Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1923-10-04
.Ouarre1inq With One Cro10m

M probably often feIt, though rarely
betrayed by crowned heads, King
George of Greece cries out, cts rotten job
being a king, I've tried it, SO I know. "
While the American correspondent who thus
reports his majesty's emotions may have
been a bit free in rendering modern Attic
prose into United States vernacular, the
meaning expressed is, doubtless, true enough
to the original. The present ruler of the
Hellenes following as he did the graceless
Constantine, would have had at best
bumpy road. The finances of his realm he
found sadly beggared, and its general condi-
ton out Of joint. To make internal trou-
bles worse came the onslaught of the Turk
and, while the ache Of that disaster was
still uncAred, the robber aggressions Of
Mussolini-enough to try the stoutest heart
and strongest head, let alone the callowest.
Louis the Fourteenth, whose course of
monarchy did not run entirely smooth once
G2cIared: THE profession of the king is
great, noble, and delightful, if one but feels
equal to performing the duties which it in
wolves" Next to being equal to great de-
mands, there is no virtue like feeling equal
to them Faith coRquers all things, or at
least keeps the battle blithe. That the
Grand Monarque' played his role of more
than three-score years and ten with a daz-
zlfng verve must be owned. Yet, at last,
49,
esty of its externaIs, and you have merely
jest"
Whether or no George of Greece is beset
with insomnia we are not appraised The
malady, however, is one most incident to
kings, as ages ago the first of the Ian
eastrians testified:
Canst thou, o partial sleep! give thy
repose
To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude;
And in the calmest and most stillest
night
With all appliances and means to boot,
Deny it to a king? Then happy low
ie-dOWni
Uneasy lies the head that wears a
crown.
The fourth Hen evidc lacked sue
corfng sense of humor which his ampler-
spirited son possessed. If one can but laugh
a-d sleep, one can nd-,e o".rt and crown;
elsewise it must be, in sooth, "rotten bust
ness" Al Raschid, of glorious Bagdad,
; never proved so casccious as in slipping
Iay from the palace to hobno6 incognito
With fishermen, huckstc@s, and delightful
,roo h fro u-i6o
Nor was there ever a happier model for
burdened rulers than that Immortality merry
old soul who "callcd for his pipe, and called
for his bowl, and called for his fddlers
three" Old King Cole, by heroicaIly refus-
ing to take himself too seriously, kept his
! wits warm and his heart kind. Sycophants
tempted him to think more highly of him
self than he should the "intellectuals" did
their uttermost to befuddle him, and the
Bolshevists to eXasperate him; the world, the
flesh and the Devil conspired to make him a
solemn, tyrannous, blinking egotist, But ct
1.-THE close of a strenuous and perpleXing day,
when the candles were lit and the hearth
glow played soft about his wrinkles, he
would open, within himself, a door to
secret shrine, where little child stood
waiting and laughing. Then miracle of
music would begin.
The kings quarrel with his job is no diff
fereHt, after all, from the cobbler's with his.
PHish or low, the quarrel is with lfe-whose
only representations THE PRINCE has told
us, is to become as a little child