The National tribune., 1907-11-14

| lfiTOUe 10 just siS CdTGlully dS
that of the royal person who occupies
| the throne. be it either father or moth
er. A great deal of the trouble which
| foreign countries have experienced in
| the past has arisen from the question
| of succession. and consequently when
Heaven has given them an unquestioned
| heir they have cherished it very care
| fully. Even in this country we concern
| ourselves good deal over the safety
| of the life of the Vice President. and
| he and the President never travel on
the same train. The hopes of Nation
rest in the baby Alfonso of Spain, and
when the trip to England was planned
recently. that the King might consult
the English specialist with regard to his
health. il was decided that 1t would not
do to expose the baby to the same pos
sible accident which might befall his
royal father. Consequently the real
Prince of the Asturias was sent on sew
eral days in advance, while the King
and Queen carried with them nice
big. rag-doll baby dressed in the little
| Princes clothes, and SO wrapped up
and vailed that no one could ever have
told the difference. To provide against
any doubt of the identity of the real
Prince should anything happen to the
| dummy and the royal pair, u formal
state paper was prepared before the
journey was made, duly signed by court
authorities at Madrid. which clearly
stated all the circumstances of the case.
The Grand Duke and Duchess of
Tuscany have certainly experienced to
the last degree the sharpness of the
serpent's tooth in the thanklessness of
their two eldest children, the ex-Arch-
duke Leopold of Austria and the noto-
rious Princess Louise, who is also an
I
The Duke and his Duchess are rigid
Catholics. exceedingly proper and con-
ventional in all their views of life, and
the conduct of their son and daughter
has been the great sorrow of their
| lives. The ex-Archduke first incurred
their displeasure by marrying a SOU
brette of Vienna, and removed himself
still further from their sympathy when
he upheld his sister in her affairs. prin-
| cipaly the disgraceful elOpement with
Giron, the tutor of her children. Never
theless. his parents fOrgave him for all
this, and had great hopes of his set
Ting down" when he procured divorce
from his actress wife. Hardly had he
obtained his freedom, however, before
he made a second marriage even more
Objectionable than the first, his second
choice being formerly a Berlin cham
bermaid. AS for the eX-Crown Princess
of SaXony. as everyone knows, she has
lately further distinguished herself by
marrying an Italian pianist, Sig. Toselli,
who. it is said, will shortly visit this
country professionally. accompanied by
his wife. The poor Grand Duke is in L
very critical, condition of health. and
the shame and grief brought upon him
by these two children is supposed to be
responsible for it.
We have abundant proof that the
| lives OF those who tempt fate are often
the longest and to this fact the old sea
captains who SUN themselves along the
pleasant main street and sit around the
Sociable grocery post office of our New
England fishing villages attest. OF the
strenuous life much is said and written.
and the man or woman in the public
| eye is generally made conspicuous by
| the exercise of some unusual mental or
| physical activity The magazines and
newspapers are full of accounts of the
doings of such people, and laterly have
appeared the biographies of two of the
most wonderful of all these strenuous
characters-Ellen Terry and Sarah
| Bernhardt. These two women, one
English and the other French-sO diff
ferent in most respects, alike only in a
certain recklessness, shall we say
were the leading actresses of the world
for lifetime. and their personalities
| have ever been of the liveliest interest
to the public Nothing like the ven-
lturesomeness of Ellen Terry from be-
| ginning to end has ever been seen. in
her marrying first at 16 a man old
enough to be her grandfather, and then.
the other day at 60, one young enough
to be her son. The English lady seems
to have been waited into fame and for
tune on pleasant airs in spite of her
self almost, and with what graceful
IcarelessnesS, with what gay, simple
ltrustfulness has she dashed thru it all,
her foibles. failings and frailties! IL is
this freshness. this breeziness, this
charm of uncertainty that made every
one love Ellen Terry, and which has
made it so easy to forgive and forget
some of the mistakes which her ven-
turesome nature led her to commit.
Sarah Bernhardt's way has been differ
ent, but not less delightful. Her life
has been full of change. but not so
Ibutterfiy-like as Ellen Terry's. The
lfiercely for all the honorS she has won.
Starting with little or no real talent for
acting she has by the hardest kind OF
work. in the face of jealousies, antag-
lonisms and all sorts of obstacles, made
lherself great actress. The thin. pale
girl who wanted to be q nun has by
). her indOmitable will and energy put
herself where she is to-day. All the
thine she was acting she was also work
ing at sculpture and painting, and the
warning of her managers that she was
killing herself only drove her to furious
enjoyment in new tasks. In her Mem
oirs' she tells many stories of famous
people whose lives touched hers at some
point She tells how she made Victor
Hugo weep at her acting of "Hernani.
and that in acknowledgment of this he
lsent her a beautiful diamond, unset,
which he said was the tear he shed
This was certainly very gallant in the
celebrated novelist, but enc wonders II
he would have put such high value
on his tears if he had not considered
himself a great genius. In her book
she pays very pretty tribute to the
women of Boston. and speaks in terms
of high praise of America and Ameri-
cans generally. 1t is to be hoped that
she will give the public another vol
ume of Memoirs" as there are many
interesting incidents in her remarkable
career which she has not touched upon
at all in this first volume.
Every little while some foolish. un-
comfortable person arises from obscur-
ity, protesting against the dear old fairy
stories, such as "Bluebeard," Little
Red Riding Hood" etc. 1t is claimed
that these stories are unfit for children
ultimately destroying their appreciation
of the Importance of truth. An icono-
, clast of this character has lately ap-
, peared, who proposes that instead OF
:, giving the children these dearly beloved
f-1a 60 nc