Evening star., 1943-11-28
ALittle King
Amid Big Events
BIZ w. II. Harrison.

progressively smaller against the back
ground of the great events now con-
vulsing his land and churning up new
political forces in it. Indeed, both as
fiesh-and-blood individual and as a
unifying national symbol, his stature
appears to be so diminutive and dimin-
ishing that he will surprise the world
If he does not vanish from his throne
In the relatively near future.
At the moment the general SUPPOSE
tion is that he will abdicate when our
Allied armies wrest Rome from the
Nazis This expectation is based on
the fact that when the Italian capital
Is liberated, Italy will be greatly in need
Of stop-gap coalition government of
some sort, encompassing such political
groups as the Socialists, the Christian
Democratic Party and the Party of Ac-
tion whose leaders-including Count
Sforza-are reported to be adamant in
refusing to serve in any cabinet under
Victor Emmanuel. He must get out,
they say; nor are they likely to be
any the less firm in rejecting his son,
Crown Prince Humbert, as his successor.
The reason for this is plain enough.
In October 1922, when the Blackshirts
were swarlning noisily into Rome, Gen.
Pietro Badoglo waited upon the King
for orders to disperse the rabble, but
the orders never came. Instead Victor
Emmanuel called upon Mlssolini to take
over, and in all the years thereafter,
he meekly approved or acquiesced in the
jut-jawed dictator's robbery of Italian
liberties. In short, he permitted his
prestige and authority to be used to
establish and strengthen Fascism, and
he gave his support to the Duce's decla-
ration of war against Britain and the
United States, and he at no time-up
until Mussoinis collapse--gave any per-
ceptible sign of being worried about the
peoples freedom.
Victor Emmanuei's apologistS have
defended him by saying that he hon.
estly felt that Italy needed the dis
cipline promised by the Fascist regime
and that all would benefit if the trains
could be made to run on time or if
benevolent" dictatorship could some
how recorder the national economy in a
profitable way. But this defense does
not get very far with men like SforZa.
The king, they hold, has been thor
oughly discredited because of the COM
pany he has kept since 1922. so that
whatever his fundamental beliefs may
be, he is tainted, by association, with
a touch of Fascism, and so is Hum
bert and neither will be acceptable to
the new Italian government. This is
taken in some quarters to mean that
the end of the House of Savoy is near
at hand, but there is still possibility
that the dynasty will be continued
through the Prince of Naples, Victor
Emmanuels 6-year-old grandson In
any case there is talk of a regency,
for not all anti-Fascists in Italy are
wholly opposed to the idea of retaining
the monarchy as unifying force.
No matter what happens to the House
of Savoy. however, it is a safe assump-
ton that the present King will soon
make his exit. Events in the world as
whole, and more particularly events
in Italy, make that as certain as any,
thing can be. Yet, as the time nears
can say at least this much for himself:
The Italian people will in all probable
ity remember him without bitterness,
many of them even with affection, and
no honest history book will ever paint
him as low character, irrespective of
how it may expatiate on his Ineffective
ness as ruler.
Because of his physical size-he is 5
feet inches in height-he has been
called the living model of Soglows
comic Little King. But Victor Emman-
uel himself is not comic. A victim of
rickets in infancy, he has been obliged
to wear steel-braced jacket for a good
part of his life, and it is a reasonable
guess that his stature has had a consid-
erable effect on his personality, accounts
ing perhaps for his tendency to be self
conscious and to look sadly ill-at-ease
when he is having his picture taken
among more prepossessing mortals.
People who happen to be 5-feet-4,
however, or 5-feet-5, or even feet or
taller, should not suppose that any one
OF lesser height must also have lesser
mentality. 1t is absurd for example, to
describe Victor Emmanuel as "moronic."
He may not be brilliant, he may not
have an intelligence that scars, but he
is definitely not stupid. Actually, driven
by his mother, Queen Margherita, he
had intensive schooling as boy, and
is today a good enough linguist to speak
English, French, German and Latin.
Moreover. he has lively interest in
literature and the arts and is an au-
thority on numismatics, his collection of
coins being one of the finest In the
world and his knowledge of them being
sufficiently great to have led him to
write several authoritative books on the
subject.
During his reign of more than 43
years. Victor Emmanuel has never dis
played any unusual qualities as states
man, but he has had the respect of
many millions Of Italians. He succeeded
to the throne on July 20, 1900, follow
ing the assassination of his father, King
Humbert I, and he quickly won the
favor of the people. They liked him for
the happy home life he led with his wife
Helena, daughter of King Nicholas of
Montenegro, and with his four daughters
and son. They liked him, too, because
he seemed personally courageous and
spent great deal of time with his SOL
diers at the front in the First World