The story of the misfortunes of expatriated
Kings and mobiles in latter days also had its
salutarv effect. The Stuarts of England,
Louis XVIII, and Charles X. of France were
obliged to live on charity after they were
driven from their Kingdoms. The United
States has been the temporary home of many
throneless monarch and penniless noble
Napoleon III. as an adventurer Louis Philippe
a poorly paid school teacher, the and
heir of the last King of Naples as the driver
of New Jersey milk wagon, not to mention
the missing French Dauphn who was found
SO often by schemers and enthusiasts along
the Mississippi
Don Carlos, the Infant of Spain, was re-
duced to such straits that he was forced to
pawn in Milan the je&eled insignia of the
Order of the Golden Fleece, trinket once the
property of the great Emperor Charles V.
Ex-Queen Isabella, before She found pro-
tectress in the person of the mother of Alfonso
Kill, was compelled to sell her most precious
jewels at public auction in Paris. And the
same city the scene of the death of one
of the sisters of the late King of France, who
for years had lived there unknown and in
direst poverty.
The Writing on the Wall