El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1914-11-07
Large Estates of Her Hus.
band in Germany Will Be
Confiscated by Kaiser.


| X Brilliant beautiful queen Marie
more Russian than English, and
not at all German. is now the dominat-
ling character in the tense situation
here and will probably throw the ma
ton into warfare on the side of the
I allies despite her weak, unpopular HO-
| henzOnern husband, the new king Fer
/ dinanad, and despite the threatened
| confirmation of his enormous estates
] in Germany.
/ To this remarkable woman. now SO
] years old, married at 16, mother of
! three at p and now of six, has come
! an extraordinary opportunity to eXer-
| else her great gifts. This granddaugh-
1 ter on one side of queen Victoria and
\ on the other side of car Alexander,
will be able to marshal 500, 600 fairly
well disciplined troops for the inva-
! sion of Austria-Hungary.
A formidable task confronted Marie
when, for reasons of state she was
married to the crown prince Ferdi-
nand, 10 years her senior. He had
fallen in love with the charming, cul-
| tivated Helen Vacarescu, a woman act
ing as maid of honor to Carmen
sylvia" as queen Elizabeth of Rou-
mania signed herself to her poems
Helen Nacarescu wrote good verse, too.
The queen ChampiOned her cause, and
fled with the hansOme maid of honor
to Venice Here the queen was prac-
! tically arrested and sent with physi-
clans and nurses, although she was not
otherwise known to be i'll, for a two
year "cOnValescence' in a German cas-
tie. Helen Vacarescu was sent packing
to Paris, where she since has had d
brilliant literary career.
Marie found her new husband a stu
deus, non military and dreamy young
man, still under the charm of the
brilliant Helen. It was her problem
to conquer him and win his love How
well she has succeeded may be Judged
from the fact that while their eldest
son, the crown prince Carol, is now p,
they have a baby of two years.
Is Called Royal FIirt.y
Her method was the old time one of
exciting Jealousy She visited every
capital of Europe where she had rela-
uVeS and acted in such a free and
easy manner that she earned the So
briquet of the royal flirt" Really
nothing was ever proved against her
except that she some times played for
high stakes IN the company of vOung
army officers at fasc spas and sacinOs
But it worked. She soon had Nor.
husband at her feet and even irving
to bind her to him and to keep her
IN Bucharest all the time. IncidentaIlv
she had the advantage in her camDaig-n
of as much beauty as Helen Vacar-
eScu. The maid Of honor was how
ever, of the black eyed Latin tyue.
The RoumanianS are much like the
French-while queen Marie is a stril<-
ing, pink checked woman whose
peaches and cream complexion in her
prime were a wonder and q delight
So it was easy in the end for FeTdf-
nand to fall in love with his wife"
woman -incomparably superior to him
in will and intelligence
English Births Russian Sympathy.
Queen Marie was born in England
ana brought up partly in that country
and at COburg, Germany. Her father
was duke of Edinburg and later duke
OF SaXe-COburg and GOtha. But de-
spite this she was in her youth in
tensely Russian. This was due to the
influence of her mother, the grand
duchess Marie, who despite her mar
riage to an English nobleman with A
German title to boot, throughout her
life retained her membership in the
national church of her native land. fine
orthodox Greek rite.
With her prejudice in favor of ST.
Petersburg- too, queen Marie imbibed
from her mother a dislike of the Ger
man kaiser. The latter was constantly
in an unwarranted man
neT with the affairs of the duchies of
SaXe-COburg and GOtha and so humil-
iating the ruler, queen Marie's father
The 16 year old crown princess was
welcomed by the people of Roumania
il not by her husband Her sparkling
manner gave an excellent first i'm
preston. Then she was an excellent
linguist and in addition to her know
ledge Of English, German, Russian
French and Italian, she soon began to
speak good ROumanian, which is closer
to Latin than any other language now
living.
She brought about revivals Of Iod
CONTINUED on page 5, this section. col 81