The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-06-04

s.From Memory's Shrine," the reminis-
 cences of Carmen Sylva; H. M. Queen
 Elizabeth of Roumania. Translated
 from the German by her majesty's de-
 sire, by her former secretary, Edith
 uonkirk. (J B. Lippincott Co.,, Phila-
 delphia), s2.50.
 This remarkable book might well have been entitled, ''The Heart of a Princess" " for here is the unveiling of a royal heart. It ia not as the author queen names 1t a heart that resembles "a graveyard thronged with memories Rather it is a. plot where resurrected memories shine like lilies freighting the air with aroma of hope; a plot where angels come and go touching the bitter pool of life's tears with a troubling of the waters that makes for healing, healing of the ills that grief and sorrow bring. Carmen Sylva was born Princess of Wied. December 29, 1S43, in a castle upon the Rhine, which for a thousand years had been the home of her ancestors.
 Through a childhood saddened, despite the glamour that beats about throne by the illness and death of dear ones the lit tie princess yet preserved happiness and health that must have come to her a gift of the gods rather than by inheri- tance. Her father, Prince of Wied, was dying of consumption, her mother was an invalid, unable to walk a step, or even to move from an invalid's chair.
 This flow of spirits, probably unusual to the little inmates of palaces, won for the small Princess many nicknames not considered complimentary. so sedate were royal children supposed to be-"Whirl- wind' and Twill O the Wisp'' she was called. It was in this period of exuber- ance that she on one occasion exclaimed to her mother: Mamma, I feel as If could carry away mountain" And the queen quaintly remarks in the present vol ume:. Alas, I have sometimes thought since that my needless words must have been overheard by fate!'
 Later a much prettier nickname was given the princess by the statesman, Clement Perthes, 'The Hundredth-and- First" because out of a hundred little girls not one could be found in the least like her. still better name was bestowed by the beloved governess of her mother, Fanny Lavater-"Little Sunbeam.
 It was Fraulen Lavater who brought brightness into the life of the child where iron discipline was the rule.
 Not for the little republicans to today Is such a training as this child received, yet the sons and daughters of freedom might be the better for some of this Spartan up-bringing Trained, writes Carmen Sylva, i've were to carry out un- uustioningly and with military prompt ness and exactitude whatever orders were given us. For this was in the old days, when 1t seemed that children had come into the world just to do what they were told, and learn whatever was taught them. Nobody thought of asking them if they found it tedious restraint to behave properly, nor were they consulted as to whether their lessons bored them"
 The elders set the young people of those old days the best of examples: People in those days knew how to be bored to death with the utmost decorum.' '
 It Is not an inviting picture given of the bare school room. bare of comforts, not of educational helps, that is given hard benches from whose too great height little legs dangled. Moreover the little girl wore often, sometimes even being compelled to walk about in it, contriv-