The sun., 1919-09-07
Rich Mems egacies the Great Not Always Unmixed Bless
Recipients of Such
Interpretations.
ty Often Appre.
bend "a String to
It," or the Loss Of
Public Esteem in
Being Annuitants

still some of them were considerah. =,
Indeed, the acceptance of these Lam.
cies to the sovereign had resulted IN
popular criticism as lacking in pro-
prlety and dignity, when the practice
was brought to a virtual close In thu
following manner:
A man had left his fortune to thu
Queen. He had been a promoter. and
the greater portion of his estate con.
sisted of shares in two unlimited LA.
bility companies. The late Earl Syd.
ney, who was at that time the Queens
principal adviser in her private finan.
cial matters, had the good sense to in.
duce her to refrain from intimatng
her acceptance of the legacy. The
reputation of the man led Lord Sydney
to urge the Queen to refuse the be-
quest. It was lucky that she did So
For about a year later the two prin.
cipal concerns in which the testator
had been a shareholder came to ter
rible grief. involving many thousands
in ruin and misery.
Had Queen Victoria accepted the
legacy, dlIf1OSl CNtiy ptllllN VI utT
then private fortune would have gone
to pay the creditors--and that only
in part. 1t was narrow escape; so
narrow, indeed, that the matter was
freely discussed in the daily press,
and Punch, the London comic weekly,
portrayed popular sentiment cor.
rectly when it published a most anus
ing cartoon, in which the Queen was
represented as the inmate of the poor,
house, in the familiar garb Of the
paupers of such institutions, with
Gladstone bringing her small pack
age of tea, and Disraeli mot yet then
Lord Beaconsfield) handing to her his
dole, a small paper parcel on which
was inscribed the word snuff"
1t was then that Queen Victoria
decided to accept no more legacies
from strangers, a practice followed by
her successors, the late King Edward
VII. and by King George V.
King of Spain Almost Caught
Alfonso XIII. showed himself equafv
sensible when he refused to accept
the bequest, amounting to some four
millions of francs, devised to him In
the will of Albert Sapene, Mayor Of
Montauban de Luchon, In the south
of France, a town which the young
monarch had occasionally visited But
he accepted the fortune of Don Ales-
sandro Soler of Madrid. who died a
bachelor, and with no legal heirs, and
who, according to official documents
and reports, was founding, yet was
welcomed as an equal in the most
exclusive circles of the Grandezza Of
Spain on the understanding that he
was In reality the offspring Of the late
Queen Christina of Spain by secret
ecclesiastical marriage In Italy with
an English artist of the name OF
Ward, a brother of her governess, be-
fore she became the consort OF King
, Ferdinand VII. and mother of Queen
Isabella II. of Spain.
The old Duchess of Galliera, vhs
born as a daughter of the Savoyart
noble house of Brignole Sale, died as
| the widow of the banker and contrac.
| tor Ferrari of Genoa, developed In the
closing years of her life an extraor.
| binary admiration for the English
horn Empress Frederick, mother Of
the eX-kaiser. On her will being
opened 1t was found that she had be.
| queathed her husbands palace in the
Faubourg st. Germain. in Paris, to the
late Emperor of Austria, for the use
of his embassy; her other metropo-
itan palace. inherited from her father,
the Marquis de Brignole Sale, looking
out on to the Place de la Concorde, to
| Leo XIII, for use as the official resi-.
cence of the Papal Nuncio In Paris,
and all her superb Jewels as we'll as
large fortune in stocks and bonds 10
| Empress Frederick. whom she scarcely
knew
Left All to Good Daughter.
The Empress left everything that
| she had inherited from the old Ouch
ess de Galliera,' as we'll as her noun
tain palace of Friedrichshohe, near
Hombers, to her favorite and youngest
! daughter, Margaret, married to Prince
Frederick Charles Of Hesse and who,
always on the very worst terms with
| her eldest brother, the Kaiser, has re-
Gently gone out OF her way Ia publicly
repudiate him and to disclaim any de-
sire to bring about his restoration
! She has never been able to forget or
| forgive the treatment to which he
subjected her father, and especially
her English mother. The Princess Is
the only one OF the former Emperors
near relatives who remains very rich
IL Is hardly necessary to add that
the eN-Kaiser accepted everything that
came his way in legacies, even II the
requests were contested by Indignant
and despoiled relatives of the testato7
and he was Obliged to fight IN court
AS recently as two years ago mo
Supreme Court OF the Empire at Lelp-
sic, in final appeal, confirmed the de-
cision of all the various lower Saxon
| courts setting aside the will by which
! Hermann Knorr, a leading citizen OF
Plauen, in Snxony, had left the butk o.
his fortune, amounting to some oVO'-
900 marks, to the ex-Ksiser, The teS-
tator intimated IN his will that he wa.
prompted to make this disposition Oh
| his fortune by his admiration for Eu-
peror William and by a sense OF deVo-
ton to the reigning house Of Hohen-
zollern- To his widow he left nothing
but a pittance OF 5000 u year.
The eX-Kaiser, instead OF seeking "
repair the wrong done 70 the w'io" ~
means Of a compromise, accepted NV
bequest in its entirety and refused "
surrender even the smallest portion "
poor Frau Knorr. who was thus e'' -
extreme poverty, So sreat TT2s i'N -.
dignation caused by his greed IN NV
matter at Plauen and throughout SAY