Secret Memoirs: The Story of Louise, Crown Princess
by Henry W. Fischer · English · Gutenberg #29167 · 408,855 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Secret Memoirs: The Story of Louise, Crown Princess
Author: Henry W. Fischer
Release date: June 19, 2009 [eBook #29167]
Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SECRET MEMOIRS: THE STORY OF LOUISE, CROWN PRINCESS ***
Produced by Barbara Tozier, Jane Hyland, Bill Tozier and
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Secret Memoirs
THE COURT OF ROYAL SAXONY
1891-1902
This edition, printed on Japanese vellum paper, is limited to two
hundred and fifty copies.
No. ________
[Illustration: LOUISE, EX-CROWN-PRINCESS OF SAXONY
Photo taken shortly before her flight from Dresden]
Secret Memoirs
THE COURT OF ROYAL SAXONY 1891-1902
THE STORY OF LOUISE CROWN PRINCESS
FROM THE PAGES OF HER DIARY, LOST AT THE TIME OF HER ELOPEMENT FROM
DRESDEN WITH M. ANDRÉ ("RICHARD") GIRON
BY HENRY W. FISCHER
Author of "Private Lives of William II and His Consort," "Secret History
of the Court of Berlin," etc., etc.
Illustrated from Photographs
BENSONHURST, NEW YORK FISCHER'S FOREIGN LETTERS, INC. PUBLISHERS
COPYRIGHT, 1912
BY HENRY W. FISCHER
Copyright, 1912, applied for by Henry W. Fischer in Great Britain
Copyright, 1912, by Henry W. Fischer, in Germany, France, Austria,
Switzerland, and all foreign countries having international copyright
arrangements with the United States
[_All rights reserved, including those of translation_]
EDITOR'S CARD
This is to certify that the Ex-Crown Princess of Saxony, now called
Countess Montiguoso, Madame Toselli by her married name, is in no way,
either directly or indirectly, interested in this publication.
There has been no communication of whatever nature, directly or through
a third party, between this lady and the editor or publishers. In fact,
the publication will be as much a surprise to her as to the general
public.
The Royal Court of Saxony, therefore, has no right to claim, on the
ground of this publication, that Princess Louise violated her agreement
with that court as set forth in the chapter on the _Kith and Kin of the
ex-Crown Princess of Saxony_, under the heads of "_Louise's Alimony and
Conditions_" and "_Allowance Raised and a Further Threat_."
HENRY W. FISCHER, _Editor_.
Fischer's Foreign Letters, Publishers
THIS BOOK AND ITS PURPOSE
By Henry W. Fischer
Of Memoirs that are truly faithful records of royal lives, we have a
few; the late Queen Victoria led the small number of crowned
autobiographists only to discourage the reading of self-satisfied royal
ego-portrayals forever, but in the Story of Louise of Saxony we have the
main life epoch of a Cyprian Royal, who had no inducement to say
anything false and is not afraid to say anything true.
For the Saxon Louise wrote not to guide the hand of future official
historiographers, or to make virtue distasteful to some sixty odd
grand-children, bored to death by the recital of the late "Mrs. John
Brown's" sublime goodness:--Louise wrote for her own amusement, even as
Pepys did when he diarized the peccadilloes of the Second Charles'
English and French "hures" (which is the estimate these ladies put upon
themselves).[1]
The ex-Crown Princess of Saxony suffered much in her youth by a
narrow-minded, bigoted mother, a Sadist like the monstrous Torquemada;
marriage, she imagined, spelled a rich husband, more lover than master;
freedom from tyranny, paltry surroundings, interference. To her
untutored mind, life at the Saxon Court meant right royal splendor,
liberty to do as one pleases, the companionship of agreeable, amusing
and ready-to-serve friends.
_The Sad Saxon Court_
Her experience? Instead of the Imperial mother who took delight in
cutting her children's faces with diamonds and exposing her daughters to
the foul machinations of worthless teachers--she acquired a
father-in-law (Prince, afterwards King George) whose pretended affection
was but a share of his all-encompassing hatred, whose breath was a
serpent's, whose veins were flowing with gall; the supposed
chevaleresque husband turned out a walking dictionary of petty
indecencies and gross vulgarities when in a favorable mood, a brawler at
other times, a coward always.
As to money--Louise wished for nothing better "than to be an American
multi-millionaire's daughter for a week"! Amusements were few and
frowned upon.
Liberty? None outside of a general permit to eat, drink and couple like
animals in pasture, was recognized or tolerated. Nor could the royal
young woman make friends. Her relatives-by-marriage were mostly freaks,
and all were unbearable; her entourage a collection of spies and
flunkeys.
If charity-bazaars, pious palaver, and orphaned babies' diapers had not
been the sole topic of conversation at court; if there had been
intellectual enjoyment of any kind, Louise might never have taken up
her pen. As it was: "This Diary is intended to contain my innermost
thoughts, my ambitions, my promises for the future, _Myself_. * * *
These pages are my Father-Confessor. I confess to myself. * * * And as I
start in writing letters to myself, it occurs to me that my worse self
may be corresponding with my better self, or vice-versa."
At any rate she thinks "this Diary business will be quite amusing."
_Louise's Amusing Writings_
It is. The world always laughs at the--husband of a woman whose history
isn't one long yawn.
Nor is Louise content with a bust picture.[2] She gives full length
portraits of herself, family, friends, enemies, and lovers, which latter
she picks hap-hazard among commoners and the nobility. Only one of them
was a prince of the blood, and he promptly proved the most false and
dishonorable of the lot.
When Louise's pen-pictures do not deal with her _amororos_, they focus
invariably emperors and princes, kings and queens,--contemporary
personages whose acquaintance, by way of the newspapers and magazines,
we all enjoy to the full, as "stern rulers," "sacrificers to the public
weal," "martyrs of duty," "indefatigable workers," "examples of
abstinence," and "high-mindedness"--everything calculated to make life a
burden to the ordinary mortal.
_Kings in Fiction and in Reality_
But kings and emperors, we are told by these _distant_ observers, are
built that way; they would not be happy unless they made themselves
unhappy for their people's sake. And as to queens and empresses,--they
simply couldn't live if they didn't inspect their linen closets daily,
stand over a broiling cook-stove, or knit socks for the offspring of
inebriated bricklayers "and sich."
Witness Louise, Imperial and Royal Highness, Archduchess of Austria,
Princess of Hungary and Tuscany, Crown Princess of Saxony, etc., etc.,
smash these paper records of infallible royal rectitude, and superhuman,
almost inhuman, royal probity!
Had she castigated her own kind _after_ royalty unkenneled her, neck and
crop, her story might admit of doubt, but she wrote these things while
in the full enjoyment of her rank and station, before her title as
future queen was ever questioned or menaced.
Her Diary finishes with her last night in the Dresden palace. We do not
hear so much as the clatter of the carriage wheels that carried her and
"Richard" to her unfrocking as princess of the blood,--in short, our
narrator is not prejudiced, on the defensive, or soured by
disfranchisement. She had no axes to grind while writing; for her all
kings dropped out of the clouds; the lustre that surrounds a king never
dimmed while her Diary was in progress, and before she ceases talking to
us she never "ate of the fish that hath fed of that worm that hath eat
of a king."
Yet this large folio edition of _obscénités royale_, chock full, at the
same time, of intensely human and interesting facts, notable and amusing
things, as enthralling as a novel by Balzac,--Louise's life record in
sum and substance, since her carryings-on _after_ she doffed her royal
robes for the motley of the free woman are of no historical, and but
scant human interest.
The prodigality of the mass of indictments Louise launches against
royalty as every-day occurrences, reminds one of the great Catharine
Sforza, Duchess of Milan's clever _mot_. When the enemy captured her
children she merely said, "I retain the oven for more."
_Royal Scandals_
Such scandalmongering! Only Her Imperial Highness doesn't see the
obloquy,--sarcasm, cynicism and disparagement being royalty's every-day
diet.
Such gossiping! But what else was there to do at a court whose
literature is tracts and whose theatre of action the drill grounds.
But for all that, Louise's Diary is history, because its minute things
loom big in connection with social and political results, even as its
horrors and abnormalities help paint court life and the lives of kings
and princes as they _are_, not as royalties' sycophants and apologizers
would have us view them.
There is a perfect downpour of books eulogizing monarchs and monarchy;
royal governments spend millions of the people's money to uphold and
aggrandize exalted kingship and seedy princeship alike; three-fourths of
the press of Europe is swayed by king-worship, or subsidized to sing the
praises of "God's Anointed," while in our own country the aping of
monarchical institutions, the admiration for court life, the
idealization of kings, their sayings, doings and pretended superiority,
as carried on by the multi-rich, are undermining love for the Republic
and the institutions our fathers fought and bled for.
_Un-American Folly_
It's the purpose of the present volume to show the guilty folly of such
un-American, un-republican, wholly unjustifiable, reprehensible and
altogether ridiculous King-worship, not by argument, or a more or less
fanciful story, but by the unbiased testimony of an "insider."
Let it be considered, above all, that a member of the proudest Imperial
family in the wide, wide world demonstrates, by inference, the absurdity
of King-worship!
Of course, whether or not you'll obey the impassioned appeal of the
corner sermonizer, who, espying a number of very décolletée ladies
passing by in a carriage, cried out: "_Quand vous voyez ces tetons
rebondies, qui se montrent avec tant d'impudence, bandez! bandez!
bandez! vous--les yeux!_" is a matter for you to decide.
* * * * *
Seek not for descriptions of ceremonials and festivities in these pages;
only imbeciles among kings are interested in such wearying spectacles,
intended to dazzle the multitude. The Czar Paul, who became insane and
had his head knocked off by his own officers, appeared upon the scene
vacated by his brilliant mother, Catharine the Great, with a valise full
of petty regulations, ready drawn up, by which, every day, every hour,
every minute, he announced some foolish change, punishment or favor, but
I often saw Kaiser Wilhelm and other kings look intensely bored and
disgusted when obliged to attend dull and superfluous court or
government functions.
_Royalty's Loose Talk_
But for genuine expressions of the royal self consult Louise. Those who
think that royalty shapes its language in accordance with the plural of
the personal pronoun, sometimes used in state papers, will be shocked at
the "négligé talk" of one royal highness and the "rag-time" expressions
of others. Louise, herself, assures us over and over again that she
"_feels like a dog_," a statement no self-respecting publisher's reader
would allow to pass, yet I was told by a friend of King Frederick of
Denmark that he loved to compare his "all-highest person" to a "_mut_,"
and I remember a letter from Victor Emanuel II to his great Minister,
Count Cavour, solemnly protesting that he (the King) was "_no ass_."
When the same Danish ruler, the seventh of his name, was asked why, in
thunder, he married a common street walker (the Rasmussen, afterwards
created Countess Danner), he cried out with every indication of gusto:
"You don't know how deliciously common that girl is."
Frederick's words explain the hostler marriages of several royal women
mentioned by Louise, as well as her own and loving family's
_broulleries_ of the fish-wife order, repeatedly described in the Diary.
_Royalty Threatens a Royal Woman_
It is safe to say that few $15 flats in all the United States witnessed
more outrageous family jars than were fought out in the gilded halls of
the Dresden palace between Louise and father-in-law and Louise and
husband. Threats of violence are frequent; Prince George promises his
daughter-in-law a sound beating at the hands of the Crown Prince and the
Crown Princess confesses that she would rather go to bed with a drunken
husband, booted and spurred, than risk a sword thrust.
At the coronation of the present Czar, at Moscow, I mistook the Duke of
Edinburgh, brother of the late King Edward, for a policeman attached to
the British Ambassador, so exceedingly commonplace a person in
appearance, speech and manner he seemed; Louise has a telling chapter on
the mean looks of royalty, but fails to see the connection between that
and royalty's coarseness.
Perhaps it wasn't the "commonness" of Lady Emma Hamilton, child of the
slums, impersonator of _risqué_ stage pictures, and mistress of the
greatest naval hero of all times, that appealed primarily to Louise's
grand-aunt, Queen Caroline of Naples, but the abandon of the beautiful
Englishwoman, her reckless exposure of person, her freedom of speech,
certainly sealed the friendship between the adventuress and the despotic
ruler who deserved the epithet of "bloody" no less than Mary of England.
_Covetous Royalty_
Royal covetousness is another subject dwelt on by Louise. We learn that
in money matters the kings and princes of her acquaintance--and her
acquaintance embraces all the monarchs of Europe--are "dirty," that
royal girls are given in marriage to the highest bidder, and that poor
princes have no more chance to marry a rich princess than a drayman an
American multi-millionaire's daughter.
Louise gives us a curious insight into the Pappenheim-Wheeler marriage
embroglio, and refers to some noble families that made their money in
infamous trades; that the Kaiser adopted the title of one of these
unspeakables ("Count of Henneberg") she doesn't seem to know.
We hear of imperial and royal highnesses, living at public expense and
for whom honors and lucrative employment are exacted from the people,
who at home figure as poor relations, obliged to submit to treatment
that a self-respecting "boots" or "omnibus" would resent.
Here we have a royal prince of twenty-four or twenty-five subjected to
kicks and cuffs by his uncle, who happens to be king--no indignity
either to the slugged or the slugger in that--but when a pretty princess
gets a few "_Hochs_" more than an ugly, mouse-colored majesty, she is
all but flayed for "playing to the gallery."
"High-minded" royalty robs widows and despoils orphans; re-introduces
into the family obsolete punishments forbidden by law; maintains in the
household a despicable spy system! Its respect for womanhood is on a par
with a Bushman's; of authors, "lickspittles" only count; literature,
unless it kowtows to the "all-highest" person, is the "trade of Jew
scribblers."
_Right Royal Manners_
As to manners, what do you think of kings and princes and grand-dukes
who, at ceremonial dinners, pound the table to "show that they are
boss"?
Louise tells of an emperor at a foreign court ignoring one of his
hostesses absolutely, even refusing to acknowledge her salute by a nod.
We hear of expectant royal heirs who engage in wild fandangoes of
merriment while their father, brother or cousin lies dying.
"Personal matter," you say? "A typical case," I retort.
"Ask the _Duc du_ Maine to wait till I am dead before he indulges in the
full extent of his joy," said the dying Louis XIV, when the _De
Profundis_ in the death chamber was suddenly interrupted by the sound of
violent laughter from the adjoining gallery. And the fact that almost
every new king sets aside the testament of his predecessor,--is this not
evidence of the general callowness of feeling prevailing in royal
circles?
_The Irish Famine and Royalty_
In famine times, the kings and princes of old drove the starving out of
town to die of hunger in the fields, and as late as 1772 one hundred and
fifty thousand Saxons died of hunger under the "glorious reign" of
Louise's grandfather-by-marriage, Frederick Augustus III. And the "Life
of Queen Victoria," approved by the Court of St. James, unblushingly
informs us that in 1847 "Her Most Gracious Majesty" was chiefly
concerned about investing to good profit the revenues of the Prince of
Wales, her infant son (about four hundred thousand dollars per annum).
Yet, while Victoria pinched the boy's tenants to extort an extra penny
for him, and "succeeded in saving all but four thousand pounds sterling"
of his imperial allowance, the population of Ireland was reduced two
millions by the most dreadful famine the world remembers!
Before the famine Ireland had a population of 8,196,597, against a
population of 15,914,148 in England and Wales, while Scotland's
population was 2,620,184.
Six years after the famine Ireland's population was 6,574,278,
Scotland's 2,888,742, England and Wales' 17,927,609. Today Ireland's
population is less than Scotland's, the exact figures being: Scotland
4,759,445, Ireland 4,381,951, England and Wales 36,075,269.
_Royalty Utterly Heartless_
However, as the waste of two million human lives, the loss of four
millions in population, subsequently enabled the Prince of Wales to tie
the price of a dukedom[3] in diamonds around a French dancer's neck and
to support a hundred silly harlots in all parts of Europe, who cares?
According to Louise and--others, royalty is the meanest, the most
heartless, the most faithless and the most unjust of the species--that
in addition she herself disgraced its womanhood, after the famous Louise
of Prussia rehabilitated queenship, is regrettable, but to call it
altogether unexpected would be rank euphemism.
_Louise's Character_
If Louise had lived at the time of Phryne, the philosophers would have
characterized her as "an animal with long hair"; if he had known her,
the great Mirabeau might have coined his pet phrase, "a human that
dresses, undresses and--talks" (or writes) for Louise; as a matter of
fact, she is one of those "_Jansenists_" of love who believe in the
utter helplessness of natural woman to turn down a good looking man.
Her great grand-uncle, Emperor Francis, recorded on a pane of glass
overlooking the courtyard of the Vienna _Hofburg_ his opinion of women
in the brief observation: "_Chaque femme varie_" (Women always change).
This is true of Louise and also untrue of her. While occupying her high
position at the Saxon court she was fixed in the determination to make a
cuckold of her husband, though Frederick Augustus, while a pumpkin,
wasn't fricasseed in snow by any means.
The process gave her palpitations, but, like Ninon, she was "_so_ happy
when she had palpitations."
_Changed Lovers Frequently_
As to lovers, she changed them as often as she had to, never hesitating
to pepper her _steady_ romances by playing "everybody's wife," chance
permitting, as she intimates naïvely towards the close of the Diary.
Qualms of conscience she knows not, but of pride of ancestry, of
insistence on royal prerogatives, she has plenty and to spare.
"My great grand-aunt, Marie Antoinette, did this"; "my good cousins
d'Orleans" (three of them) "allowed themselves to be seduced"; "_ma
cousine de_ Saxe-Coburg laughs at conventionalities,"--there you have
the foundation of the iniquitous philosophy of the royal Lais. And for
the rest--when she is queen, all will be well.
_Her Court--A Seraglio_
Louise's fixed idea was that, as Queen of Saxony, she had but to say the
word to establish a court _à la_ Catharine II; time and again she refers
to the great Empress's male seraglio, and to the enormous sums she
squandered on her favorites. If the Diarist had known that Her Majesty
of Russia, when in the flesh, never suffered to be longer than
twenty-four hours without a lover, Louise, no doubt, would have made the
most elaborate plans to prevent, in her own case, a possible
_interregnum_ of five minutes even.
She thought she held the whip hand because a king cannot produce princes
without his wife, while the wife can produce princes without the king;
besides Frederick Augustus was no paragon, and he who plants horns, must
not grudge to wear them.
A wanton's calculations, it will be argued,--but Louise's records show
that her husband, the king-to-be, fell in with her main idea,--that he
forgave the unfaithful wife, the disgraced princess, because, as Queen,
her popularity would be "a great asset."
And Americans, our women of whom we are so proud, are asked to bow down
to such sorry majesties!
_Sired and "Cousined" by Lunatics_
And is there no excuse for so much baseness in high places? Our royal
Diarist offers none, but her family history is a telling apology.
Be it remembered that Louise is not so much an Austrian as a
Wittelsbacher of the royal house of Bavaria that gave to the world two
mad kings, Louis II and Otho, the present incumbent of the throne,
besides a number of eccentrics, among others Louise's aunts, the Empress
Elizabeth and the Duchess d'Alencon, both dead; Crown Prince Rudolph of
Austria, her cousin, was also undoubtedly insane, the result of breeding
in and in, Austrian, Bourbon and Wittelsbach stock, all practically of
the same parentage, in a mad mix-up, the insane Wittelsbachers
predominating.
To cap the climax, Louise has eighteen or nineteen insane cousins on her
mother's side!
* * * * *
Once upon a time Louise's prosaic and stupid great-uncle, as a young
husband, felt dreadfully scandalized when his Queen, Marie Antoinette,
bombarded him with spit-balls.
"What can I do with her?" he asked "Minister Sans-culotte" Dumouriez.
"I would spike the cannon, Sire," replied the courtier.
"_Enclouer le canon_," if performed in time, might have saved Louise,
but I doubt it.
HENRY W. FISCHER.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1: "Be civil, good people, I am the English hure," said Nell
Gwyn, addressing a London mob that threatened to storm her carriage,
assuming that its occupant was the hated Frenchwoman.]
[Footnote 2: "Your biography give a faithful portrait of self," said
Fontenelle, the famous French Academician, to an 18th Century Marquise,
"but I miss the record of your gallantries."
"_Ah, Monsieur, c'est que je ne me suis peinte qu'en buste!_" replied
her ladyship.]
[Footnote 3: The Prince of Wales' revenue is derived from the Duchy of
Cornwall, amounting to about half a million dollars per year.]
KITH AND KIN OF THE EX-CROWN PRINCESS OF SAXONY
_Louise's Own Family_
The royal woman whose life's history is recorded in this volume was born
Louise Antoinette, Daughter of the late Grand Duke Ferdinand IV of
Tuscany (died January 17, 1908) and the Dowager Grand Duchess Alice,
_née_ Princess Bourbon of Parma.
* * * * *
Louise has four brothers, among them the present head of the Tuscany
family, Joseph Ferdinand, who dropped the obsolete title of Grand Duke
and is officially known as Archduke of Austria-Hungary.
He is a brigadier general, commanding the Fifth Austrian Infantry, and
unmarried.
Better known is Louise's older brother, the former Archduke Leopold, who
dropped his title and dignities, and, as a Swiss citizen, adopted the
name of Leopold Wulfling. This Leopold is generally regarded as a black
sheep.
Louise more often refers to him in the present volume than to any other
member of her family.
He is now a commoner by his own, more or less enforced, abdication, as
Louise is a commoner by decree of her chief-of-family, the Austrian
Emperor, Francis Joseph, dated Vienna, January 27, 1903.
A month before above date the Saxon court had conferred on Louise the
title of Countess Montiguoso, while, on her own part, she adopted the
fanciful cognomen of Louise of Tuscany.
Of Louise's two remaining brothers, one, Archduke Peter, serves in the
Austrian army as Colonel of the Thirty-second Infantry, while Archduke
Henry is Master of Horse in the Sixth Bavarian Dragoons.
Only one of Louise's four sisters is married, the oldest, Anna, now
Princess Johannes of Hohenlohe-Bartenstein.
The unmarried sisters are Archduchesses Margareta (31 years old),
Germana (28 years old), Agnes (22 years old).
* * * * *
_Mother Comes of Mentally Tainted Stock_
Louise's mother, _née_ Princess Alice of Parma, is the only surviving
sister of the late Duke Robert, who left twenty children, all living,
and of whom eighteen or nineteen are either imbeciles or raving
lunatics, the present head of the house, Duke Henry, belonging to the
first category of mentally unsound.
Louise's first cousin, Prince Elias of Parma, the seventh son, is
accounted sound, but Elias's sister, Zita (the twelfth child), developed
maniacal tendencies since her marriage to Archduke Karl Francis Joseph,
heir-presumptive to the crown of Austria-Hungary.
* * * * *
_Francis Joseph's Autocratic Rule_
_Louise Formerly in Line of Austrian Succession_
Louise was in the line of the Austrian succession until, upon her
marriage to the Crown Prince of Saxony (1891), she officially renounced
her birthrights.
Emperor Francis Joseph of Austria-Hungary is Louise's grand-uncle as
well as chief of the imperial family of Austria, the royal family of
Hungary, the Grand-ducal family of Tuscany (now extinct as far as the
title goes), and of the Estes, which is the Ducal Line of Modena,
extinct in the male line. Finally he is recognized as chief by the ducal
family of Parma, descendants of the Spanish Hapsburgs.
Emperor Francis Joseph rules all the Hapsburgers, Austrian, Hungarian,
and those of Tuscany, of Este, of Modena and Parma, autocratically, his
word being law in the family. Even titles conferred by birth can be
taken away by him, as exemplified in the case of Louise and her brother
Leopold.
* * * * *
_Royal Saxons_
As a member of the Austrian imperial family, the Hapsburgers, founded in
883, Louise ranked higher than her husband, the Crown Prince of the
petty Kingdom of Saxony, whose claim to the royal title dates from
1806,--a gift of the Emperor Napoleon.
She married Frederick Augustus November 21, 1891, while the latter's
uncle reigned as King Albert of Saxony (1873 to 1902).
Louise's father-in-law, up to then known as Prince George, succeeded his
brother June 19, 1902. He was then a widower and his family consisted
of:
Princess Mathilde, unmarried,
The Crown Prince Frederick Augustus, husband of Louise,
Princess Marie-Josepha, wife of Archduke Otho of Austria,
Prince Johann George, at that time married to Isabelle of Württemberg,
and
Prince Max. The latter subsequently shelved his title and entered the
Church July 26, 1896. He is a professor of canonical law and slated for
a German bishopric.
At the time of Prince George's ascension, there was also living the late
King Albert's widow, Queen Caroline, _née_ Princess of Wasa, since
dead.
The Marchesa Rapallo, _née_ Princess Elizabeth of Saxony, is a sister of
the late King George.
_Louise and Her Father-in-Law_
During King George's short reign, Louise ran away from the Saxon court,
end of November, 1902.
On February 11, 1903, divorce was pronounced against her by a special
court assembled by King George.
Louise was adjudged the guilty party and deprived of the name and style
of Crown Princess of Saxony. As previously (January 27) the Austrian
Emperor had forbidden her to use the name and title of Austrian
Archduchess and Imperial and royal Princess, Louise would have been
nameless but for the rank and title of Countess Montiguoso, conferred
upon her by King George.
* * * * *
_Louise's Alimony Conditional_
At the same time Louise accepted from the court of Saxony a considerable
monthly allowance on condition that "she undertake nothing liable to
compromise the reigning family, either by criticism or story, either by
word, deed or in writing."
* * * * *
_Frederick Augustus, King_
Upon his father's death, Frederick Augustus succeeded King George
October 15, 1904. He is now forty-seven years old, while Louise is
forty-two.
The King of Saxony has six children by Louise, three boys and three
girls, five born in wedlock, the youngest born without wedlock. The
children born in wedlock are:
The present Crown Prince, born 1893.
Frederick Christian, likewise born in 1893.
Ernest, born 1896.
Margaret, born 1900.
And Marie Alix, born 1901.
The youngest Princess of Saxony, so called, Anna Monica, was born by
Louise more than six months after she left her husband and nearly three
months after her divorce.
Louise desired to retain Anna Monica in her own custody, but though the
child's fathership is in doubt, to say the least, Frederick Augustus
insisted upon the little one's transference to his care.
* * * * *
_Allowance Raised and a Further Threat_
King Frederick Augustus raised Louise's allowance to $12,000 per year,
"which alimony ceases if the said Countess Montiguoso shall commit,
either personally, directly or indirectly, any act in writing or
otherwise liable to injure the reputation of King Frederick Augustus or
members of the royal family of Saxony, or if the said Countess
Montiguoso contributes to any such libellous publication in any manner
or form."
* * * * *
_The Divorce of Royal Couple Illegal_
After divorce was pronounced against her, Louise declined to accept the
decree of the court, pronouncing the proceedings illegal on the ground
that both she and husband are Catholics and that the Roman Catholic
Church, under no circumstances, recognizes divorce. Her protest gained
importance from the fact that her marriage to Frederick Augustus was
solemnized by the rites of the Roman Catholic Church. The Saxon court,
on the other hand, justified its own decision by basing same on a
certain civil ceremony entered into by Louise and Frederick Augustus
previous to the church marriage.
* * * * *
_Louise Marries a Second Time_
When Louise realized in the course of years that Frederick Augustus
would not take her back, she changed her mind as to the illegality of
her divorce and married, September 25, 1907, Enrico Toselli, an Italian
composer and pianist of small reputation.
This marriage was performed civilly. They have one child, a boy, about
whose custody the now legally separated parents have instituted several
actions in law. The boy has now been allotted to the care of Toselli's
mother.
_King Did Not Marry Again_
King Frederick Augustus, though by the laws of Saxony and Germany
allowed to contract a second marriage, has not availed himself of the
license, probably in deference to the wishes of the Vatican. At the same
time he spurned all of Louise's attempts at reconciliation, the most
dramatic of which was her _coup de tête_ of December, 1904, when she
went to Dresden "to see her children," was arrested at the palace gate
and conducted out of the kingdom by high police officials.
* * * * *
_Other Royalties Mentioned in This Volume_
Louise refers, in her Diary, to the Kaiser as "cousin." If there be any
relationship between her and William, it is that imposed by the Saxon
marriage, Saxon princes and princesses having frequently intermarried
with the royal and princely Hohenzollerns, despite the differences of
religion. There are four courts of Saxony despite that of Dresden:
Weimar, Meiningen, Altenburg and Coburg and Gotha.
The latter duchy's ruler, Karl Eduard, is of English descent, a son of
the late Duke of Albany. Hence, Louise's cousinship with Victoria
Melita, sometime Grand Duchess of Hesse, now Grand Duchess Kyril of
Russia.
Of course, Louise is closely related to all the Orleans and Bourbons.
Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, who died on the scaffold at Paris,
October 16, 1793, she calls her great-grand-aunt and namesake, claiming,
at the same time, most of the Kings and princes of France of the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as relatives.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
MOTHERHOOD
PAGE
A sterile Royal Family once fruitful--Diary true record of
self--Long legs of Countess Solms--A child only because
he can't help it--Wet nurse to Socialist brat--Royal
permit for nursing--Royal negligee talk--A Saxon
failing 1
CHAPTER II
THE SWEET FAMILY
Husband loving, but family nasty--Money considerations--Brutal
caresses in public--Pests in the family--Awful
serenity--Meddle with angels' or devils' affairs--Father-in-law's
gritty kiss 7
CHAPTER III
WEEPING WILLOW--EMBLEM ROYAL
A pious fraud--Theresa Mayer--Character of the Queen--Mopishness
rampant 11
CHAPTER IV
MY UNPLEASANT YOUTH
Father hard to get along with--Royal imaginations--Kings
cursing other kings--Poverty and pretense--Piety that
makes children suffer--Up at five to pray on cold
stones--Chilblains and prayer 15
CHAPTER V
A FIERCE DISCIPLINARIAN
Diamonds used to punish children--Face object of attacks--
Grunting and snorting at the royal table--Blood flowing
at dinner--My brother jumps out of a window 19
CHAPTER VI
LEOPOLD DEFENDS MY HONOR AT HIS PERIL
Punished for objecting to familiarities--Awful names I was
called--Locked in the room with wicked teacher--Defend
myself with burning lamp--My brother nearly kills
my would-be assailant 23
CHAPTER VII
PRINCES AND PRINCESSES DANCE TO THE TUNE OF THE WHIP
The result shows in the character of rulers--Why English
kings and princes are superior to the Continental kind--Leopold's
awful revenge--Mother acts the tigress--Her
mailed fist--"I forbid Your Imperial Highness to see
that dog" 27
CHAPTER VIII
PLANNING TO GET A HUSBAND FOR ME
Dissecting possible wooers at Vienna--Royalty after money,
not character--"He is a Cohen, not a Coburg"--Prince
who looked like a Jew counter-jumper in his Sunday
best--Balkan princes tabooed by Francis Joseph--A
good time for the girls--Army men commanded to attend
us 35
CHAPTER IX
LOVE-MAKING
The fascinating Baron--The man's audacity--Putting the
question boldly--Real love-making--_Risqué_ stories for
royalty 41
CHAPTER X
MY POPULARITY RENDERS GEORGE DYSPEPTIC
The Cudgel-Majesty--Prince George's intrigues--No four-horse
coach for Princess--Popular demonstration in my
favor--"All-highest" displeasure 45
CHAPTER XI
SCOLDED FOR BEING POPULAR
Entourage spied upon by George's minions--My husband
proves a weakling--I disavow the personal compliment--No
more intelligent than a king should be 53
CHAPTER XII
ROYAL DISGRACE--LIGHTNING AND SHADOWS
Ordered around by the Queen--Give thanks to a bully--Jealous
of the "mob's" applause--"The old monkey after
'_Hochs_'"--Criticizing the "old man"--Royalty's plea for
popularity--Proposed punishments for people refusing
to love royalty 57
CHAPTER XIII
UNSPEAKABLE LITTLENESSES OF PETTY COURTS
Another quarrel with my husband--Personal attendant to a
corpse--Killing by pin pricks--The mythical three "_How
art thou's?_"--Unwanted sympathy from my inferiors--Pride
of the decapitated Queen of France is in me--Lovers
not impossible--Court to blame for them--My
husband acts cowardly--Brutalizes my household--I
lock myself in 63
CHAPTER XIV
IMPERIAL RUSSIAN ETHICS TRANSFERRED TO DRESDEN
My husband's reported escapade--Did he give diamonds to a
dancing girl?--His foolish excuses--"I am your pal"--A
restaurant scene in St. Petersburg--The birthday
suit 71
CHAPTER XV
ROYALTY NOT PRETTY, AND WHY
Fecundity royal women's greatest charm--How to have
beautiful children 77
CHAPTER XVI
MORE JEALOUSIES OF THE GREAT
Men and women caress me with their eyes--Some disrespectful
sayings and doings of mine--First decided quarrel
with Frederick Augustus--I go to the theatre in spite
of him 81
CHAPTER XVII
THE ROYAL PRINCE, WHO BEHAVES LIKE A DRUNKEN BRICKLAYER
I face the music, but my husband runs away--Prince George
can't look me in the eye--He roars and bellows--Advocates
wife-beating--I defy him--German classics--"Jew
literature" _Auto da fé_ ordered 85
CHAPTER XVIII
I DEFY THEM
Laughter and pleasant faces for me--Frederick Augustus refuses
to back me, but I don't care--We quarrel about
my reading--He professes to gross ignorance 91
CHAPTER XIX
ATTEMPTED VIOLENCE DEFEATED BY FIRMNESS
Frederick Augustus seeks to carry out his father's brutal
threats--Orders and threats before servants--I positively
refuse to be ordered about--Frederick Augustus
plays Mrs. Lot--Enjoying myself at the theatre 95
CHAPTER XX
TITLED SERVANTS LOW AND CUNNING
George tries to rob me of my confidante--Enter the King's
spy, Baroness Tisch in her true character--Punishment
of one royal spy 99
CHAPTER XXI
BANISHMENT
I am ordered to repair to a country house with the hated spy
as my Grand Mistress--My first impulse to go home,
but afraid parents won't have me 103
CHAPTER XXII
"POOR RELATIONS" IN ROYAL HOUSES
Myself and Frederick Augustus quarrel and pound table--The
Countess Cosel's golden vessel--Off to Brighton--Threat
of a beating--I provoke shadows of divorce--King
threatens force--More defiance on my part--I
humble the King and am allowed to invite my brother
Leopold 105
CHAPTER XXIII
A SERVANT-TYRANT
My correspondence is not safe from the malicious woman
appointed Grand Mistress--Lovers at a distance and by
correspondence--Fell in love with a leg 115
CHAPTER XXIV
MORE TYRANNY OF A TITLED SERVANT
My daily papers seized, and only milk-and-water clippings
are submitted--"King's orders"--Grand Mistress's veracity
doubted--My threats of suspension cow her 119
CHAPTER XXV
THE TWO BLACK SHEEP OF THE FAMILY UNITED
Leopold upon my troubles and his own--Imperial Hapsburgs
that, though Catholics, got divorces or married
divorced women--Books that are full of guilty knowledge,
according to royalty--A mud-hole lodging for one
Imperial Highness--Leopold's girl--What I think of
army officers' wives--Their anonymous letters--Leopold's
money troubles--We will fool our enemies by
feigning obedience 123
CHAPTER XXVI
FREDERICK AUGUSTUS CONTINUES VERY RAW
Manners _à la_ barracks natural to royal princes--Names I
am called--My ladies scandalized--Leopold turned over
a new leaf, according to agreement, and is well treated--The
King grateful to me for having "influenced Leopold
to be good" 129
CHAPTER XXVII
PRINCE MAX MAKES LOVE TO ME
Wants me to consult him on all spiritual matters--Warns me
against the Kaiser, the heretic bishop--Princes as ill-mannered
as Russian-Jew up-starts 133
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE SHAH OF PERSIA FALLS IN LOVE WITH ME
The "animal" and his show of diamonds and rubies--Overcome
by love he treats me like a lady of the harem--On
the defensive--The King of kings an ill-behaved
brute--Eats like a pig and affronts Queen--Wiped off
greasy hands on my state robe--When ten thousand
gouged-out eyes carpeted his throne--Offers of jewels--"Does
he take me for a ballet girl?"--The Shah almost
compromises me--King, alarmed, abruptly ends
dinner--I receive presents from him 135
CHAPTER XXIX
THE SHAH COMPROMISES ME IN PUBLIC
Has only eyes for me at the grand manoeuvres, and I can't
drive him from my carriage--Ignores the King and the
military spectacle--Calls me his adored one--Court in
despair--Shah ruins priceless carpets to make himself
a lamb stew 139
CHAPTER XXX
MY LIFE AT COURT BECOMES UNBEARABLE
Laughter a crime--Disappointed Queen lays down the law
for my behavior--Frederick Augustus sometimes fighting
drunk--Draws sword on me--Prince George would have
me beaten--To bed with his boots on 143
CHAPTER XXXI
PRISON FOR PRINCES THAT OPPOSE THE KING
Duke of Saxony banished--Cut off from good literature
even--Anecdote concerning the Grand Dauphin and his
"kettledrums"--A royal prince's garrison life--His association
with lewd women 147
CHAPTER XXXII
PRINCE GEORGE SHOWN THE DOOR BY GRAND-DUCHESS MELITA
A royal lady who walks her garden attired in a single diaphanous
garment--Won't stand for any meddling--Called
impertinent--My virtuous indignation assumed--A
flirtation at a distance--An audacious lover--The
Grand Mistress hoodwinked--Matrimonial horns for
Kaiser--The banished Duke dies--Princes scolded like
school-boys 151
CHAPTER XXXIII
MELITA'S LOVE AFFAIRS AND MINE
The Grand Duchess tells me how she cudgeled George--Living
dictaphone employed--Shows him who is mistress
of the house--Snaps fingers in Prince George's
face--Debate about titles--"A sexless thing of a husband"--Conference
between lover and husband--Grand
Duke doesn't object to his wife's lover, but lover objects
to "his paramour being married" 157
CHAPTER XXXIV
MORE ABOUT THE SWEET ROYAL FAMILY LIFE
"Closed season" for petty meannesses--A prince who enjoys
himself like a pig--Why princes learn trades--A family
dinner to the accompaniment of threats and smashing of
table--The Duke's widow and children robbed of their
inheritance by royal family--King confiscates testament 163
CHAPTER XXXV
FLIRTATION DEVELOPS INTO LOVE
At the theatre--My adorer must have felt my presence--Forgot
his diplomacy--The mute salute--His good looks--His
mouth a promise of a thousand sweet kisses--Our
love won't be any painted business 169
CHAPTER XXXVI
COUNT BIELSK MAKES LOVE TO THE CROWN PRINCESS
Fearless to indiscretion--He "thou's" me--Puts all his
chances on one card--Proposes a rendezvous--Shall I
go or shall I not go?--Peril if I go and peril if I don't 171
CHAPTER XXXVII
RAPID LOVE MAKING IN THE BOIS
A discreet maid--"Remove thy glove"--Kisses of passion,
pure kisses, powerful kisses--I see my lover daily--Countess
Barnello offers "doves' nest"--Driving to
rendezvous in state--"Naughty Louise," who makes fun
of George 177
CHAPTER XXXVIII
"IN LOVE THERE ARE NO PRINCESSES, ONLY WOMEN"
A diplomatic trick--Jealous of Romano's past--The pact for
life and the talisman--If there were a theatre fire the
talisman would discover our love to the King--Some
ill-natured reflections--Bernhardt's escapades cover up
my tracks--The "black sheep" jumps his horse over a
coffin--King gives him a beating--Bernhardt's mess-room
lingo--Anecdotes of royal voluptuaries--Forces
animals to devour each other--Naked ballet-girls as
horses--Abnormals rule the world 183
CHAPTER XXXIX
MY PUNISHMENT
I lose my lover--Quarrels with me because I did my duty
as a mother--Royalty extols me for the same reason---My
pride of kingship aroused by Socialist scribblers--Change
my opinion as to Duke's widow--Parents arrive--Father
and his alleged astrolatry--His finances disarranged
by alimony payments--My uncle, the Emperor,
rebukes mother harshly for complaining of _roué_
father 193
CHAPTER XL
A PLEBEIAN LOVER
In need of a friend--My physician offers his friendship--I
discover that he loves me, but he will never confess--I
give him encouragement--We manage to persuade
the King to further our intrigue--Not a bit repentant of
my peccadilloes--Very submissive--Introduced to my
lover's wife 199
CHAPTER XLI
AN ATROCIOUS ROYAL SCANDAL
A royal couple that shall be nameless--The voluptuous
Duchess--Her husband the worst of degenerates--"What
monsters these royalties be"--Nameless outrages--A
Duchess forced to have lovers--Ferdinand and I
live like married folk--Duchess feared for her life--Her
husband murdered her--I scold and humiliate my overbearing
Grand Mistress--The medical report too horrible
to contemplate 205
CHAPTER XLII
I LOSE ANOTHER OF MY LOVERS
Happily no scandal--Rewarded for bearing children--$1250--for
becoming a mother--Royal poverty--Bernhardt,
the black sheep, in hot water again--The King rebukes
me for taking his part 213
CHAPTER XLIII
THE CROWN PRINCESS QUELLS A RIOT
Asked to play the coward, and I refuse--A hostler who
would die for a look from me--Hostler marriages in
royal houses--Anecdotes and unknown facts concerning
royal ladies and their offspring--Refuse police escort
and rioters acclaim me--Whole royal family proud
of my feat 219
CHAPTER XLIV
THE NEW LOVER, AND "I PLAY THE HUSSY FOR FAIR"
Who is that most exquisite _Vortänzer?_--A lovely boy--"Blush,
good white paper"--I long for Henry--My eyes
reflect love--"I must see you tonight. Arrange with
Lucretia"--Sorry I ever loved a man before Henry--Poetry
even--I try to get him an office at court--Afraid
women will steal him 227
CHAPTER XLV
LOVE AND THE HAPPINESS IT CONVEYS
My Grand Mistress suspects because I am so amiable--Pangs
of jealousy--Every good-looking man pursued by women--A
good story of my cousin, the Duchess Berri--We
all go cycling together--The Vitzthums--Love making
on the street--A mud bath 233
CHAPTER XLVI
FEARS FOR MY LOVE
Some reflections on queens of old who punished recreant
lovers--Henry was in debt and I gave him money--Indignities
by which some of that money was earned--Husband
accompanies me to Loschwitz--Reflections on
Frederick Augustus's character 239
CHAPTER XLVII
LOVE'S INTERMEZZO
Bernhardt takes advantage of my day-dreams--My husband's
indolent _gaucherie_--Violent love-making--Ninon who
loved families, not men--Does Bernhardt really love me? 245
CHAPTER XLVIII
GRAND MISTRESS TELLS HUSBAND I KEEP A DIARY
He wants to see it, but seems unsuspecting--Grand Mistress
denies that she meant mischief, but I upbraid her
unmercifully--Threaten to dismiss her like a thieving
lackey 251
CHAPTER XLIX
ARISTOCRATIC VISITORS
I hear disquieting news about my lover's character--The
aristocracy a dirty lot--Love-making made easy by titled
friends--Anecdotes of Richelieu and the Duke of Orleans--The
German nobleman who married Miss Wheeler and
had to resign his birthright--The disreputable business
the Pappenheims and other nobles used to be in--I am
afraid to question my lover as to charges 255
CHAPTER L
TO LIVE UNDER KING'S AND PRINCE GEORGE'S EYE
Abruptly ordered to the royal summer residence--The Vitzthums
and Henry take flight--Enmeshed by Prince
George's intrigues--Those waiting for a crown have no
friends--What I will do when Queen--No wonder Kings
of old married only relatives--Interesting facts about
relative marriages furnished by scientist 261
CHAPTER LI
COLD RECEPTION--ENEMIES ALL AROUND
Frederick Augustus gives his views on adultery--Doesn't
care personally, but "the King knows"--"Thank God,
the King is ill"--I am deprived of my children--Have
I got the moral strength to defy my enemies? 265
CHAPTER LII
PRINCE GEORGE REVEALS TO ME THE DEPTH OF HIS HATRED
A terrible interview--"The devil will come to claim you"--Uncertain
how much the King and Prince George know--I
break into the nursery and stay with my children all
day--Prince George insults me in my own rooms and
threatens prison if I disobey him 269
CHAPTER LIII
REVOLVER IN HAND, I DEMAND AN EXPLANATION
An insolent Grand Mistress, but of wonderful courage--Imprisonment,
threats to kill have no effect on her--Disregards
my titles--My lover's souvenir and endearing
words--How she caused Henry to leave me--My paroxysms
of rage--Henry's complete betrayal of me 273
CHAPTER LIV
FORCED TO DO PENANCE LIKE A TRAPPIST-MONK
"By the King's orders"--I submit for the sake of my children--Must
fast as well as pray--In delicate health, I insist
upon returning to Dresden--Bernhardt, to avoid
being maltreated by King, threatens him with his sword--The
King's awful wrath--Bernhardt prisoner in Nossen--I
escape, temporarily, protracted _ennui_ 279
CHAPTER LV
FRANCIS JOSEPH JOINS MY SAXON ENEMIES
Cuts me dead before whole family--Everybody talks over
my head at dinner--I refuse to attend more court festivities--Husband
protests because I won't stand for insult
from Emperor--I give rein to my contempt for his
family--Hypocrites, despoilers, gamblers, religious maniacs,
brutes--Benign lords to the people, tyrants at home--I
cry for my children like a she-dog whose young
were drowned 285
CHAPTER LVI
I AM DETERMINED TO DO AS I PLEASE
I reject mother's tearful reproaches--I beard Prince George
in his lair despite whining chamberlains--I tell him what
I think of him, and he becomes frightened--Threatens
madhouse--"I dare you to steal my children"--I win my
point--and the children--"Her Imperial Highness regrets"--Lots
of forbidden literature--Precautions against
intriguing Grand Mistress--The affair with Henry--was
it a flower-covered pit to entrap me?--Castle Stolpen
and some of its awful history 291
CHAPTER LVII
I CONFESS TO PAPA
King Albert dies and King George a very sick man--Papa's
good advice--"You will be Queen soon"--A lovely old
man, very much troubled 301
CHAPTER LVIII
MONSIEUR GIRON--RICHARD, THE ARTIST
The King asks me to superintend lessons by M. Giron--A
most fascinating man--His Grecian eyes--He is a painter
as well as a teacher--In love--Careless whether I am
caught in my lover's arms--"Richard" talks anarchy to
me--Why I don't believe in woman suffrage--Characters
and doings of women in power 305
CHAPTER LIX
THE PEOPLE THINK ME A WANTON
Credit me with innumerable lovers, but don't disapprove--Glad
the King feels scandalized--Picture of the "she-monster"--Everybody
eager for love--I delight in Richard's
jealousy--Husband's indelicate announcement at
table--I rush from the royal opera to see my lover--A
threatening dream--Richard not mercenary like my noble
lovers 309
CHAPTER LX
THE DAY OF JUDGMENT LOOMS UP
My Grand Mistress shows her colors--Richard advises flight--I
hesitate on account of my children--My Grand Mistress
steals a letter from Richard to me--I opine that an
adulteress's word is as good as a thief's--I humble my
Grand Mistress, but it won't do me much good--Pleasant
hours at his studio 317
CHAPTER LXI
A MAD HOUSE FOR LOUISE--PROBABLY
My confidential maid, Lucretia, is banished--The new King
has got the incriminating letter, but Frederick Augustus
says nothing--On the eve of judgment the King falls ill 321
CHAPTER LXII
KING'S ILLNESS A BOON TO LOVERS
Prayers mixed with joy--Espionage disorganized, and I can
do as I please--Love-making in the school-room--Buying
a ring for Richard--"Wishing it on"--"Our marriage"--King's
life despaired of--My tormentors obsequious--Smile
at my peccadilloes--Husband proud of
me--My popularity a great asset--Frederick Augustus
delighted when he hears that King can't last long--The
joyous luncheon at Richard's studio--Making fun of
majesties--I expect to be Queen presently 325
CHAPTER LXIII
WHAT I WILL DO WHEN I AM QUEEN
A foretaste: titled servants put me _en route_ for lover--The
bargain I will propose to Frederick Augustus--Frederick
Augustus will be a complaisant King--To revive
_Petit Trianon_--I am addressed as Queen 331
CHAPTER LXIV
THE KING IS ALIVE AND PUNISHMENT NEAR
My queenship postponed--King George publicly acclaimed--Cuts
me dead in church--Frederick Augustus's disappointment--Terrible
power of a king over his family,
and no appeal--I am like the nude witch of old 335
CHAPTER LXV
FISTICUFFS DON'T SAVE MY CROWN
The attempted theft of my Diary--Grand Mistress discovered
after breaking open my desk--Reading Diary like
mad--Personal encounter between me and Grand Mistress--I
am the stronger, and carry off the manuscript,
but have to leave all my love letters, which go to the
King--I discover that they had stolen the key to my
Diary from my neck 339
CHAPTER LXVI
ABANDONED
My titled servants withdraw from me--An old footman my
sole support--Queen takes the children--Old Andrew
plays spy for me 343
CHAPTER LXVII
FAMILY COUNCIL AT CASTLE
Rendezvous at studio--State takes my children from me--Madhouse
or flight--I brought fifty-two trunks to the
palace--Depart with small satchel--If I attempt to see
my children I'll be seized as "mad woman"--Varying
emotions of the last ten minutes--Threatening shadows
thrown on a curtain decide me--Ready for flight--Diary
the last thing to go into the satchel 345
[Illustration: FROM LOUISE'S DIARY]
THE STORY OF LOUISE, CROWN PRINCESS OF SAXONY
CHAPTER I
MOTHERHOOD
A sterile Royal Family once fruitful--Diary true record of
self--Long legs of Countess Solms--A child only because he can't
help it--Wet nurse to Socialist brat--Royal permit for
nursing--Royal negligee talk--A Saxon failing.
CASTLE WACHWITZ, _February 17, 1893_.
I did my duty towards the Saxons. I gave them a Prince. The Royal House
ought to be grateful to me:--I am helping to perpetuate it. Who would,
if I didn't? My sister-in-law, Princess Mathilde, is an old maid. The
other, Maria Josepha, as sterile as Sarah was before she reached the
nineties. This applies also to Isabelle, the wife of brother-in-law,
John-George. And Prince Max, tired of ballet girls, is about to take the
soutane.
There is just one more royal Saxon princess, Elizabeth, and she
succeeded in having children neither with her husband _de jure_, the
late Duke of Genoa, nor with her husband-lover, Marquis Rapallo.
Louise, then, is the sole living hope of the royal Saxons that, only 160
years ago, boasted of a sovereign having three hundred and fifty-two
children to his credit, among them not a few subsequently accounted
geniuses. Augustus, the Physical Strong (1670 to 1733), was the happy
father, the _Maréshal de_ Saxe one of his numerous gifted offspring.
Alas, since then the House of Wettin has declined not in numbers only.
Poor baby is burdened with ten names in honor of so many ancestors. Why,
in addition, they want to call him "Maria" I cannot for the life of me
understand, for there never was a Saxon princess or queen that amounted
to a row of pins.
I wonder whether they will say the same of me after the crown of the
Wettiners descended upon my brow. Those so inclined should consult these
papers ere they begin throwing stones, for my Diary is intended to
contain my innermost thoughts, my ambitions, my promises for the future,
_Myself_, and let no one judge me by what I say other than what is
recorded here.
These pages are my Father Confessor. I confess to myself,--what a woman
in my position says to members of her family or official and
semi-official persons--her servants, so to speak--doesn't signify, to
borrow a phrase from my good cousin, the Kaiser Wilhelm.
Father-in-law George tells me to trust no one but him, my husband, and
Frederick Augustus's sisters, cousins and aunts, and to rely on prayer
only, yet, stubborn as nature made me, I prefer respectable white paper
to my sweet relatives.
Up to now my most ambitious literary attempts were intimate letters to
my brother Leopold, the "Black Sheep." As I now start in writing letters
to myself, it occurs to me that my worse self may be corresponding with
my better self, or vice versa. If I was only a poet like Countess Solms,
but, dear, no. All real bluestockings are ugly and emaciated. Solms is
both, and her legs are as long and as thin as those of Diana, my English
hunter.
I think this Diary business will be quite amusing,--at any rate, it will
be more so than the conversation of my ladies. Ah, those ladies of the
court of Saxony! If they would only talk of anything else but orphans,
sisters of charity and ballet girls. The latter always have one foot in
Hades, while you can see the wings grow on the backs of the others.
When the von Schoenberg struts in, peacock fashion, and announces "his
royal Highness did himself the honor to soil his bib," I sometimes stare
at her, not comprehending at the moment, and the fact that she is
talking of my baby only gradually comes to mind. Isn't it ridiculous
that a little squalling bit of humanity, whom the accident of birth
planted in a palace, is royalty first and all the time, and a child only
because he can't help it?
As for me, I am a woman and mother first, and my child is an animated
lump of flesh and blood--_my_ flesh and blood--first and all the time.
Of course, when baby came I wanted to nurse it. You should have seen
Frederick Augustus's face. If I had proposed to become a wet-nurse to
some "socialist brat" he couldn't have been more astonished. Yet my
great ancestress, the Empress Maria Theresa, nursed her babies "before a
parquet of proletarians," at the theatre and at reviews, and thought
nothing of giving the breast to a poor foundling left in the park of
Schoenbrunn.
Frederick Augustus recovered his speech after a while--though he never
says anything that would seem to require reflection, he always acts the
deep thinker. "Louise," he mumbled reproachfully,--"what will his
Majesty say?"
"I thought you were the father of the child," I remarked innocently.
"No levity where the King is concerned," he corrected poor me. "You know
very well that for an act of this kind a royal permit must be previously
obtained."
Followed a long pause to give his mental apparatus time to think some
more. Then: "And, besides, it will hurt your figure."
"Augusta Victoria" (the German Empress) "nursed half a dozen children,
and her _décolleté_ is still much admired," I insisted.
Frederick Augustus paid no attention to this argument. "Anyhow, I don't
want the doctors to examine your breast daily," he said with an air of
mixed sentimentality and brusqueness.
These were not his own words, though. My husband, not content with
calling a spade a spade, invariably uses the nastiest terms in the
dictionary of debauchery. When he tells me of his love adventures before
marriage it's always "I bagged that girl," or "I made something tender
out of her," just as a hunter talks of game or a leg of venison.
He doesn't want to be rude; he is so without knowing it. His indelicacy
would be astounding in a man born on the steps of the throne, if the
Princes of this royal house were not all inclined that way.
Two weeks after my accouchement George and Isabelle called. Though
brother and sister-in-law, we are not at all on terms of intimacy.
Frederick Augustus made some remarks of a personal nature that sent all
the blood to my head; Isabelle seemed to enjoy my discomfort, but George
had the decency to go to the window and comment on the dirty boots of a
guard lieutenant just entering the courtyard. Frederick Augustus
thought he had made a hit with Isabelle and applauded his own effort
with a loud guffaw, while pounding his thighs, which seems to give him
particular satisfaction.
CHAPTER II
THE SWEET FAMILY
Husband loving, but family nasty--Money considerations--Brutal
caresses in public--Pests in the family--Awful serenity--Meddle with
angels' or devils' affairs--Father-in-law's gritty kiss.
CASTLE WACHWITZ, _February 24, 1893_.
I have been married some fifteen months and I love my husband. He is
kind, not too inquisitive and passionate. I have better claims to
domestic happiness than most of my royal sisters on or near the thrones
of Europe. Of course when I married into the Saxon royal family I
expected to be treated with ill-concealed enmity. Wasn't I young and
handsome? Reason enough for the old maids and childless wives, my new
sweet relatives, to detest me.
Wasn't I poor? I brought little with me and my presence entailed a
perpetual expense. Now in royal families money is everything, or nearly
so, and the newcomer that eats but doesn't increase the family fortune
is regarded as an interloper.
If I hadn't "_made good_," that is if, in due time, I hadn't become a
mother, my position among the purse-proud, rapacious and narrow-minded
Wettiners would have become wellnigh intolerable. But I proved myself a
_Holstein_. I rose superior to Queen Carola, who never had a child, and
to Maria, Mathilda, Isabelle and Elizabeth, who either couldn't or
didn't. But, to my mind, acting the _cow_ for the benefit of the race
did not invite stable manners.
I wasn't used to them. They hadn't figured in the dreams of my girlhood.
I thought love less robust. I didn't expect to be squeezed before my
ladies. Even the best beloved husband shouldn't take liberties with his
wife's waist in the parlor.
And Frederick Augustus's negligee talk is no less offensive than his
manner of laying loving hands on my person. As a rule, he treats me like
a third-row dancing girl that goes to petition the manager for a place
nearer the footlights. There is no limit to his familiarities or to the
license of his conversation. "_Fine wench_" is a term of affection he
likes to bestow on his future queen; indeed, one of the less gross. He
has the weakness to like epithets that, I am told, gentlemen sometimes
use in their clubs, but never towards a mistress they half-way respect.
My father-in-law, Prince George, is a pest of another kind. While
Frederick Augustus is jovial and rude, George is rude and serene of a
serenity that would make a Grand Inquisitor look gay.
One of my famous ancestresses, the Princess-Palatine, sister-in-law of
Louis the Fourteenth, once boxed the Dauphin's ears for a trick he
played on her, by putting his upright thumb in the centre of an armchair
which her royal highness meant to sit on.
Whenever I behold George's funereal visage, I long to repeat the
Dauphin's undignified offense. I would like to see this royal parcel of
melancholy jump and dance; change that ever-frowning and mournful aspect
of his. Indeed, I would like to treat him to one of the anecdotes that
made the Duchess de Berri explode with laughter.
Frederick Augustus lives in deadly fear of him, and never gets his hair
cut without first considering whether his father will approve or not.
George isn't happy unless he renders other people unhappy. I actually
believe he would rather meddle with the angels' or devils' affairs than
say his prayers, though he is a bigot of the most advanced stripe.
Sometimes when the itch for meddling has hold of him, he cites all the
married princes of the royal house and lectures them on the wickedness
of having no children, winding up by commanding each one to explain, in
detail, his failure to have offspring.
Of course, these gentlemen put the blame on their wives, whereupon the
ladies are forthwith summoned to be threatened and cajoled.
Prince George had the great goodness to approve of my baby and to
congratulate me, also to set me up as an example for Isabelle. When I
return to Dresden I shall be made Colonel of Horse.
Twice has George kissed me,--upon my arrival in Saxony and five days
after the birth of my child. It felt like a piece of gritty ice rubbing
against my forehead.
CHAPTER III
WEEPING WILLOW--EMBLEM ROYAL
A pious fraud--Theresa Mayer--Character of the Queen--Mopishness
rampant.
CASTLE WACHWITZ, _March 1, 1893_.
Prince Max came unexpectedly. He is studying for the priesthood and
looks more sour than his father even. I was in bed, nursing a sick
headache, but presuming upon his future clerical dignity, he walked in
without ceremony and sat down on a chair near my bed. Then he raised his
hands in prayer and announced that he had come to assist in my
devotions.
"Forget that I am your brother-in-law and cousin," he said; "tell me
what's in your heart, Louise, and I will pray to the good God for thee."
"Don't trouble yourself," I replied, "I have a court chaplain charged
with these affairs. Rather tell me about the latest comic opera."
"Comic opera!" he stammered. "You don't intend to go to such worldly
amusements now that you are a mother?"
"Of course I do. The very day I return to Dresden I will take a look at
your girl."
"My--what?" gasped Max.
"Your Theresa--Theresa Mayer. I understand she made a great hit in the
_Geisha_, and everybody approves of your taste, Max."
Max turned red, then green, and I thought to myself what a fool I was.
He's a favorite with the King and Queen, and my father-in-law believes
every word he says.
* * * * *
CASTLE WACHWITZ, _March 10, 1893_.
Queen Carola is a good soul though she doesn't dare call her soul her
own. I never heard her say "_peep_" in the presence of his Majesty. She
looks forlorn and frightened when King Albert is around.
I like her better since I am a mother, for she loves baby. Yes, though
she is a Queen, I saw her actually smile at the child once or twice.
Poor woman, the point of her nose is always red, and, like Father-in-law
George, she believes weeping willow the only fit emblem for royalty. The
look of the whipped dog is always in her weak eyes.
I am too young and--they _do_ say--too frivolous to stand so much
mopishness. These mustard-pots, sedate, grave, wan and long-faced, make
me mad. I don't know what to say,--all I can do is try to hide my
"un-princess-like" cheerfulness when they are around.
I wish I had an ounce or so of diplomacy in my composition. It might
enable me to sympathize with the fancied troubles of the Queen and
Prince George, but I am incorrigible.
CHAPTER IV
MY UNPLEASANT YOUTH
Father hard to get along with--Royal imaginations--Kings cursing
other kings--Poverty and pretense--Piety that makes children
suffer--Up at five to pray on cold stones--Chilblains and prayer.
CASTLE WACHWITZ, _March 11, 1893_.
It occurs to me that, if this is intended as a record of my
life--somewhat after the fashion of the _Margravine_ of Bayreuth's
Memoirs--I ought to tell about my girlhood.
Let me admit at once that my marriage to the Crown Prince of Saxony was,
politically speaking, a stroke of good luck. My father, the Grand-duke
of Tuscany, had been deprived of land and crown ten years before I was
born, and, though he likes to pose as a sovereign, he is, as a matter of
fact, a mere private gentleman of limited resources, whom the head of
the family, the Austrian Emperor, may coax or browbeat at his sweet
pleasure. If papa had been able to save his thronelet, I have no doubt
he would be a most agreeable man, open-handed and eager to enjoy life,
but instead of making the best of a situation over which he has no
control, he is forever fretting about his lost dignities and about "his
dear people" that don't care a snap for his love and affection. This
makes him a trying person to get along with,--mention a king or prince
in the full enjoyment of power, and father gets melancholy and calls
Victor Emanuel, the second of his name, a brigand.
He seldom or never visits his _confrères_ in the capitals of Europe, but
when I was a girl our gloomy palace at Salzburg saw much of the ghosts
of decaying royalty. The Dukes of Modena and Parma, the King of Hanover,
the _Kurfurst_ of Hesse, the King of Naples and other monarchs and
toy-monarchs that were handed their walking papers by sovereigns
mightier than themselves, visited us off and on, filling the air with
lamentations and cursing their fate.
And, like papa, all these _ex'es_ are ready to fly out of their very
skins the moment they notice the smallest breach of etiquette concerning
their august selves. If they had the power, the Imperial Highnesses
would execute any man that called them "Royal Highness," while the Royal
Highnesses would be pleased to send to the gallows persons addressing
them as "Highness" only.
And papa has other troubles, and the greatest of them, lack of money.
Poverty in private life must be hard enough, but a poor king, obliged to
keep up the pretense of a court, is to be pitied indeed.
Add to what I have said, father's share of domestic unhappiness. Mother
is a Bourbon of Parma, serious-minded and hard like my father-in-law,
and almost as much of a religious fanatic.
Oh, how we children suffered by the piety of our mother. There were
eight of us, myself the oldest of five girls, and seven years older than
my sister Anna. Yet this baby, as soon as she could walk, was obliged to
rise, like myself, at five o'clock summer and winter to go to the chapel
and pray. The chapel was lighted only by a few wax candles and, of
course, was unheated like the corridors of the palace. And like them it
was paved with stones. Many a chilblain I carried away from kneeling on
those granite flags.
And the stupidity of the thing! Instead of saying our prayers we
murmured and protested, and as soon as we were old enough we slipped
portions of novels in our prayer-books, which we read while mass was
said. That trick was not unfraught with danger though, for mother's
spies were always after us, and the bad light made reading difficult.
I am sure that if mother had found us out, she would have whipped us
within an inch of our lives.
CHAPTER V
A FIERCE DISCIPLINARIAN
Diamonds used to punish children--Face object of attacks--Grunting
and snorting at the royal table--Blood flowing at dinner--My brother
jumps out of a window.
CASTLE WACHWITZ, _April 1, 1893_.
Nothing of consequence happened since my last entry, and I continue the
story of my girlhood.
Her Imperial Highness, my pious mother, had a terrible way of punishing
her children. The face of the culprit was invariably the object of her
attacks. She hit us with the flat of her bony hand, rendered more
terrible by innumerable rings. The sharp diamonds cut into the flesh and
usually made the blood flow freely.
The court chaplain at Salzburg was a peasant's boy without manners or
breeding of any kind. While the least violation of etiquette or
politeness on the children's part was punished by a box on the ear, or
by withholding the next meal, mother overlooked the swinishness of the
chaplain simply because he wore a black coat.
One of the chaplain's most offensive habits was to grunt and snort when
eating. On one occasion my brother Leopold gave a somewhat exaggerated
imitation of these disgusting practices at table, whereupon mother,
blind with fury, for she thought a priest could do no wrong, struck
Leopold in the face, causing the blood to gush from his lacerated cheek.
Father immediately rose from table and savagely turning upon mother
said, "Understand, Madame, that as a sovereign and head of the family I
will have no one punished in my presence. If I think punishment
necessary, I will inflict it myself in a dignified way."
Mother immediately began to cry. She always had a flood of tears ready
when father offered the slightest reprimand. Afterwards she upbraided
father and us, the children. If it were not for her incessant prayers,
she said, and for the Christian life she was leading, God would have
destroyed the Tuscans long ago, and she wasn't sure that either of us
would attain Paradise except for her intercession with the Almighty.
This and similar scenes and incidents disgusted me with religion early
in life. Myself and all my brothers and sisters hated the very sight of
the court chaplain who licked our mother's boots, while heaping
punishments and indignities upon us.
At one time my brother Leopold didn't know his catechism. "I will teach
your Imperial Highness to skip your lessons," said the court chaplain.
"Kneel before me and read the passage over ten times as a punishment."
Leopold promptly answered: "I won't."
"Yes, you will, Imperial Highness, for such are my orders," cried the
court chaplain.
Leopold said doggedly, "I kneel before the altar and before the Emperor,
if he demands it, not before such as you."
"Suppose I call on your Imperial Highness's mother and ask her to forbid
you to mount a horse for a month or so?" queried our tormentor.
Horseback riding was Leopold's chief pleasure, and the chaplain had no
sooner launched his threat, when Leopold opened the window and
apparently jumped out. As the school-room was situated in the third
story, the teacher thought his pupil dead on the pavement below, but
Leopold was merely hanging on to the stone coping and shutters. That
gave him the whip hand over the teacher. "I will let go if you don't
promise not to inform mother," demanded the twelve-year-old boy.
"I promise, only come in," moaned the teacher.
"Promise furthermore there shall be no punishment whatever for what I
did and said."
"None whatever, your Imperial Highness."
"Swear it on the cross."
The chaplain did as ordered and Leopold crawled back to safety.
Leopold is a good deal like me, and has been in hot water more or less
all his life.
When I was a girl of fifteen, he defended my honor at the risk of the
fearful punishments my mother had in store for those children that
wouldn't buckle down to the chaplain, but that is so sad a chapter of my
girlhood days I cannot bring myself to put it down today.
CHAPTER VI
LEOPOLD DEFENDS MY HONOR AT HIS PERIL
Punished for objecting to familiarities--Awful names I was
called--Locked in the room with wicked teacher--Defend myself with
burning lamp--My brother nearly kills my would-be assailant.
CASTLE WACHWITZ, _April 2, 1893_.
I want to finish with evil recollections. Maybe I will be able to forget
them, when I have done with this narrative. My mother, as pointed out,
had more confidence in our rascally court chaplain than in her own
children, and was far more concerned about the chaplain's dignity than
ours. She never hesitated to doubt her children's veracity, but regarded
all the chaplain said as gospel truth.
About two weeks before Easter, 1885, the time when I was just budding
into young womanhood, the chaplain began to pay me a great deal of
attention. The lessons he gave me to learn were insignificant compared
with those of my brothers and sisters, and it mattered not whether I
came to school prepared or otherwise. The strict disciplinarian had all
of a sudden turned lenient. He began to pat my hair, to give me friendly
taps on the shoulder, and never took his eyes off me. I was too young
and innocent to see the true significance of his strange behavior, but
I woke up suddenly and ran crying to my mother, telling her what had
happened.
"I won't take another lesson from that man, unless my lady-in-waiting is
present," I sobbed.
"You are a malicious, lying, low-minded creature," hissed my mother, at
the same time striking me in the face with her big diamonds. "It's
mortal sin to throw suspicion on so holy a man, and I will not have him
watched."
I ran out of mother's room crying, intending to go to papa, but met the
boys in the corridor, who told me that father had just departed for the
chase. Then I took Leopold aside and told him everything. He was
half-mad with rage and was hardly able to articulate when he rushed to
mother's room demanding protection for me.
"I will protect the holy man instead," answered my fanatic mother.
"Louise shall be locked in the room with the chaplain while she has her
lesson." And my mother actually carried out that wicked design inspired
by fanaticism.
Locked in a room with me, the chaplain was sweetness itself, but for a
while at least remained at a distance. When he attempted to approach me,
I seized the burning kerosene lamp, as Leopold had advised.
"One step more," I cried excitedly, "and I will throw the lamp in your
face."
The coward stood still in his tracks, and began whispering to me in a
hoarse voice things I hardly understood, but that nevertheless wounded
me to the quick. I kept my hand at the burning lamp during the whole
hour and was ready to faint when the fiend at last left me.
As the door opened, I saw Leopold standing outside, an enormous dog whip
in hand. Without a word he applied the whip to the chaplain's broad
face, lashing him right and left. The scoundrel offered no resistance,
but fled like the dog he was, Leopold after him through the long
corridors, upstairs and downstairs, through the picture gallery and the
state apartments, lashing him as he ran, the two of them filling the
palace with cries of rage and pain. Only the fact that Leopold stumbled
over a footstool, enabled the chaplain to reach his room alive, where he
barricaded himself.
CHAPTER VII
PRINCES AND PRINCESSES DANCE TO THE TUNE OF THE WHIP
The result shows in the character of rulers--Why English kings and
princes are superior to the Continental kind--Leopold's awful
revenge--Mother acts the tigress--Her mailed fist--"I forbid Your
Imperial Highness to see that dog."
CASTLE WACHWITZ, _April 21, 1893_.
If my Diary ever fell into plebeian hands, I suppose such stories as the
above would be branded as rank exaggerations.
A Queen endangering life and health of her children by a form of
punishment otherwise known only in the prize ring.
An Imperial Highness using her diamonds to graft scars on the cheeks of
a little girl!
Royal children beaten worse than dogs, deprived of sleep, subjected to
cold and damp and, withal, given over, bound hand and foot, so to speak,
to the tender mercies of low-minded, unworthy, and even dangerous
persons without manners or education.
And, to cap the climax, a Royal maid in the first blush of budding
womanhood grossly repulsed and physically attacked when she appeals to
her mother for protection; that child locked in a room with her would-be
ravisher and obliged to defend her honor by a threat of murder.
Only the uninitiated--men and women living outside the pale of royal
courts--will deem such things impossible. Let me tell these happy
ignoramuses that all through the nineteenth century the princes and
princesses of Europe were brought up to the tune of the whip and of
physical and mental humiliation. It was the fashion.
The only eminent monarch of the immediate past--Frederick the Great--was
all but flayed alive by his father when a boy and young man,--emulate
the second King of Prussia's brutalities and your offspring will be
destined for greatness, argued princes.
The first Emperor William of Germany had a gentle mother, my famous
namesake; he was always a gentleman. The Russian Czars, Paul, Nicholas
I, and Alexander III, were brought up with the knout, their preceptors
used the boys at their sweet pleasure. The first turned out a madman;
the second a brute; the third his people's executioner.
Czar Paul would run a mile to cane a soldier who had a speck of dust on
his boots. My grand-uncle, Emperor Francis Joseph of Austria, sometimes
travels tens of miles to box the ears of a member of his family.
Francis Joseph had a cruel bringing up.
At the Royal Library in Berlin I saw the manuscript of _Les Mémoires de
ma vie: la princesse de Prusse, Frederice Sophie Wilhelmine, qui epousa
le Margrave de Bayreuth_,--the original, unedited save by the
corrections of the authoress. A good many passages of this "most
terrible indictment of royalty" reminded me of home. There is even a
parallel, or a near-parallel, of my own case just recorded. The Princess
Wilhelmina's all-powerful governess was Madame Leti, who pummelled the
child "as if she had been her mother." This Leti was undoubtedly a
Sadist; to inflict torture, to practice refined cruelties was a joy to
her. Not content with whipping the little girl, she added, shortly
before her dismissal, some poisonous matter to Wilhelmina's wash water
"that gnawed the skin and made my face all coppery and inflamed my
eyes." This species of wickedness, at last, resulted in the discharge of
Leti, "but she decided to leave me a few souvenirs in the shape of
fisticuffs and kicks. She had told my mother that I was suffering from
nose bleed and punched my nose whenever she was unobserved. During the
last week of her stay at the palace I sometimes bled like an ox, and my
arms and legs were blue, green and yellow from her kicks and cuffs. I am
sure if she could have broken my legs with impunity, she would not have
hesitated a moment to do so."
History and the court gossip of the day afford plenty of precedents for
what happened to me and my brothers and sisters in Salzburg. Indeed,
Prince Albert, Consort of the late Queen Victoria, was the only royal
father of the first half of the century that used the rod in moderation.
To my mind that is one of the reasons why English kings and princes are
so far superior to the Continental kind.
But to return to Salzburg.
Leopold had it all his own way for a quarter of an hour, as none of the
servants would interfere in favor of the hated chaplain and mother was
engaged in her oratory in a far away part of the castle. So my brother
kicked in the door and went for the cowering brute again, raining
stripes on every part of his bloated body, alternately using the whip
and the whip-end. Undoubtedly Leopold would have killed him then and
there if his boy's strength had not given out. He left him more dead
than alive, bleeding and moaning.
I will never forget the spectacle when Leopold came down the stairs
after leaving the chaplain's room. I and my brothers and sisters were
huddled together behind our ladies in the blue ante-chamber. A dozen or
more lackeys stood in the corridor, whispering.
Leopold's face was deathly pale as he descended the stairs, and blood
was dripping from his whip, reddening the white linen runners
protecting the carpet. He wore his army uniform, that should have saved
him from violence at any rate. At that moment I prayed my sincerest that
father would come home. I would have thrown myself on my knees and told
everything, servants or no servants. But mother came instead.
She was fully informed and she sprang upon poor Leopold like a tigress,
knocking him from one end of the corridor to the other with her
diamond-mailed fist. It was terrible, and all of us children cried aloud
with terror. But the more we cried and the more we begged for mercy, the
harder were the blows mother rained upon poor Leopold's face and head.
His blood spattered over the white enameled banisters and doors until
finally he was dragged out of my mother's clutches by an old footman who
placed his broad back between the Imperial Highness and her victim.
Now, it was the rule in our house that the whipped child had to ask our
mother's forgiveness for putting her to the trouble of wielding the
terrible back of her hand.
Six weeks Leopold stayed at Salzburg after the scene described, and
daily my mother urged him to beg her forgiveness. The boy stood
stockstill on these occasions, never twitching a muscle of his face and
never saying a word in reply. During all these six weeks he waited on
mother morning, noon and night, according to ceremony, but never a word
escaped him, never did he look in her direction unless actually forced
to do so. He played the deaf and dumb to perfection.
Father must have thought that Leopold got enough punishment, for he
never mentioned the matter to him and forbade the servants to even
allude to the court chaplain. Mother, on her part, placed the chaplain
in charge of two skilled surgeons and sent every little while to inquire
how he was doing.
On the third day she said to my father at table, that she was going to
pay a visit to the court chaplain.
"I forbid your Imperial Highness to see that dog," said my father in an
icy voice that brooked no reply. "I will have his carcass thrown out of
here as soon as his condition permits."
That was the only time I heard father speak like a sovereign and man.
That Leopold nearly killed the scoundrel, as he promised to do, is
evident from the fact that the court chaplain lay in the castle three
weeks before he could be transported to a monastery. Some monks--for
none of the servants would lend a helping hand--carried him away by
night and none of the children ever saw or heard of our tormentor again.
The only sorry reminder of the episode is the estrangement of Leopold
and our mother. Though mother tried her hardest to win back the boy's
confidence and affection, he remained an iceberg towards her,
ceremonious but cold, polite but wholly indifferent.
CHAPTER VIII
PLANNING TO GET A HUSBAND FOR ME
Dissecting possible wooers at Vienna--Royalty after money, not
character--"He is a Cohen, not a Coburg"--Prince who looked like a
Jew counter-jumper in his Sunday best--Balkan princes tabooed by
Francis Joseph--A good time for the girls--Army men commanded to
attend us.
CASTLE WACHWITZ, _April 25, 1893_.
A change of scene. I was eighteen and my parents were anxious to get a
husband for me. Royalty marries off its princes at an early age to keep
them out of mischief; its princesses as soon as a profitable suitor
turns up or can be secured by politics, diplomacy, the exercise of
parental wits or the powerful influence of the head of the House.
Sister Anna, now Princess John of Hohenlohe, myself and mother were
invited to Vienna. It was my introduction to royal pomp and
circumstance. The _Hofburg_, our town lodging, seemed to me the first
and also the last cry in sumptuousness--all that was beautiful and
expensive in days gone by is there, and all that is new and desirable is
there, too; Schoenbrunn, the Imperial summer residence, is a dream of
loveliness wedded to grandeur. Between the Emperor and my mother and
between her and the numerous archduchesses and archdukes every second
word uttered referred to me as the possible wife of someone or another.
And that someone was well dissected as to fortune, success in life and
political exigencies.
Whether he was good-looking or a monkey in face and figure mattered not.
Health, good character, uprightness didn't count.
Has he expectations for gaining a throne? Will he be wise enough to
retain that throne? What kind of an establishment will he be able to set
up? How long may his parents live, hanging on to the family
fortune?--These were the only considerations deemed worthy of
discussion.
Three or four of the archduchesses seemed to be acting as marriage
brokers for Ferdinand, just elected hereditary prince of Bulgaria, whose
mother, Princess Clementine, a daughter of the dethroned King Louis
Philippe of France, was reputed to be rolling in gold.
Leopold irreverently called Ferdinand's partisans "_Fillons_" after
famous "_La Fillon_," who supplied the harem of our jolly ancestor, the
Regent of France, Duke of Orleans, and he insisted that Ferdinand was a
_Cohen_, not a Coburg. As a matter of fact, Ferdinand's great fortune is
derived from a Kohary, which is Hungarian for Cohen. The original Kohary
was a cattle-dealer, who supplied the armies of the Allies during the
Napoleonic wars. In this way he accumulated so much wealth that an
impoverished Coburg prince fell in love with his daughter and made her
his wife, after she exchanged the name of Rebecca for Antonie and the
Mosaic faith for that of Rome.
Young and proud and flippant as I was, Leopold's talk filled me with
hearty contempt for the "Coburger" long before we were introduced. And
as to his ambassador, who was forever dancing attendance upon me, I
hated him. Yet the Imperial "_Fillons_" kept up their clatter, and one
fine morning Prince Ferdinand was announced.
He wasn't half bad looking, but struck me as too much of a mother's-boy.
Princess Clementine seemed to decide everything for him. Anyhow, I
wouldn't have him and he marched off again.
I next reviewed, as another Balkan matrimonial possibility, Prince
Danilo of Montenegro, a small, thin person, looking like a Jew
counter-jumper in holiday dress--Vienna "store-clothes."
Danilo spoke the worst _table d'hôte_ French I ever heard in my life,
and I told mother I would rather marry a rich banker than this crowned
idiot. For once she agreed with me and said his father was only a
"mutton-thief," anyhow.
Finally there was talk of King Alexander of Servia, six years younger
than I. Queen Natalie, who a few days ago celebrated one of her several
reunions with ex-King Milan, spoke feelingly of her "Sasha" to mother,
lauding him as the best of sons and the most promising of sovereigns,
but the oft-divorced Majesty was less communicative when mother asked
how many millions she would pass over to Alexander on his marriage day.
That settled "Sasha's" ambitions as far as my hand was concerned. Marry
a Balkan King and the _née_ Keshko holding the purse-strings! Not for my
father's daughter! I didn't want to marry into a Russian Colonel's
family, anyhow. I believe Queen Natalie's father was a colonel, or was
he only a lieutenant-colonel?
These marriage negotiations aside, Anna and myself had a mighty good
time in Vienna (I forgot to say that Emperor Francis Joseph agreed with
me that Danilo and Alexander were quite impossible and that henceforth
Balkan marriages should be taboo).
"I have ordered a dozen young officers to report for tonight's dancing,"
said my Imperial uncle one evening. "Select from among them your tennis
partners, girls." Baron Cambroy of the Guards was my choice, and a
mighty handsome fellow he is. He seemed pleased when I commanded him to
tennis duty every afternoon during our stay. He is tall and spare in
appearance and I might have fallen in love with him sooner, but for his
dark skin. I am an Italian and, by way of contrast, prefer blondes to
any other sort of man.
Anna, myself and our ladies bicycled to the tennis court every
afternoon, and on our way back to the castle were escorted by the Baron
and the other officers.
Trust a girl with a dress reaching an inch below her knees to find out
scandals! On the second day after our meeting with the Baron, Anna told
me that he was the lover of Draga Maschin, lady-in-waiting to Queen
Natalie of Servia.[4]
Draga was in attendance upon Queen Natalie when she called on us, a
beautiful girl, somewhat too full-bosomed for an unmarried one, like my
great-aunt, Catharine, who became the wife of that upstart, Jerome
Napoleon. At home we have her picture, and mother, who was rather skinny
as a girl, never failed to point out that it was painted before Queen
Catharine's marriage, despite her voluptuous bust.
If my Baron was really Draga's beloved, that would more than half
explain mother's puzzle.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 4: The same who afterwards became the Queen of King Alexander
of Servia and eventually the cause of his death and of the extinction of
the Obrenovitsch dynasty. Alexander and Draga were both slaughtered in
their beds May 29, 1903, ten years after the above was written.]
CHAPTER IX
LOVE-MAKING
The fascinating Baron--The man's audacity--Putting the question
boldly--Real love-making--_Risqué_ stories for royalty.
CASTLE WACHWITZ, _May 1, 1893_.
I am in love but, like a prudent virgin, I admitted the fact to myself
only shortly before we departed for Salzburg. After I put several
hundred miles between me and my fascinating Baron, all's well again.
My first love, and it was the man's audacity that won the day!
Imagine an Imperial Highness, decidedly attractive, eighteen, and no
tigress by any means, wheeling at the side of a mere lieutenant who has
nothing but his pay to bless himself with and nothing but good looks to
recommend him. And, as before stated, he wasn't even my style.
Anna pedalled ahead some twenty-five paces; our ladies wheezed and
snorted that many behind. This devil of a lieutenant took a chance.
"Imperial Highness," he commenced, "I wager you don't know what love
is."
It was the one theme I was aching for, scenting, as I did, the odor of
forbidden things. Never before had I the opportunity.
"R-e-a-l love," he insisted.
"Do you blame me?" I asked, vixen-like. "Would be a poor specimen of
Guard officer who didn't know more about real love than a mere girl of
eighteen and a princess at that."
"Will your Imperial Highness allow me to explain?" This, oh so
insinuatingly, from the gay seducer.
"Why not?" I asked, with the air of a _roué_ and hating myself for
blushing like a poppy--I felt it.
"Charmed to enlighten you--with your Imperial Highness's permission,"
whispered the Baron, his knee crowding mine as he drew nearer on his
wheel.
"Explain away."
"Not until I have your Imperial Highness's express command and your
promise not to get angry if I should offend."
Anna, always an _enfant terrible_ and invariably in the way, was waiting
for us in the shadow of a tree and now rode by the Baron's side. She had
evidently heard part of our conversation.
"Permission and pardon granted beforehand," she cried. "Go ahead."
The Baron looked at me, and not to be outdone by the parcel of
impudence in short petticoats, I said carelessly: "Oh, tell. I command."
The Baron began to stroke his moustache and then related a story of
Napoleon and our ancestress Marie Louise, the Austrian Archduchess, not
found in school books.
On the day before her entry into Paris, he said, and when they were
destined to meet for the first time, Napoleon waylaid his bride-to-be at
Courcelles and without ceremony entered her carriage. They rushed past
villages, through towns _en fête_ and at last, at nine o'clock in the
evening, reached the palace of Compiègne. There the Emperor cut short
the addresses of welcome, presentations and compliments, and taking
Marie Louise by the hand conducted her to his private apartments. Next
morning they had breakfast in bed. The marriage ceremony took place a
few days later.
"That's love," said the Baron, shooting significant glances at me.
"Henry _Quatre_ did the same to Marie de Medici--an Italian like you,
Imperial Highness."
Anna didn't know what to make of it, and as for me, my tongue stuck to
the roof of my mouth.
The impudent fellow seems to have misinterpreted our silence, for,
brazen like the _Duc de_ Richelieu, who boasted of sleeping in the beds
of queens, he continued:
"Catharine the Great, too, knew what love was. One fine afternoon when
she wasn't a day older than you, Imperial Highness, she looked out of
the window of her room at Castle Peterhof. In the garden below a
sentinel, very handsome, very Herculean, very brave, was pacing up and
down. Catharine, then Imperial Grand-duchess and only just married, made
a sign to the soldier. The giant, abandoning his rifle, jumped below the
window and Catharine jumped onto his shoulders from the second story.
"That's real love," concluded the Baron.
Anna got frightened and fled down the avenue, but I had the weakness to
remain at the Baron's side until we reached the palace.
Alas, Frederick Augustus wasn't as good a talker as the Baron.
[Illustration: FREDERICK AUGUSTUS, REIGNING KING OF SAXONY
Louise's Ex-Husband]
CHAPTER X
MY POPULARITY RENDERS GEORGE DYSPEPTIC
The Cudgel-Majesty--Prince George's intrigues--No four-horse coach
for Princess--Popular demonstration in my favor--"All-highest"
displeasure.
DRESDEN, _September 1, 1893_.
I haven't lived up to my promise to keep a daily record, or even a
weekly one. Those tales of my girlhood days disgusted me with diary
keeping as far as my early experiences at home went and I reflected that
many of the subsequent happenings in my life might be safer in the
shrine of memory, than spread over the pages of a blank-book, even
though no one sees it and I carry its golden key on a chain around my
neck.
We are back in the capital now and things are moving. Great doings had
been planned for our reception, for the re-entry of the little prince,
my baby, and his mother who is expected to give another child to Saxony
at the end of the year. Two babies in one year! I am going to beat the
German Empress, and if Wilhelm doesn't send me a medal I will cut him
dead the next time I see him!
Well, about that reception. Flags, triumphal arches, speeches by the
burgo-master, white-robed virgins at the station and all that sort of
thing!
But Father-in-law George said "no." Anything that gives joy to others
goes against his royal grain, gives him politico-economic dyspepsia. He
doesn't want me to be popular,--neither me, nor Frederick Augustus, nor
the baby.
George will be the next king, and if the Dresdeners or the Saxons want
to "_Hoch the King_," they must "_Hoch_" George. They MUST. "It's their
damned duty," says George the Pious, who never blasphemes on his own
account, but allows himself some license concerning his subjects. His
attitude recalls the story told of Frederick William the First of
Prussia, whose appearance on the streets of Berlin used to cause
passers-by to run to save their back. Upon one occasion His Majesty
caught one of these fugitives, and whacking him over the head with his
Spanish reed, cried angrily: "What do you want to run away from me for?"
"Because I'm afraid of your Royal Majesty," stuttered the poor devil.
"Afraid?" thundered Frederick William, giving the fellow another whack
with his cane. "Afraid?"--the beating continuing--"when I, your King,
commanded you to love me. Love me, you miserable coward, love God's
Anointed." And the loving Majesty broke his cane on the unloving
subject's back.
Two days before our arrival Prince George sent his adjutant, Baron de
Metsch-Reichenbeck, to the Mayor of Dresden, stopping all reception
arrangements contemplated.
To have children was a mere picnic to Her Imperial Highness, lied
George's messenger,--if the physicians hadn't used chloroform I would
have perished with the torture. Ovations intended as a sort of reward or
recognition of my services to the country, then, would be entirely out
of place, and must not be thought of.
The municipality thereupon officially abandoned preparations. I was a
little vexed when I first heard about George's meanness, yet again felt
tickled that he went out of his way to intrigue against me, the despised
little princess of a House that ceased to reign. And I had an idea that
the Dresdeners would give us a good welcome anyhow.
I had contemplated ordering my special train to leave in the early
morning or at noon, but the Ministry of Railways informed me that it was
impossible to accommodate me at the hours mentioned.
"We will take the ordinary express, then, and will be in Dresden at four
in the afternoon," I suggested.
"According to the new schedule, the express doesn't stop in Dresden,"
protested Frederick Augustus.
"We will command it to stop," I cried.
Frederick Augustus looked at me as if I had asked him to borrow twenty
marks from the Kaiser. "For God's sake!" he cried, "don't you know what
happened to John the other day?"
I confessed my ignorance.
"Well," said Frederick Augustus, "John ordered the Continental express
to pick him up at his garrison, and he had no sooner arrived in Dresden
than he was commanded by the King to appear before him. His Majesty
walked all over John, accusing him of 'interfering with international
traffic' and forbidding him to issue another order of that character."
"Pshaw!" I said, "John is merely a childless princeling. I am the mother
of Saxony's future king. The regeneration, the perpetuation of your race
depends on me."
It was a mere waste of breath, for at that moment came a telegram,
announcing that our special was billed to leave at 3:30, getting us to
Dresden at half-past five--King's orders.
"Did you command the _Daumont_ coach-and-four to meet us at the
station?" I asked.
"My dear child, you are dreaming," replied Frederick Augustus. "The
State carriages are the property of the Crown and we don't own a
four-horse team in Dresden. They will send the ordinary royal carriage,
I suppose."
I was mad enough to wish my husband's family to Hades, the whole lot of
them, but the people of Dresden took revenge in hand and dealt most
liberally. Of course, having fixed our arrival at a late and unusual
hour, George expected there would be no one to welcome us, but the great
concourse of people that actually assembled at the station and in the
adjacent streets, lining them up to the palace gates, was tremendous
instead.
One more disappointment. George had sent an inconspicuous, narrow
_coupé_ to the station,--the Dresdeners shouldn't see more than the
point of my nose. I saw through his scheme the moment I clapped eyes on
that mouse-trap of a vehicle standing at the curb.
And then I remembered the brilliant stagecraft of August the Physical
Strong--he of the three hundred and fifty-two--and how he always managed
to focus everybody's eyes on himself. And I stood stockstill on the
broad, red-carpeted terrace when I walked out of the waiting room and
held up my baby in the face of the multitude. You could hear the
"_Hochs_" and Hurrahs all over town, they said. Hats flew in the air,
handkerchiefs waved, flags were thrust out of the windows of the houses.
"What are you doing, Imperial Highness?" whispered _Fräulein von_
Schoenberg, my lady-in-waiting.
"Never mind, I will carry the baby to the carriage," I answered curtly.
"But the King and Prince George will be angry,--everything will be
reported to them."
"I sincerely hope it will," I said.
And before I entered that petty _souricière_ of a royal coach, I danced
the baby above my head time and again, giving everybody a chance to see
him. And as I stood there in the midst of this tumult of applause, this
waving sea of good-will, this thunder of jubilation, I felt proud and
happy as I never did before. And when the thought struck me how mad
George would feel about it all, I had to laugh outright.
I was still grinning to myself when I heard Frederick Augustus's
troubled voice: "Get in, what are you standing around here for?"--These
manifestations of popularity spelt "all-highest" displeasure to him,
poor noodle. He anticipated the scene at the palace, George fuming and
charging "play to the gallery," the Queen in tears, the King threatening
to banish us from Dresden.
"Be it so," I said to myself, "we might as well be hanged for a sheep as
a lamb." And I refused to enter the carriage until I had waved and
smiled profound thanks to everybody in the square and in the windows and
on the balconies of the surrounding houses.
I saw the Master of Horse address the coachman and immediately divined
his purpose. So I pulled at the rope and commanded the coachman to drive
slowly. I said it in my most imperious manner, and the Master of Horse
dared not give the counter order with which Prince George had charged
him. Poor man, his failure to subordinate my will to his, or George's,
cost him his job.
And so we made our royal entry into Dresden amid popular rejoicings. I
glued my face to the carriage window and smiled and smiled and showed
the baby to everyone who asked for the boon.
Baby took it all in a most dignified fashion. He neither squalled nor
kicked, but seemed to enjoy the homage paid him.
When we reached the palace there was another big crowd of well-wishers,
who shouted themselves hoarse for Louise and the baby, and, malicious
thing that I am, I noticed with pleasure that it all happened under
George's windows.
"This will give father-in-law jaundice," said baby's nurse in Italian.
She is a girl from Tuscany and very devoted to me.
"If he dies, I will be Queen the sooner," thought I,--but happily I
didn't think aloud.
CHAPTER XI
SCOLDED FOR BEING POPULAR
Entourage spied upon by George's minions--My husband proves a
weakling--I disavow the personal compliment--No more intelligent
than a king should be.
DRESDEN, _September 5, 1893_.
I wrote the foregoing at one sitting, without interruption. It's not so
easy a matter to put down the consequences of our triumph, or rather
mine and baby's.
When I entered my apartments, I met a whole host of long faces. The
Commander of the Palace, in great gala, offered a most stiff and icy
welcome. The adjutants, the chamberlains, the _maître d'Hôtel_, all
looked ill at ease. They evidently felt the coming storm in their bones
and didn't care to have it said of them, by George's spies, that they
lent countenance, even in a most remote way, to my carryings-on. Even
the Schoenberg--my own woman--shot reproachful glances at me when the
Commander of the Palace happened to look her way.
Frederick Augustus looked and acted as if he was to be deprived of all
his military honors.
"Your courage must have fallen into your _cuirassier_ boots, look for it
there," I said to him in an undertone when he seemed ready to go to
pieces at the entrance of the King's grand marshal, Count Vitzthum.
With that I advanced towards His Excellency and, holding out my hand to
be kissed, took care to say to him with my most winning smile,
"I trust His Majesty will be pleased with me, for of course our grand
reception was but a reflex of the love the people have for their King. I
never for a moment took it as a personal compliment."
My smart little speech disconcerted the official completely. Maybe he
had orders to say something disagreeable, but my remark disarmed him,
forestalled any quarrel that might have been in the King's or Prince
George's mind.
Frederick Augustus, who is no more intelligent than a future king should
be, was so amazed, he had to think hard and long before he could even
say "Good evening" to the Count. As for the latter, he hawed and coughed
and stammered and cleared his throat until finally he succeeded in
delivering himself of the following sublime effort:
"I will have the honor to report to His Majesty that during the time of
your Imperial Highness's entry, your Imperial Highness thought of
naught but the all-highest approval of His Majesty."
Whereupon I shook his hand again and dismissed him. "It will please me
immensely, Count," I said, "immensely."
CHAPTER XII
ROYAL DISGRACE--LIGHTNING AND SHADOWS
Ordered around by the Queen--Give thanks to a bully--Jealous of the
"mob's" applause--"The old monkey after '_Hochs_'"--Criticizing the
"old man"--Royalty's plea for popularity--Proposed punishments for
people refusing to love royalty.
DRESDEN, _September 8, 1893_.
Thrice twenty-four hours of royal disgrace and I am--alive. This
morning: "All-highest order," signed by Her Majesty's Dame of the
Palace, Countess von Minckwitz: "The Queen is graciously pleased to
invite your Imperial Highness to audience."
Of course her pleasure is a command. I dressed in state and ordered all
the ladies and gentlemen of my court to attend me to the royal chambers.
Queen Carola was very nice, giving the impression that she would be more
lovely still if she dared.
"Prince George has just commanded your husband," she said,--"the King
ordered this condescension on my brother-in-law's part. You will have to
thank him for it."
Isn't it amusing to be an Imperial Highness and a Crown Princess to be
ordered around like a "boots" and to be "commanded" like an orphan
child to say thanks to one's betters!
I promised and the Queen, assuming that I intended to act the good
little girl, took courage to say--for she is the biggest of
cowards--"You are too popular, Louise. Such a reception as you had! All
the papers, even the Jew-sheets, are full of it."
And before I could make any excuses for my popularity she added in
sorrowful, half-accusing tones: "I lived here ever so many years and the
mob never applauded _me_."
"It's so fickle," I quoted. I had to say something, you know.
"And contemptible," added the Queen heartily. "But how is baby?"
I begged permission to send for him. Her Majesty was pleased to play
with the little one for a minute or two and that secured me a gracious
exit. The Queen attended me to the door, opening it with her own royal
hand, thereby rehabilitating me with my entourage waiting outside.
Meanwhile Frederick Augustus had a "critical quarter of an hour" with
father-in-law, who assumed to speak on behalf of the King.
"The King," he said, "despised 'playing to the gallery' worse than the
devil hated holy water." (This court is overrun with Jesuits, and we
must needs adopt their vernacular.)
The King, he repeated, thought it very bad taste for anyone to take the
centre of the stage in these "popularity-comedies," and he told a lot
more lies of the same character. Then he bethought himself of his own
grieved authority.
"Tell your wife," he said, "that I, her father-in-law, and next to the
throne, do everything in my power to escape such turbulent scenes, and
that I would rather ride about town in an ordinary _Droschke_ (cab) of
the second class, preserving my incognito, than in a state carriage and
be the object of popular acclamation."
When Frederick Augustus repeated the above with the most solemn face in
the world, I thought I would die with laughter and actually had to send
for my tire-woman to let my corset out a few notches.
"The old monkey," I cried--"as if he wasn't after '_Hochs_' morning,
noon and night; as if he thought of anything else when he mounts a
carriage or his horse."
"You forget yourself, Louise," warned Frederick Augustus in the voice of
an undertaker, and I really think he meant it. But I wasn't in the mood
to be silenced.
"And as if I didn't know that, like Kaiser Wilhelm, he keeps a record of
towns and villages that were never honored by one of his visits,
intending to make his ceremonial entry there at the first plausible
opportunity."
"It isn't true," insisted Frederick Augustus.
Then I got angry. "It may be thought polite in the bosom of your family
to call one another a liar," I retorted, "but don't you get into the
habit of introducing those tap-room manners in the _ménage_ of an
Imperial Highness of Austria. I forbid it."
And then I gave rein to some of the bitterness that had accumulated in
my heart against the old man. Didn't I know that George was mad enough
to quarrel with his dinner when, on his drives about town, he observed a
single person refusing to salute him? And wasn't it a fact that the
Socialists had combined never more to raise their hats to him just
because he insisted on it? And wasn't that one of the reasons why the
government was more hard on them than happened to be politic?
"You mustn't say these things," pleaded Frederick Augustus.
I pretended to melt. "May I not quote your father's own words?"
"What my father says is always correct," replied the dutiful son.
"Well, then, this is what he told House Minister von Seydowitz a couple
of weeks ago: 'When I see one of these intending destroyers of the state
and social order staring at me, hat on head and cigar in face, I doubly
regret the good old times when kings and princes were at liberty to yank
a scoundrel of that ilk to jail and immure him for life, giving him
twenty-five stripes daily to teach him the desirableness of rendering
unto Cæsar that which is Cæsar's.'"
Frederick Augustus was holding his hands to his ears when I finished. He
ran out and slammed the door behind him.
CHAPTER XIII
UNSPEAKABLE LITTLENESSES OF PETTY COURTS
Another quarrel with my husband--Personal attendant to a
corpse--Killing by pin pricks--The mythical three "_How art
thou's?_"--Unwanted sympathy from my inferiors--Pride of the
decapitated Queen of France is in me--Lovers not impossible--Court
to blame for them--My husband acts cowardly--Brutalizes my
household--I lock myself in.
DRESDEN, _December 1, 1893_.
I saved myself the trouble to record events for two or three months. I
expect my child by the end of the year and, believing in prenatal
influence, it would be a shame, I think, to poison the unborn baby's
mind by dwelling on the unspeakable littlenesses that make up and burden
life at this petty court.
But I may die in the attempt of presenting Saxony with another candidate
for appanages and honors, and this threat, hanging over every expectant
mother, makes me take up my pen again. If I perish, let there be a
record of my sufferings and also of my defiance.
It turned out that the Queen's and George's apparent acquiescence to my
sinful popularity marked the deceitful calm before the storm. Frederick
Augustus has not succeeded in gaining the King's and his father's
forgiveness even now. As a military officer he is shunted from pillar to
post, and the generals and high officials of the court treat him like a
recruit in disgrace. Of course he blames me, shouting that I wrecked his
career.
As if a future king need care a rap whether, as prince, he got a
regiment a few months earlier or later.
"When you are King," I sometimes say to him, "you may nominate yourself
Field-Marshal-General and Great-Admiral above and below the sea--what do
you care?"
"It isn't the same," he moans. "I would like to have my patents signed
by uncle or father."
"Antedate your papers," I advised, "who dare dispute the king? Didn't
the Kaiser nominate himself Adjutant-General to his grand-dad long after
William I lay mouldering in Charlottenburg?"
But Frederick Augustus takes colonel-ships and his petty kingship of the
future too seriously to see even the humor of appointing oneself
personal attendant to a corpse.
As for me, if I weren't _enceinte_, they would send me to some
lost-in-the-woods country house to die of _ennui_. But respect for
public opinion forbidding drastic measures, George relies on a Russian
expedient to humble my proud self and force me to submit to his
meddling.
In the Czar's country, when a village resolves on the death of some
obnoxious individual, they take him, or her, and bind the body naked to
a tree. Then several papers of pins are distributed among the
inhabitants, and each man, woman and child is asked to put a pin in the
lady or gentleman, whom they must approach blindfolded. They stick the
pin wherever they touch the body and if the thing leaks out are able to
swear by all the saints that they don't know where it struck. The pin
pricking is continued until the obnoxious one expires amid awful
tortures and, while all contributed to the murder, none can be hanged
for it.
In like manner George and his minions are trying to reduce me to the
position of social and political corpse.
Court festivities and public acts, attended by the court, seem to be
specially arranged to pillorize me and husband. We are invited, of
course. We are next in importance to Prince George. Our entourage is
more numerous and more richly costumed than that of the other princes.
Four horse coaches for us; Ministers of State waiting on us. I have
train-bearers, pages, what-not.
But the King and Prince George cut me and Frederick Augustus in sight of
the whole court, of the public in fact!
I don't mean to say that the "All-highest Lords," as they call
themselves, treat us as air, or offer insult plain to the ear and
eye--they couldn't afford to--nevertheless the stigma of royal disfavor
is stamped on us. This is the mode of proceedings: Ceremony obliges the
King to address each member of the royal family with the words: "How do
you do?", in the German fashion, "_How art thou?_"
To princes and princesses that are in disgrace, this momentous question
is put only once. Those in good standing are asked three times.
Ever since that September day when all Dresden did me honor, the King
and Prince George have said "_How art thou's?_" to me and mine but once,
whenever and wherever we met, and be sure there were always listeners to
report the double omission.
At first it amused me; then enraged me; I don't care a fig now. But
Frederick Augustus! Poor imbecile, he is eating his heart out about
those two missing "_How art thou's?_" and though he looks splendid in
gala uniform he acts in the royal, but ungracious, presence like a green
recruit expecting to be kicked and cuffed by his noncommissioned officer
on getting back to the barracks.
As to my entourage, it surrenders to royal disfavor even as Frederick
Augustus: depressed faces, pitying glances. I could box their ears for
their sympathy.
Am I not the great-granddaughter of that mighty Maria Theresa that ruled
Austria and Hungary with an iron hand, lined with velvet. "_Moriamur pro
rege nostro_" (We will die for our King), cried the Hungarians, when she
appealed to their chivalry, her new-born babe at her breast. "_Rege_,"
not "_Regina_." They called her King. They forgot the woman in the
monarch, yet I am treated like an insipid female always, never as the
Crown Princess!
Let them beware. My full name is Louise Marie Antoinette. I was named
after the Marie Antoinette of history--another ancestor of mine--and the
pride of the decapitated Queen of France is in me! My namesake was
satisfied when she read the Saint-Antoine placard of June 25, 1791:
"Whosoever insults Marie Antoinette shall be caned, whosoever applauds
her shall be hanged." Some day I will dismiss the cattle that now grudge
me the people's applause and punish those that insult me.
Come to think of it, Marie Antoinette had not only pride and defiance,
she had lovers too. Well, some day this Marie Antoinette may have
lovers, and if it's wrong, let the recording angel debit my sins to the
Saxon court.
Thank God, I am blessed with that truly royal attribute, ability to
dissimulate. "_Qui nescit dissimulare nescit regnare_" was all the Latin
Charles VIII knew, yet he made a pretty successful king for one who died
at the age of twenty-seven.
I always act as if the King, and father-in-law George, had asked me not
once, or three times, but a dozen times "_How art thou?_" I don't know
anything about being in disgrace, I don't anticipate being snubbed and
when I am snubbed I don't see it.
The "all-highest Lord" looks daggers at me--I curtsy and smile!
Father-in-law Prince George exhibits the visage of a poisoned pole-cat
at my table--I congratulate him on his good digestion!
Majesty pays no more attention to my presence than if I was a pillar, or
a lackey; I greet him with my most devoted genuflections, rise from the
carpet smiling all over the face and begin a frivolous conversation with
the nearest man at hand, who in his fright acts as if he had taken an
overdose of physic.
If Frederick Augustus only had an inch of backbone, a pinch of ginger in
his constitution! But he always stands around with a red face and the
mien of a penitent. No dog, accustomed to daily beatings, follows his
master's movements with more anxious looks than the Crown Prince of this
realm bestows upon the goings and sayings of the King and Prince George.
Then, as recompense for his royal feast of toads, he plays the tyrant at
home. Jellyfish in the state apartments, a brute in our own and--on the
drill grounds, I am told! He is always finding fault with the servants,
and cares not whether he calls his Court Marshal, or a groom,
"_Lausbub_." Poor Chamberlain von Tumpling earned that scurvy epithet
the other day and he prides himself on being a nobleman and an army
officer! Only this morning the prince roared and bellowed at one of my
ladies, I thought she would have a stroke from righteous anger and
vexation.
When he attempted to address me in the same fashion, I simply turned my
back on him, went into my boudoir and locked the door. I will keep him
"guessing" for two days, sending for the court physician every little
while.
When he has to eat his meals alone and sleep alone for twice twenty-four
hours, it will occur even to him that Louise is not made of the stuff
that stands for being bullied.
CHAPTER XIV
IMPERIAL RUSSIAN ETHICS TRANSFERRED TO DRESDEN
My husband's reported escapade--Did he give diamonds to a dancing
girl?--His foolish excuses--"I am your pal"--A restaurant scene in
St. Petersburg--The birthday suit.
DRESDEN, _December 3, 1893_.
After all, Frederick Augustus has more spirit than I gave him credit
for. Isabelle just told me that he has a new love, and a very appetizing
piece of femininity she is, _Fräulein_ Dolores of the Municipal Theatre.
"She's as well made as you, Louise, and rather more graceful," she said,
"only her expression is somewhat inert. She lacks animation. Of course,
she hasn't your attractive bust."
That devilish Isabelle _sowed_ her poisonous information rather than
pronounced it. "She has been seen with a new diamond-studded _bandeau_,"
she added.
At that moment the Schoenberg came to say that baby wants me. Isabelle
went along to the nursery, but I managed to take the Schoenberg aside.
"I must know, before dinner, who gave the Dolores woman the new jewelry
she is displaying; likewise whether His Royal Highness is sweet on that
hussy. No half-truths, if you please. I want to know the worst if there
be any."
The Schoenberg has a cousin who is a Councillor in the office of the
police president, and the police president keeps a detailed record of
the love affairs of all the actresses and singers employed in
Dresden,--a relic of the time when stage folks, in European capitals,
classed as "the King's servants."
The Councillor came himself to report and, after listening to what he
said, I raised the boycott on Frederick Augustus without further ado,
inviting him to my bed and board once more.
"So you went slumming with Kyril," I said after we had retired for the
night.
"Who told you?" stammered the big fellow, reddening to the roots of his
hair.
"Never mind. I know all! About the Dolores woman, her brand new
diamonds, the pirouettes she did on the table and the many lace
petticoats she wore."
"My word, I didn't count them," vowed his Royal Highness.
"Neither would I advise you to do so," I warned sternly, though as a
matter of fact I was near exploding with laughter. "Now make a clean
breast of it."
"I swear I was only the elephant. The King himself would excuse me
under the circumstances," whimpered my husband.
"You big booby," I interposed, "can't you see that I'm not angry? I blab
about you to the King? What do you take me for? I am your pal, now and
always, in affairs liable to prove inartistic to the King's, or Prince
George's, stomach. To begin with, what has an elephant to do with
supping with a dancing girl?"
Frederick Augustus explained that the name of the pachyderm applies to a
third party, who attends a couple out for a lark until he proves a
crowd. Our cousin, Grand-duke Kyril of Russia, visiting Dresden
incognito, had prevailed on Frederick Augustus's good nature to serve
him and the Dolores.
"The Dolores is prettier than I?" I inquired.
"Not at all. She has a black mole under her left bosom."
"You saw that?"
"How could I help it? Russian Grand-dukes never allow a girl to wear
corsets at supper. Kyril says it interferes with digestion."
How considerate of His Russian Imperial Highness!
Well, they had a good time and I guess the Dolores earned her diamonds.
A fair exchange is no robbery. "But in St. Petersburg," said Frederick
Augustus, "they do these things better." And he gave an elaborate
description of a famous restaurant there, where the princes of the
imperial family hold high carnival occasionally.
"The upper tier of dining rooms is reserved at night for any Grand-duke
who promises his visit," quoted my husband, "and the broad marble stairs
leading to them must not be used by others. Well, one fine evening
Grand-duke Vladimir and a crowd of nobles and officers supped at the
'_Ermitaj_' and when they were all good and drunk, one of Vladimir's
guests, Prince Galitzin, bet the host the price of the supper and a
champagne bath for all, that he could induce the famous _danseuse_
Mshinskaya to descend the stairs stark naked and walk among the tables
below without anyone offering her insult.
"The bet was accepted and the girl sent for. She was found in a near-by
theatre and rushed to the '_Ermitaj_'. Of course, seeing that His
Imperial Highness wished it, she consented to pull off the trick
and--her clothes, but she made a condition."
"She demanded tights," I suggested.
"Pshaw, she is a sport, says Kyril." This in a tone of disgust from
Frederick Augustus. He continued: "She merely begged his Imperial
Highness to have it announced that she, Mshinskaya, was acting under the
Grand-duke's orders. Done. 'By His Imperial Highness's leave,' shouted
the _Maître d'Hôtel_ from the top of the stairs, as _Mademoiselle_
descended in her birthday suit. And the Mshinskaya made the tour of the
restaurant as unconcernedly and as little subject to protests, or
remarks, as if she had been muffled up to her ears.
"That's what I call freedom--discipline," concluded Frederick Augustus.
"Think of doing anything like that in a Dresden restaurant."
"I would gladly give a year's allowance to the poor if you could manage
it here while Prince George was masticating a Hamburg steak at a table
opposite the grand staircase," said I.
CHAPTER XV
ROYALTY NOT PRETTY, AND WHY
Fecundity royal women's greatest charm--How to have beautiful
children.
DRESDEN, _February 25, 1894_.
Behold the mother of two boys in a twelve-month! Frederick came just in
the nick of time, Sylvester Eve (December 31, 1893), to gain me a little
brief renown, for royalty likes its women to be rabbits and, in the
reigning houses at least, we are esteemed in proportion to our
fecundity.
"January 15--December 31," not half bad! Even Prince George had to admit
that. And the Kaiser remarked: "Louise, if she keeps it up, bids fair to
break de Villeneuve's record. Let me see, Sophie's first child was born
January 9--a girl" (with a sneer); "her next, the Hereditary Count, on
December 28th of the same year."
The "de Villeneuve" is Sophie, Countess of Schlitz. Wilhelm made her
celebrated by his gallantries and Lenbach by the great portrait he
painted of her wondrous loveliness. If I ever have a daughter, I will
have a copy of the Lenbach canvas placed in baby's room. Come to think
of it, I will have one made right away to hang in my own boudoir.
As stated, I believe in prenatal influence, and am more than convinced
that the portraits of Saxon and Prussian princesses frowning from the
walls of our palaces are calculated neither to promote beauty nor
gentleness.
If I had my way, I would send the whole lot to the store-room and fill
the space they occupy with the present store-room treasures, old time
portraits of August the Physical Strong's favorites, Aurora von
Königsmark, Countess Cosel, Princess Lubomirska, Fatime, the Circassian,
the Orselska and--who can remember their names?
As a rule, queens and princesses are conspicuous for lack of beauty,
while kings and princes cut most ordinary figures in _mufti_. Only their
uniforms, the ribands and decorations, the _mise-en-scène_ render them
tolerable imitations of the average military man.
Why?
Because their mothers and fathers, their sisters, cousins and aunts see
nothing but painted and photographed and sculptured frights and
grotesques. So much ugliness of the past must needs cause ugliness of
the present and future.
In a century the thrones of Europe have known but two beauties, both
plebeians, the Empress Josephine and the Empress Eugenie. My aunt, the
Empress Elizabeth, is only good-looking, the German Empress was just an
ordinary German _Frau_ even in her salad-days.
Well, my little girls, if I have any, shall profit by the lessons of the
past. As expectant mothers in ancient Greece were wont to walk in the
temple of _Athene Parthenos_, filled with the greatest sculptures the
world has ever seen (ruins of them I admired in the British Museum), so
I intend to have a gallery of my own for beauty's sake, even if every
female figure be a harlot's likeness.
CHAPTER XVI
MORE JEALOUSIES OF THE GREAT
Men and women caress me with their eyes--Some disrespectful sayings
and doings of mine--First decided quarrel with Frederick Augustus--I
go to the theatre in spite of him.
DRESDEN, _April 1, 1894_.
I am afraid I wrote down some wicked things--wicked from the standpoint
of the Saxon court--and though Queen Carola and father-in-law George
know naught of my scribblings, punishment was meted out to me in full
measure.
Of course, it's my "damned popularity," as the King calls it, that got
me into trouble again. My carriage happened to follow one occupied by
the Queen at a distance of some hundred or more paces along the avenues
of the _Grosser Garten_. I had no idea that Her Majesty was out at the
time, and certainly was dressed to please the eye. I can't help it. It's
a habit with me.
Well, the optics of a good many of my future subjects grew long and
cozening, like gipsies', when they beheld their queen-to-be; there was
many a "flatteringly protracted, but never a wiltingly disapproving
gaze," and those who liked me--and they all seemed to--shouted "Our
Louise," and Hurrah. They shouted so loud that poor Queen Carola got
plenty of auricular evidence of how her successor-to-be was loved by the
people, by _her_, Carola's, people. And the poor old girl got so
"peeved," she ordered her coachman to turn back and proceed to the
palace by the shortest route, through the least frequented streets.
Frederick Augustus knew all about it before I reached home and was in a
terribly dejected state.
"This has to stop," he said with a fine effort at imitating authority.
"On Sunday, when we drove home from High Mass, you got an ovation while
the King's carriage passed almost unnoticed. And now this affront to the
Queen."
"Bother the old girl," I replied, stamping my foot.
Frederick Augustus got as white as a sheet. "That's the language of
a--a--" He knew enough not to finish.
"It's the title by which Queen Victoria is known to many of her
subjects."
"Who told you that?"
"I often run across it in the English newspapers."
"Jew-sheets!" roared Frederick Augustus.
"Since you don't understand a word of English, you couldn't distinguish
the London Times from the Hebrew At Work." After this sally, I added
maliciously: "I'm going to the Opéra Comique tonight. Come along?"
"You are _not_ going to the Opéra Comique," shouted Frederick Augustus.
"You don't want me to go, papa don't want me to go, uncle and aunt and
cousins don't? So many reasons more why I _shall_ go. I announced my
coming and I will go, if I have to tear the ropes, by which you might
bind me hand and foot, with my teeth."
I rang the bell and ordered dinner served half an hour earlier than
usual. Then I went to my dressing room to inspect the new gown that I
intended to wear at the theatre.
Girardi night! Girardi, the famous Vienna comedian! I never saw him. His
humor will act as a tonic. Just what I need. I will die if I breathe
none other but the air of this palace, that reeks with cheap
pretensions, Jesuitical puritanism, envy and hatred, where every second
person is a spy of either the King or George.
I must escape the polluted atmosphere for a few hours, at least, and
laugh, laugh, LAUGH.
* * * * *
11:30 P.M.
I have seen Girardi. I have laughed. I saw the Dolores. And I don't
blame Kyril a bit.
CHAPTER XVII
THE ROYAL PRINCE, WHO BEHAVES LIKE A DRUNKEN BRICKLAYER
I face the music, but my husband runs away--Prince George can't look
me in the eye--He roars and bellows--Advocates wife-beating--I defy
him--German classics--"Jew literature" _Auto da fé_ ordered.
DRESDEN, _April 2, 1894_.
Chamberlain Baron Haugk, of the service of Prince George, called at nine
A.M. and insisted upon seeing me. I sent out my Grand-Mistress, Baroness
von Tisch, to tell him that "Her Imperial Highness would graciously
permit him to wait upon her at half past ten."
"But my all-highest master commands."
I was listening in my boudoir and I went out to him only half-dressed, a
powder-mantle over my shoulders.
"Her Imperial Highness will not have her commands questioned by
servants," I said in my most haughty style. The _Kammerherr_ knocked his
heels together, bowed to the ground and retired. That's my way of
dealing with royal flunkeys, no matter what their title of courtesy.
He was back at the stroke of the clock to announce his "sublime master"
for one in the afternoon.
"I will be ready to receive his Royal Highness. My household shall be
instructed," I answered coldly, though I dread that old man.
"You are not wanted," I told Frederick Augustus. "Better make yourself
scarce." He didn't need to be told twice. "Undress-uniform," he shouted
to his valet. "And send somebody for a cab."
"Why a cab?" I inquired.
He looked at me in a pitying way. "Women are such geese," he made
answer. "Don't you see, if I left the palace in one of our own
carriages, the King, or father, might notice and call me back."
"Oh, very well. And don't 'celebrate' too much while you are out."
I had the lackeys line the staircase and corridors. My military
household stood in the first ante-chamber, my courtiers in the second,
my ladies in the third when Prince George walked into my parlor. At
first he acted in no unfriendly manner. He kissed me on the forehead and
asked after the babies, and if he hadn't riveted his eyes all the time
into some corner of the room--his stratagem when in an ugly mood--I
might have persuaded myself that he wasn't on mischief bent.
But he soon began pouring out his bile. With a face like a wooden martyr
he announced that he was not pleased with me.
"You are too much of a light-weight, too vivacious, too attractive to
the mob," he said in his bitterest tones. "You are forever seeking the
public eye like--an actress."
"I beg your Royal Highness to take notice that Imperial Princesses of
Austria"--I put some emphasis on the Imperial--"while popular, never
descend to jugglery," I answered politely, but firmly.
"No offence to your Imperial Highness," said George, "but you must
understand once and for all that Saxon princes and princesses are bound
by our house laws to the strictest observance of precedence. The love of
the people naturally goes out to the King and Queen. Junior members of
the Royal House must not seek to divert to themselves the popularity
that is the King's own."
"I have always been taught to respond to popular greetings offered me.
My aunt, the Empress Elizabeth, in particular instructed me to that
effect," I submitted with great deference.
"Her Majesty didn't instruct you to make a show of yourself every hour
of the day," hissed George, his eyes devouring the stove.
"I drive out twice, in the morning to go shopping, in the afternoon to
air my babies."
George, unable to dispute me, abandoned pretensions of politeness or
manners. He fairly roared at me: "You are travelling the streets all the
time. It has to stop."
Whereupon I said in as sharp a voice as I could manage: "And Your Royal
Highness has to stop bellowing at me. I'm not used to it. In Salzburg
and Vienna gentlemen don't use that tone of voice and that sort of
language to gentlewomen."
"Salzburg," cried George, "in Salzburg you got your ears boxed, but it
didn't do much good to all appearances."
"Your Royal Highness," I answered, "my mother has her faults, but it's
no one's business outside of her immediate family. And no one at this
court has a mother's authority over me."
I saw that George was beside himself with rage. "If your husband," he
snarled, "was as free with his hand as your mother, there would be an
end to your frivolities."
"Your Royal Highness forgets what you admitted yourself, namely, that
the indignities offered me while I was a child were bereft of beneficial
results. And please take notice," I added, raising my voice, "I won't
stand violence from anyone, neither from my husband--as you kindly
suggest--nor from you, or the King."
George was too surprised to even attempt a reply. He evidently didn't
know what to say or do. To avoid my eyes that were seeking his, he
turned his back on me and stepped up to a little table laden with books.
He studied the titles for a while, then, turning suddenly, held a small
volume towards me. His arm was out-stretched as if he feared to
contaminate his uniform.
"What have we got here?" he cried.
It was my turn to be astonished. "Why, according to the binding, it must
be Heine's _Atta Troll_."
"_Atta Troll_," cried George, and opening the book at random he read
half to himself:
"This bear-leader six Madonnas
Wears upon his pointed hat,
To protect his head from bullets
Or from lice, perchance, it may be."
He fired the volume on the floor and grabbed another. "What's this?"
"As the title will indicate to your Royal Highness, Nietzsche's
Zarathustra." For the life of me I couldn't see any harm in this portion
of my library.
George continued to rummage among the books. He acted like a madman.
"What's this, what's this?" he kept on saying, turning them over and
over. I thought it beneath my dignity to answer. I just stared at the
fanatic.
After he finished his hurried examination, he took one book after the
other and tossed it violently at my feet.
"Heine, the Jew-scribbler," he cried, aiming a kick at Atta Troll.
"Don't you dare," I said, "that book was given me by Her Majesty, the
Empress of Austria."
"I can't believe it," shouted George, "that Jew-scribbler, the reviler
of kinship."
"He never lampooned the kings of Saxony," I calmly remarked, picking up
the volume. "Here is Her Majesty's dedication to me."
"Everybody knows the eccentricities of Her Majesty of Austria," shouted
George. "Anyhow, who gave you permission to read such rotten stuff as
this at our court?"
"Prince George," I answered, taking two steps towards him, "Duke of
Saxony, the Archduchess of Austria takes pleasure to inform you that in
her house she asks no one's permission what to read or do."
At this he turned drill-ground bully. "You are in the King's house,"
rang out his voice in cutting tones, "and at this moment I represent the
King. And in the King's name I forbid you to read these obscenities, and
in the King's name I hereby command that these books be destroyed at
once."
Well, since he talked in the King's name I had no leg to stand on. I
merely bowed acquiescence and he strutted out, turning his back on me as
he went without salutation of any sort. I ran into my room, locked the
door and had a good cry.
CHAPTER XVIII
I DEFY THEM
Laughter and pleasant faces for me--Frederick Augustus refuses to
back me, but I don't care--We quarrel about my reading--He professes
to gross ignorance.
DRESDEN, _May 1, 1894_.
What's the use keeping a diary that is nothing but a record of quarrels
and humiliations? After I finished the entry about my scene with Prince
George, I felt considerably relieved. I had held my own, anyhow. But
fighting is one thing and writing another. I am always ready for a
fight, but "war-reporting" comes less easy.
The unpleasantness with George brought in its wake, as a natural
consequence so to speak, a whole lot of other squabbles and
altercations, family jars and general rumpuses, which I cared not to
embalm in these pages at the time. However, as they are part and parcel
of my narrative, incomplete as it may be, I will insert them by and by
according to their sequence.
After George was gone I made up my mind that, his commands and threats
notwithstanding, I must continue to live as I always did: joyful, free
within certain limits and careless of puritan standards. If the rest of
the royal ladies, and the women of the service, want to mope and look
sour, that's their affair. Let them wear out their lives between
confessional, knitting socks for orphan children, _Kaffe-klatsches,_
spying and tale-bearing and prayer-meetings,--it isn't my style. I'm
young, I'm pretty, I'm full of red blood, life means something to me. I
want to live it my own way.
I want to laugh; I have opinions of my own; I want to read books that
open and improve the mind. I want to promote my education by attending
lectures, by going to the theatre--in short, I don't want to become a
dunce and a bell-jingling fool like the others.
If that spells royal disgrace--be it so. Louise won't purchase two "_How
art thou's?_" at the price their Majesties and Royal Highnesses ask.
Of course, it would come easier with Frederick Augustus's help and
support, but since he chooses to be bully-ragged and sat upon and,
moreover, finds pleasure in licking the hand that strikes at his and his
wife's dignity, I will go it alone.
I defy them.
* * * * *
DRESDEN, _June 16, 1894_.
I had another tiff with Frederick Augustus, but the cause is too
insignificant to deserve record. I will rather tell about our grand
quarrel following Prince George's visit. We dined alone that day, as he
was eager to hear the news. The preliminaries didn't excite him much,
but when I mentioned the book episode, he bristled up.
"You won't allow the King, or Prince George, to dictate what I shall
read or not read?" I demanded. "My house is my castle and I won't brook
interference in my _ménage_."
"Do you really suppose," replied Frederick Augustus, "that I'll court
royal displeasure for the sake of those Jew-scribblers? I never read a
book since I left school and can't make out what interest books can have
to you or anyone else. Where did you get them, anyhow?"
I told him that Leopold supplied my book wants. "My brother is a very
intelligent man," I said, "and the books he gives me are all classics in
their way."
"Go to with your book-talk!" he mocked in his most contemptuous voice.
"I asked the director of the royal library and was told that each of the
books, to which father objects, was written by a Jew. Let Jews read
them. It isn't decent for a royal princess to do so."
"My brother isn't a Jew."
"But in utter disgrace in Vienna. No one at court speaks to him. He is
head over heels in debt and the next we know he will be borrowing from
us. As to those books, don't bring any more into the house. Royal
princes and princesses have better things to do than waste time on
Jew-scribblers."
With that he violently pushed back his chair and left me, a very much
enraged woman. He didn't give me the chance to have the last word.
CHAPTER XIX
ATTEMPTED VIOLENCE DEFEATED BY FIRMNESS
Frederick Augustus seeks to carry out his father's brutal
threats--Orders and threats before servants--I positively refuse to
be ordered about--Frederick Augustus plays Mrs. Lot--Enjoying myself
at the theatre.
DRESDEN, _June 17, 1894_.
The chance came later and with it the conviction that His Royal
Highness, Prince George, didn't quite believe me when I told him that I
wouldn't stand for violence, for tonight Frederick Augustus attempted
something of the sort.
I had ordered my carriage for seven o'clock to drive to the theatre, and
had just finished dressing when he stormed into my boudoir and demanded
to know if I had taken leave of my senses.
"Not that I am aware of."
"But I hear you intend to go to the theatre--a princess in disgrace
going to the theatre!"
"Aren't you coming along, Frederick Augustus?" I asked naïvely.
"I have no desire to lose my regiment."
"And I have no desire to sit at home and talk nothingnesses with the
fools His Majesty appoints for my service."
"Take a care," cried Frederick Augustus.
"Don't be a noodle and a coward," I answered hotly.
"Louise, remember that I am an army officer."
"What has that to do with my going to the theatre?"
"It's the height of audacity to defy the King."
"It would be the depth of cowardice to stay at home."
"Take back that word, or----"
"I wish Your Royal Highness a very pleasant evening," I said, indulging
in a low genuflexion.
Frederick Augustus got blue with rage. I saw him clench his fists as I
swept out of the room, making as much noise with my train as I could
manage.
"An out-rider," I commanded the Master of Horse who stood in the
ante-chamber awaiting me.
"At your Imperial Highness' commands," bowed the Baron with the most
astonished face in the world. We use out-riders, that is grooms in
livery, to ride ahead of the royal carriage, only on state occasions in
Dresden. But, of course, my orders would be obeyed even if I had
demanded twelve grooms to attend me.
I was just going out, preceded by my Chamberlain and followed by my
ladies, Baroness Tisch and _Fräulein_ von Schoenberg; there were two
lackeys at the door and in the corridor stood the groom-in-waiting,
holding several lap-robes for me to decide which to take, when the
Prince caught up with me.
"I forbid you to go to the theatre," he bawled in the presence of my
titled entourage and three servants.
I realized at once that this was the supreme moment of my life at the
court of Saxony. Either bend or break. If I allowed myself to be roared
at and ordered about like a servant-wench--goodbye the Imperial
Highness! Enter the Jenny-Sneak German housewife, greedy for her
master's smile and willing to accept an occasional kick. The Prince had
begun this family brawl in public. I would finish.
"I won't take orders," I held forth. "No commands, understand, princely,
royal or otherwise. And be advised, now and for all time, that I will
answer any attempt to brutalize me by immediate departure, or by seeking
refuge with the Austrian Ambassador."
If Frederick Augustus had suddenly become Mrs. Lot he wouldn't have been
more conspicuous for utter petrification and silence. He stared at me
with wide-open, bleary eyes and if I had taken him by the neck and feet
and dropped him out of the window, as his ancestor Augustus of the
three-hundred and fifty-two took the "spook" sent into his bedroom by
Joseph the First, he wouldn't have offered the ghost of resistance, I
dare say.
"Your arm, Mr. Chamberlain, since His Royal Highness doesn't wish to
accompany us." And I swept out of the ante-chamber and through the
corridor, triumphant.
"Gipsy Baron" was the bill of the play. I knew only a few of its waltzes
and I drank in the comedy and the pretty music like one desperately
athirst. Kyril's girl, the Dolores, was very chic and looked ravishingly
pretty, and brother-in-law Max isn't the dunce I took him for.
His Theresa is a droll dog, fair to look upon, dark and fat. It will
take a lot of holy water to save her from purgatory.
Girardi made me screech with laughter. He is as funny as my
father-in-law is mournful--a higher compliment to his art I cannot pay.
Of course, actor-like, he appreciated an Imperial Highness' applause and
looked up to my box every little while. I wish, though, he hadn't
acknowledged my plaudits by bowing to me. It attracted general attention
and soon the whole house was staring and smiling. The people seemed to
be glad that their Crown Princess was enjoying herself.
CHAPTER XX
TITLED SERVANTS LOW AND CUNNING
George tries to rob me of my confidante--Enter the King's spy,
Baroness Tisch in her true character--Punishment of one royal spy.
DRESDEN, _August 1, 1894_.
Prince George is planning a devilish revenge. He threatens to separate
me from my Secretary and confidante, little Baranello, whom I brought
with me from Salzburg. She is an Italian, and, unlike most of them, as
faithful as a dog. A connection of the Ruffo family, princes and dukes
that gave the world more than one pope, the small fry Saxon nobility
hate her, and George knows that he can't corrupt Lucretia by his paltry
presents and ridiculous condescension.
They would send her back to Salzburg, if they dared,--anyhow, Baroness
von Tisch is to be both Chief Mistress and confidential secretary. If
she died of the first confidence I make her, she wouldn't live five
minutes.
The King's House Marshal, Baron von Carlowitz, came to announce the
change to me, but I knew, of course, that it was George's doings.
"Tell Prince George," I said icily, "that I appreciate the fact of being
deprived of the services of an honest woman in favor of a spy."
I will "show" this Tisch woman, as my American friends say. Some three
years ago Emperor Francis Joseph appointed a spy as attendant to my
brother Leopold. Schoenstein, Baron or Count, was his name, I think.
Schoenstein would rather bear evil tales of his young master to his old
master than eat, and nothing would please him better than to meddle with
Leopold's correspondence.
He stole as many letters as he could lay his hands on. Fished them even
from slop-pails, or pieced together such as Leopold tore up and dropped
in the cuspidors. When brother observed this, he used to tear up bills
and the most innocent writings of his own and other people into little
bits and planted them in Schoenstein's hunting-grounds. Appropriate work
for a _lick-spittle_ to pull them out. But Leopold got tired of playing
with this vermin, and it tickled him to make an example of the scamp.
Hence, he allowed it to be observed by Schoenstein when he, Leopold,
locked a parcel of letters from his girl in the cash-box.
The toad-eating Schoenstein burned with desire to copy these letters and
send the transcript on to Emperor Francis Joseph. They would have made
interesting reading to my old uncle who has given up cracking nuts since
his teeth fell out. There is Kati Schratt, you say. Pshaw, Kati is as
old, or nearly as old, as his Majesty and she isn't a Ninon de l'Enclos
by any means.
To cut a long story short, Schoenstein could see but one way for getting
those compromising letters: steal the keys and borrow the parcel for a
short while. That's what Leopold was waiting for. Not half an hour after
the keys had been abstracted, he raised the alarm. He had been "robbed."
The archducal safe had been rifled. And he managed to catch Schoenstein
red-handed.
"Send for the police," thundered my brother, "and meanwhile watch the
thief well." Schoenstein was given no chance to explain and deemed
himself lucky to escape arrest. My brother suspended him from service
and made him go to a hotel while he telegraphed the story of the
attempted theft to Vienna, asking the Count's immediate dismissal.
Of course, Vienna disavowed the dunderhead--royalty has no use for
persons that allow themselves to be compromised--and he has been in
disgrace ever since. Nor can he get another courtly office, for Leopold
threatened the moment he sees him with a Highness to warn everybody:
"Look to your watch and purse, we have a thief with us."
I jotted this down to remind me that Prince George's spy deserves no
better than the Emperor's.
CHAPTER XXI
BANISHMENT
I am ordered to repair to a country house with the hated spy as my
Grand Mistress--My first impulse to go home, but afraid parents
won't have me.
DRESDEN, _August 10, 1894_.
Order from the King that myself and children spend the rest of the
summer at Villa Loschwitz, to remain until I get royal permission to
return to Dresden,--the Tisch to act as chief of my household.
Banished! I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Smile, because I
escaped the _ennui_ of attending court at the summer residence of
Pillnitz; weep, because my absence from court would be interpreted as a
disciplinary measure.
I know Pillnitz is about as gay as a Trappist feast of carrion and ant's
milk, but this princess doesn't want to be disciplined.
I shall tell them that I want to go home, but will they have me in
Salzburg? Papa, of course, but if mother hears of my acquaintance with
Heine, "who doesn't love Jesus,"--her own words,--she will undoubtedly
side with Prince George against her daughter. It was Heine who wrote of
one of her ancestors, King Louis of Bavaria: "As soon as the monkeys and
kangaroos are converted to Christianity, they'll make King Louis their
guardian saint, in proof of their perfect sanity." And you don't suppose
for a moment that mamma forgets a thing like that. As to Nietzsche, he
will give her no conscientious qualms, for I'm sure she never heard of
the gentleman, but my going to the Gipsy Baron "where two princely
mistresses are gyrating"--horrible!
I hear her say: "I think Prince George is most considerate sending our
daughter to Loschwitz. She deserved to be put in a nunnery and made to
kneel on unboiled peas three times a day." And when it comes to an
_éclat_, even papa may have to abandon me. Emperor Francis Joseph holds
the purse-strings; and papa always lives beyond his means and Francis
Joseph, King Albert and Prince George are fast friends. If papa
quarrelled with the two latter gentlemen, they would immediately
denounce him to the Emperor. The rest can easily be guessed.
Sorry, but papa is no hero in his daughter's eyes.
CHAPTER XXII
"POOR RELATIONS" IN ROYAL HOUSES
Myself and Frederick Augustus quarrel and pound table--The Countess
Cosel's golden vessel--Off to Brighton--Threat of a beating--I
provoke shadows of divorce--King threatens force--More defiance on
my part--I humble the King and am allowed to invite my brother
Leopold.
VILLA LOSCHWITZ, _September 1, 1894_.
Father had to give in. He is the poor relation, and a poor relation in
royal circles doesn't amount to more than one among well-to-do merchants
and farmers. He has no rights that others need respect and if he shows
backbone he is given to understand that the head of the family has other
uses for the palace or hunting grounds lent him.
"I would love to have you with me in Salzburg," he wrote, "but, dear
child, it's for your best to learn to obey. Do it for your old father's
sake."
Still I wouldn't give in at once. "I won't go to Loschwitz," I declared.
And gave a dozen reasons besides the paramount one that I wouldn't go,
because Prince George wanted me.
"I'm no trunk to be shipped hither and thither at someone's behest," I
said.
Frederick Augustus took umbrage at the "someone," which he pronounced
_lèse majesté_, and to emphasise the fact hit the table with a bang,
whereupon I pounded the table twice: bang-bang!
It hurt my hand, and didn't do Frederick Augustus any good. Nor was the
discussion advanced thereby. For the rest: an exchange of names and
epithets that smacked of the kitchen rather than the _salon_.
"Too bad you exhaust all your energy with me," I said among other
things, "while in the royal presence you act the docile lamb's tail."
He began prating about his character as an army officer again, and I
reminded him that I wasn't the Countess Cosel.
"Who's that?" asked the big ignoramus.
"Never heard of the lady that refused to accompany Augustus to the Camp
of Mühlberg unless he brought her a certain intimate golden vessel
costing five thousand _Thalers_?"
"A loving cup?" asked my husband.
"If you like to call it so."
"But why did you say you are no Cosel?"
"I meant to imply that I am not a prisoner of state and don't want to be
treated like one. Hence, since a visit to my parents would greatly
embarrass them, I decided to go to Brighton for the season."
"Brighton," he repeated, "and where will you get the spondulicks?"
"I saved up quite a bit of money. Guess I can manage the expense
alright."
"Lip-music," cried Frederick Augustus in his polite way. "You have no
idea what such a trip costs."
I assured him that I had made every inquiry and was able to meet all
expenses. "We will go incog.," I added, "the babies and nurse and
Lucretia. The Tisch woman shall have a furlough even before she asks for
it."
"Is that so?" Frederick Augustus laughed brutally. "You seem to forget
that you are subject to our house laws."
"And you seem to forget that I have a will of my own," I almost shouted.
Frederick Augustus jumped up. "Not another word on the subject," he
commanded. "The incident is closed."
It suddenly occurred to me that Prince George had been talking once more
to Frederick Augustus about the pugilistic performances of my mother.
Perhaps he was trying to pluck up courage to beat me, a diversion not
altogether unknown in the House of Saxony, according to the Memoirs of
the famous Baron Schweinichen, Court Marshal and _Chroniqueur_.
His diaries, covering a number of years, have many such entries as this:
"His Royal Highness hit the Princess a good one on the 'snout' by way
of silencing her tongue." Doubtless George would be delighted to have me
"shut up" by some such process, but Frederick Augustus lacks the sand.
When he was gone, I indicted a letter to the King, advising him in oily,
malicious, yet eminently respectful language that, not wishing to figure
as a prisoner of state, I had decided to spend the rest of the summer
abroad with my children. At the same time I intimated that I was well
aware of being in disgrace and being regarded with ill favor by the
several members of the royal family.
"If it pleases your Majesty," I added, "I will relieve a most unhappy
situation by giving back his liberty to Frederick Augustus. I'll promise
not to oppose divorce, or allow my family to interfere."
This letter I sent to the King, sealing it with my personal arms, of
which there is no duplicate at court. After that I sent three telegrams.
One to papa, announcing that I was going to Brighton; another to the
Palace Hotel in Brighton; a third to the Minister of Railways,
commanding that my saloon carriage be coupled to the Continental express
night after next. I knew, of course, that the King would be informed of
these messages in a twinkling.
I waited an hour for the Powers to move; as a rule it takes them a week
or ten days. Exactly sixty-five minutes after sending my letter to the
King, Frederick Augustus rode into the courtyard like a madman. He had
been hurriedly summoned from the drill-grounds, I heard afterwards. He
dismounted at the stairs leading to the King's apartments. Half an hour
later, he slunk into my room, as serious as a corpse. There wasn't a
trace of brutality in his voice as he said:
"A fine row you kicked up."
I didn't favor him by questions, but kept looking out of the window. He
walked up and down for five or six minutes, boring his eyes into the
corners of the room. Suddenly, at a safe distance, he delivered himself
of the following:
"His Majesty interdicts your plans _in toto_. You will be conducted to
Loschwitz tonight. Don't put yourself to the humiliation of trying to
disobey. You are being watched."
"His Majesty's own words?"
"He refused to see me," answered Frederick Augustus, dejectedly. He
acted as if pronouncing his own death warrant. "Baumann told me." (This
is the King's Secretary.)
I almost pitied the poor fellow, but I had to hold my own.
"My dear Frederick Augustus," I said, "you can tell Baumann from me that
I won't go to Loschwitz tonight; that for the present I intend to stay
here and that, if they force me, they'll need plenty of rope, for I
will holler and kick and do all I can to attract attention."
Maybe Frederick Augustus wanted to say something in reply, but open his
mouth was all he could manage. Seeing him so bamboozled, I continued:
"It is decided, then, that I stay, but I give you fair warning that I
will skip to England sooner or later. I don't want you to get into
trouble, Frederick Augustus, therefore inform Baumann without delay."
Frederick Augustus got blue in the face. He seemed ready to jump on me,
crush me between his cuirassier fists. I held up my hand.
"Did Baumann tell you that I offered to accept divorce if it pleases the
King?"
Frederick Augustus changed color. White as a ghost, he fixed his eyes
upon mine, momentarily, and murmured: "Have we got to that point?"
He ran out of the room and a minute later was tearing up the stairs
leading to the King's apartments. Lucretia says he returned within a
quarter of an hour and tried my door. But I had locked myself in and
refused to open. We didn't meet until dinner. Neither of us ate a bite,
or said a word. Baumann was announced with the ice. He was all smiles,
all devotion.
"His Majesty will be pleased to see your Imperial Highness in a quarter
of an hour," he said sweetly.
Frederick Augustus was a painted sepulchre when I coolly replied: "Pray
inform His Majesty that I am not well and about to retire for the
night."
At this Baumann looked like a whipped dog. He probably thought it
impossible for anyone to refuse to answer the summons of His Majesty.
With the most downcast mien in the world, he seemed singularly anxious
to render himself ridiculous. "Maybe the Crown Prince will do in my
stead," I suggested maliciously.
Baumann grabbed at the straw and withdrew. A little while later a lackey
came, summoning Frederick Augustus to Prince George. When he came back,
he was all undone.
"Father treated me very well," he said. "He says the King regrets that
your uncontrollable temper causes so many misunderstandings, and both
His Majesty and father have no objection to your staying in Dresden if
you like. Loschwitz was suggested because you and the children seem to
need country air.
"As to your proposed visit to England, the King begs you to consider
that such a journey at this time is liable to provoke a scandal which
would reflect not only on you, on us, but on your poor parents."
The old story of the penurious relations, I thought bitterly, but on the
whole I was well pleased. I had beaten and out-generaled them all.
"If Loschwitz isn't meant for punishment, I accept with pleasure," I
said. "It's a very pretty place." Poor Frederick Augustus' face lit up.
"But there must be an end to the talk about I being in disgrace. If the
King is as friendly to me as he makes out, let him come and see me and
the babies. As to summonses by Baumann or others, I won't accept them."
"Very well," said Frederick Augustus, and I saw that I had risen
mile-high in his estimation, "when will it be your pleasure to leave for
Loschwitz?"
"Tonight, if I have permission to invite Leopold for a week or so."
"Are you stark, staring mad?" shouted my husband,--"Impose conditions
after the King moderated?"
"Go and tell Baumann I'll have Leopold or all is off," I said.
Next morning: Ceremonial visit from the Queen. The tip of her nose was
redder than ever and she seemed prepared to weep at the flicking of an
eye-lash. She gave me a list of her troubles, mental, physical,
political, matrimonial and otherwise, since the day she was born, but
said: "Obedience to my father, the King, and obedience to my husband,
the King, has enabled me to weather all storms. You, too, must learn
obedience, Louise. It's women's only salvation and especially a
princess's."
I answered that I fully recognized my obligations to the King. "I only
object to being buffeted around like a piece of furniture."
"I know, I know," said the Queen, "and hope all is arranged
satisfactorily. The King will be glad if you invite your parents to
Loschwitz."
"I asked permission to invite Leopold."
"But, no doubt, your parents would take more interest in the children
than your brother."
"I don't dispute that, Your Majesty. But if my parents joined me at the
present time, people might think they came to condole with me or else to
scold me. I want Leopold."
The Queen said she wouldn't dare mention Leopold to His Majesty.
"Well, then," I concluded, "I shall stay in Dresden, regarding Baumann's
fine promises as mere talk."
The Queen went away with the air of a martyr, but three days later
Baumann came and said His Imperial Highness was welcome.
A triumph all along the line. I left Dresden without seeing the King.
Frederick Augustus is at the manoeuvres.
The Baroness is acting as my Grand Mistress.
I expect Leopold in a fortnight.
CHAPTER XXIII
A SERVANT-TYRANT
My correspondence is not safe from the malicious woman appointed
Grand Mistress--Lovers at a distance and by correspondence--Fell in
love with a leg.
LOSCHWITZ, _September 8, 1894_.
Baroness Tisch, now that she attained the height of her ambition, is
beginning to show her claws. She is an infernal cat. Her skinniness
makes her repulsive to me and her face gives everyone the impression
that she just sucked an enormous lemon. She lisps and that makes me
nervous. I feel like aping her when she isn't around.
She's after me like the devil chasing a poor soul and as I never address
her except to command or reprimand, she tries to find out any secret
doings, or thinkings, I may be guilty of by way of letters I write or
receive.
According to the laws of most countries private correspondence is
sacred, legally and morally. The late Field-Marshal, Count Blumenthal,
wrote to his wife of the Crown Prince, afterwards Emperor Frederick,
that he was a "d----fool," but "as communications between husband and
wife are privileged," no official cognizance was taken.
Otherwise in this petty kingdom and, as already told, in Austria, whose
monarch, in family matters at least, holds to the "_L'Etat c'est moi_"
maxim.
The King's spy, the Tisch, constituted herself post-office of Villa
Loschwitz--a duty appertaining to her rank--and I wager she works the
"_Black Cabinet_" to perfection. Of course, I am now careful in all I
write and advise my friends to be, but I sometimes get letters from
Unknowns, people that sympathize with me or have fallen in love with me.
All women in high station have lovers among the lowly. I recall the
Cardinal Dubois' yarn about Salvatico, envoy of the Prince of Modena, my
kinsman of yore. The Italian was sent to Paris to conduct home his
master's lovely intended, _Mademoiselle_ de Valois, daughter of the
Regent. It happened that the emissary was introduced to _Mademoiselle's_
room an hour before the time set, when she was lying on a lounge "with
one leg, almost naked, hanging down." Salvatico fell in love with the
leg and exhausted himself in so many "Ah, ah's" of admiration and other
love-sick stunts that the Duke of Richelieu, having older rights, said
to him: "Rogue, if you had your deserts I would cut off your two ears!"
No man, except my husband, has seen my legs, which is a pity, perhaps,
but the extreme _décolleté_ demanded at certain court functions,
especially in Berlin, gained me many epistolary lovers, whose homage I
accept gracefully, but in silence, of course.
Still, a malicious thing like the Tisch, if one gives her enough rope,
might arrange, on paper at least, to get me with child by a Lothario a
hundred miles off, even as the children of Madame de Montespan and Louis
XIV were credited to the Marquis, her husband, residing a hundred
leagues away, at Guienne. Let me find her red-handed and she will fare
even worse than Schoenstein.
CHAPTER XXIV
MORE TYRANNY OF A TITLED SERVANT
My daily papers seized, and only milk-and-water clippings are
submitted--"King's orders"--Grand Mistress's veracity doubted--My
threats of suspension cow her.
LOSCHWITZ, _September 10, 1894_.
This morning there were no newspapers at the usual hour. Instead, the
Tisch furnished a heap of clippings carefully pasted up--the veriest
milk-and-water slush "ever." Instanter I sent for my tormentor.
"What's this?" I demanded.
"Today's papers, Your Imperial Highness."
"You made these clippings?"
"At Your Imperial Highness's commands."
"And you think me ninny enough to be satisfied with reading no more than
what you consider proper for me to see?"
The Tisch wavered not a bit. "His Majesty the King is served the same
fashion."
"No matter. I want my papers whole, and don't you dare to mutilate
them." By way of letting her down easier I added: "Don't give yourself
the trouble."
"No trouble, I assure your Imperial Highness. With your permission,
then, I will continue to clip for Your Imperial Highness."
I rose and, measuring her from head to toe with flaming eyes, I said:
"You will do nothing of the kind, do you understand?"
The impertinent cat insisted: "But I think it proper----"
"Have you heard what I said or not, Baroness?"
She tried to save her face by asserting, "I am acting by command of His
Majesty."
"I will ask His Majesty whether you spoke the truth," I said quick as a
flash; "meanwhile you are suspended and will return to Dresden until
recalled. Ring the bell and I will give orders to the Master of Horse to
send you away."
Of course Tisch couldn't afford such an inquiry to be made, which would
have exposed her clumsy hand and, as remarked, royalty doesn't care to
be found out. Defeat staring her in the face, Tisch wavered: "Of course,
if your Imperial Highness chooses to take the responsibility, I will be
most happy to submit the papers as they arrive."
"In their wrappers," I commanded, as I dismissed her.
By distributing a hundred marks in silver, I found out that the Tisch
examines my body-servants daily and that, night after night, she sits
up hours writing long-winded reports. She is the King's tool, but she
let the cat out of the bag when cornered. That gives me the whip hand
for the time being.
CHAPTER XXV
THE TWO BLACK SHEEP OF THE FAMILY UNITED
Leopold upon my troubles and his own--Imperial Hapsburgs that,
though Catholics, got divorces or married divorced women--Books that
are full of guilty knowledge, according to royalty--A mud-hole
lodging for one Imperial Highness--Leopold's girl--What I think of
army officers' wives--Their anonymous letters--Leopold's money
troubles--We will fool our enemies by feigning obedience.
LOSCHWITZ, _September 15, 1894_.
Leopold is with me, the brother two years older than I. They just made
him a Major--a twelve-month later than his patent calls for.
Like myself, he is almost permanently in disgrace with the head of the
family, even as I am with the King and Prince George. We had no sooner
embraced and kissed, than I asked him for the latest gossip concerning
the Crown Princess of Saxony.
"You are a tough one," he said, shaking his finger with amused mockery.
According to Vienna court gossip, "I threw Prince George out of doors,"
when he "raised his hand against me," Frederick Augustus and myself
haven't been on speaking terms for six months; and the Saxe family was
actually considering the advisability of divorce.
Of course I told Leopold how things really are.
"Then there will be no divorce?" he asked.
"If the King and Prince George leave me alone,--no."
"Too bad," he said with a laugh, "that knocks me out of the pleasure of
maintaining my _thesis_ that the founder of the Christian religion
didn't believe in indissoluble marriage, but, on the contrary, in
divorce if such couldn't be avoided."
"Who told you that?"
"Professor Wahrmund is preparing a paper on the subject," said Leopold,
who, as remarked, is a very well-read chap and a student. He named five
or six emperors and kings, Catholics, some of them members of the
Austrian Imperial family, who obtained divorces, or married divorced
women. I jotted down the list.
Lothair II divorced his wife Theutberga and married his love, Waldrade.
Emperor Frederick I divorced the Empress Anna on the plea that she was
sterile. She married a Count, with whom she had a dozen children.
Margaret, a daughter of Leopold VI of Austria, was divorced by King
Ottokar of Bohemia.
John Henry, Prince of Bohemia, divorced his wife Margareta, who
afterwards married an ancestor of the Kaiser, Ludwig of Brandenburg.
King Ladislaus of Sicily divorced Queen Constance and forced his vassal,
Andrea di Capua, to marry her against his will. Ten years later
Ladislaus married Maria de Lusignan.
* * * * *
But a little knowledge is a terrible thing, if it happens to be acquired
by a prince. Princes are supposed to know nothing but the art and the
_finesses_ of destruction--war. Upbuilding is not in their line.
"I hear you are exercising a bad influence on Louise," roared our uncle,
the Emperor, at Leopold when the latter took leave from him. "You
furnished to her those infernal books, sowing the seed of guilty
knowledge?"
Leopold so far forgot himself as to address a question to the
"All-Highest": "What infernal books?"
"Books full of indecencies and obscenities, in short pornographic
literature," shouted the head of the family, turned his horse and rode
away in high dudgeon. Royal arguments are nothing if not one-sided!
Then Leopold told of himself. His garrison: a filthy mud-hole in Poland.
One-story houses and everybody peeping into everybody else's windows.
The few notables of the town and neighborhood tickled to death because
they have an Imperial Highness with them, and the fool of an Imperial
Highness goes and "besots himself with a mere country lass." He showed
me her photograph. I like her looks. A pretty face, blonde hair and soft
eyes. He was her first lover. On his account she left her family. She
dotes on him as a dog dotes on his master.
Leopold is eccentric enough to jeopardize his career for this poor
thing. He rented a small house for her and spends much of his time there
when not on the drill-grounds.
Hence intense indignation among the "respectable ladies." An Imperial
Highness within reach and he "doesn't come to our dances, he doesn't
visit and sends his regrets when invited!"
Poor Marja suffers especially from the venom of the officers'
wives,--cattle I detest. No royal or imperial prince is safe from them
except in his mother's womb.
"From morn till night and half the night they do nothing but gossip
about me and my girl," said Leopold,--"If the cats were only satisfied
with that! But every little while I get an anonymous letter from one of
them, denouncing her; Marja is favored in a similar way; so is my
general and our uncle, the Emperor."
And needless to say Leopold can't get along on his salary and appanage.
Father can't give him much. The Emperor won't, because the clergy
intrigues against him as a free-thinker and non-church-goer.
We thought long and deep whether it wouldn't be possible to improve our
position and we decided on this:
We will keep up each other's spirits by clandestine correspondence,
carried on with the aid of a mutual friend. At the same time we will,
apparently, fall in with the ideas of "our masters" and endure a few
pin-pricks rather than waste our strength in useless opposition.
Let no one chide us for hypocrites, because our gentleness will be a
mask, our submission a snare, our obedience a lie. It's all on the
outside. Inwardly Leopold and Louise will remain true to themselves.
CHAPTER XXVI
FREDERICK AUGUSTUS CONTINUES VERY RAW
Manners _à la_ barracks natural to royal princes--Names I am
called--My ladies scandalized--Leopold turned over a new leaf,
according to agreement, and is well treated--The King grateful to me
for having "influenced Leopold to be good."
LOSCHWITZ, _October 1, 1894_.
I have tried it a fortnight during Frederick Augustus' sojourn here,
and, like the French Countess who fell in love with the strong man of
the circus, I am disappointed. Frederick Augustus considers my
tractability _carte blanche_ to carry into the boudoir of an Imperial
Princess the license of the brothel. He treats me like a kept-woman--all
with the utmost good-nature. I am called names such as the other
Augustus bestowed on the mothers of his three hundred and fifty-two, and
I daren't remind him that some day I'll be Queen of these realms.
This prince, like the majority of them, hasn't the ghost of an idea of a
sensitive woman's nature. He paws me over like a prize cow, and as the
fourteenth Louis esteemed his mistress's chamber-women no more worthy of
notice than her lap-dogs, so Frederick Augustus makes love _à la_
barracks before the Schoenberg, Countess von Minckwitz, or whatever
other lady is in attendance.
Only when he does it before the Tisch I am inclined to be amused rather
than incensed. Tisch, cadaverous beanpole, never felt a loving touch on
her shoulder. The place where her bosom should be never experienced a
friendly squeeze. No one ever cared whether she wore silk stockings or
rubber boots--be amorous, Frederick Augustus, when the Tisch is 'round!
Indulge your coarseness! Put twenty-mark pieces in my stockings for a
kiss. Tell gay stories and don't forget playing with my corsage. It will
make the old woman mad. It will remind her of what she missed--of what
she will miss all her life!
* * * * *
LOSCHWITZ, _October 10, 1894_.
Letter from Leopold. He is going to church and--they leave his mistress
in peace.
He is paying banal compliments to the noble-women of his garrison and
pinches the officers' wives when he finds one in a corner--and they seem
to live in corners when His Imperial Highness is around--hence, no more
anonymous letters!
The spy planted in his household by the Emperor is allowed to see much
of the "innocent" correspondence passing between me and Leopold. He has
reported to Francis Joseph that the Prince turned over a new leaf.
Result: Leopold's debts have been paid and he got about two thousand
marks over and above his wants.
Further results: A gracious letter from the King's House Marshal, Baron
Carlowitz, praising me for "the good influence I am exercising on
Leopold."
Truly the world wants to be deceived.
CHAPTER XXVII
PRINCE MAX MAKES LOVE TO ME
Wants me to consult him on all spiritual matters--Warns me against
the Kaiser, the heretic bishop--Princes as ill-mannered as
Russian-Jew up-starts.
DRESDEN, _November 15, 1894_.
Prince Max called on me the day of my arrival and promised me an
armchair in Paradise for "reforming" Leopold. "I understand that your
family life is ideal now," he added. "What bliss!"
"Oh, Louise," he continued, with the face of a donkey withdrawing his
nozzle from a syrup barrel, "whenever doubtful of the right way, of the
Lord's way, come to me."
It would have been un-politic to repulse the grotesque ape, and I said:
"I will. I will even give you the preference over the Kaiser, who asked
me the same thing--as _summus episcopus_, of course."
Max looked about the room. We were alone, yet he lowered his voice to a
faint whisper. "William is a heretic. Don't trust him in religious
matters," he breathed stealthily. And this devilish Max began to stroke
my hands and admire a bracelet I wore above the elbow.
The Kaiser wouldn't have gone much further under the circumstances.
Maybe he would have kissed my arm, though, from wrist to pit.
* * * * *
Tonight family tea in the Queen's _salon_. The King an icicle, but
polite as a French marquis. He gave me the three "_How art thou's_" in
the space of five minutes, asked after the babies and promised to come
and look them over.
Frederick Augustus, half insane with delight, pinched my arm and
squeezed my leg under the table. I felt like boxing his ears.
My father-in-law had to behave in the presence of the King and said a
few commonplaces to me.
Johann George and Isabella talked automobiles, not to let us forget they
are millionaires.
"How much did you pay for my blue car?" asked Isabella.
"Not much," replied Johann George; "sixty thousand francs, if I
recollect rightly."
"My allowance for a whole year." I smiled my sweetest, and the King
looked disapprovingly at the braggarts.
For ill manners recommend me to a Russian-Jew upstart or to a Royal
Highness.
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE SHAH OF PERSIA FALLS IN LOVE WITH ME
The "animal" and his show of diamonds and rubies--Overcome by love
he treats me like a lady of the harem--On the defensive--The King of
kings an ill-behaved brute--Eats like a pig and affronts
Queen---Wiped off greasy hands on my state robe--When ten thousand
gouged-out eyes carpeted his throne--Offers of jewels--"Does he take
me for a ballet girl?"--The Shah almost compromises me--King,
alarmed, abruptly ends dinner--I receive presents from him.
DRESDEN, _November 20, 1894_.
Lover No. two. Very much in earnest, like the first, but I--extremely
distant this time, though I accepted some emeralds and sapphires as big
as dove's eggs. The Shah of Persia is the happy-unhappy man.
The King and all the Princes went to the railway station to receive him.
The Queen and Princesses, our entourage behind us, assembled in the
throne room to do honor to the "animal." To designate him otherwise
would be callow flattery.
But his diamonds and rubies fairly dazzled us. Nothing like it in
Europe, and our gala uniforms, compared with his, like stage tiaras to
the Russian Crown jewels!
Though he had eyes for me only, I didn't like him a bit. He is a little
fellow, unsecure on his pins. And like the Balkan princeling I met in
Vienna, looks as though there was a strain of Jewish blood in his veins.
Like a true Oriental potentate, he wasted not a minute's time on the
Queen and my sisters-in-law, but began making love to me as soon as he
entered. The King had to take him by the arm to remind him that his
first greetings were due to her Majesty. Poor Carola! Her face looked
like parchment, much interlined, and the point of her nose was as
conspicuous as usual.
There's nothing elegant about this "King of kings," and his French, like
his manners, is atrocious. He addressed a few set phrases to the Queen,
then attacked me--"attacked" is the right word. If I hadn't been on the
defensive, I think he would have handled my charms as unceremoniously as
Frederick Augustus when in his cups. As it was I escaped but by the
length of an eye-lash.
State dinner at five. I never saw such an ill-behaved brute, yet he
intended to be most agreeable. We are very pious at this court, but on
occasions like this even an old woman like the Queen is obliged to
denude herself like a wet-nurse on duty.
His Majesty had the Queen on one side; me on the left. The King of
Saxony was opposite.
After we sat down the Shah examined Queen Carola from the point of her
chin to the edge of her desolate corsage and had the effrontery to
express disapproval in all but words. Then he turned to me. His gaze
became admiring. He was evidently delighted with his discoveries and,
true despot that he is, turned his back on the Queen, while paying
extravagant court to my charms.
The King, the whole vast assembly, the surrounding splendor were lost on
this mutton-eater of a barbarian. He saw only me, _m-e_, ME, and I'm
sure would have consigned all the rest to some unspeakable Oriental
death for five minutes' _tête-à-tête_ with Louise.
"You are neglecting Her Majesty," I whispered to him over and over
again. This seemed to enrage him, but at last he turned to the Queen,
expecting her to begin a conversation with him. Of course, Her Majesty
thought he would take the initiative, which led to mutual staring, the
Shah's eyes growing wickeder every second. Then he began to devote
himself to the food and, be sure, there was small pleasure in watching
him. He fed more like a dog than a human being and actually had the
effrontery to wipe his sauce-spattered hands in the lap of my state
robe.
Then, before his mouth was empty, he began talking again.
"Which of the princes is your husband?"
I singled out Frederick Augustus. "He isn't a beauty by any means," he
said, after examining him like a horse for sale.
The next second his eyes were wandering over my body; I felt as if I was
being disrobed.
"You will attend the opera?"
"I'll have the honor."
"I will send you a little present after dinner," he said. "If you wear
it tonight, I will regard that as a sign of hope." The beast affected a
sentimentality to which he must be a stranger.
I recalled that he was the monster who carpeted the steps of his throne
with the gouged-out eyes of ten thousand enemies of his régime when he
was crowned. On twenty-thousand human eyes he trod with naked feet as he
acclaimed himself "King of kings" and the "true son of God." And
Juggernaut was in love with me!
I was speechless. Did he take me for a dancing girl? I narrowed my
shoulders and gave him a look of disdain. House Marshal Baron Carlowitz,
standing behind the King's chair, took in the situation and whispered to
King Albert.
The King immediately rose from table and the state dinner came to an
abrupt end.
An hour later, while I was dressing for the theatre, a big jewel box was
handed in. "From the Shah."
Despite my disgust with the fellow, I opened it in feverish haste. There
was a bracelet set with rubies, sapphires and emeralds of fabulous
size.
CHAPTER XXIX
THE SHAH COMPROMISES ME IN PUBLIC
Has only eyes for me at the grand manoeuvres, and I can't drive
him from my carriage--Ignores the King and the military
spectacle--Calls me his adored one--Court in despair--Shah ruins
priceless carpets to make himself a lamb stew.
DRESDEN, _December 1, 1894_.
I am in disgrace again and that uncouth animal, the Shah, is
responsible.
The dinner episode was bad enough, but he carried on worse at the grand
parade next day.
Six or eight regiments, Horse, Foot and Artillery, had been moved to do
him honor, but he flatly refused to accept a mount for the occasion.
Like the ladies of the royal family, he drove to the parade field in a
coach and four, and no sooner did he clap eyes on me at the rendezvous
in another vehicle than he left his and shambled over to me. He stood at
the carriage door, chanting love and devotion, and if I hadn't been all
ice, I have no doubt he would have jumped in and ordered the coachman to
drive to a hotel.
Meanwhile the King trotted around the manoeuvre field in honor of his
"sublime guest." Evolutions, _Parade-marsch_, attacks, saluting the
colors, Persian and Saxon, what not? Imagine the feelings of the old
King when he rode up to the Shah's gala coach and found it empty.
The marching past had begun, and still the "King of kings" turned his
back on it all, while trying to persuade me to be Queen of his seraglio.
Our courtiers, the princes, the Queen, the generals were in despair.
They took counsel with each other, disputed, advised, got red in the
face. The Shah's gentlemen alone kept cool. They probably argued: If our
master prefers the company of a pretty woman to looking at ten thousand
men, he shows his good taste.
I tried to shake him off. He stood his ground and smiled.
"The Grand March has begun, Your Majesty."
"Bother the Grand March."
The King began to bombard me with ungracious, glances, and of course
everybody stared. Three times I asked the big booby to return to his
carriage to oblige his host. "Not while I may look at you, adored one."
His love-making became desperate. The Crown Princess of Saxony, the
Imperial Highness of Austria, the "adored one" of this butcher, who was
ruining twenty-five thousand marks' worth of carpets in his apartments
at our palace by using them as a shambles to prepare his breakfast of
lamb stew. It was contemptible,--nay, ridiculous. Surely there was
nothing to do but laugh. And I laughed and laughed again.
Only when the last battalion had marched by and the music ceased, the
"King of kings" returned to his carriage and drove back to Dresden with
the most bored looking visage of the world.
CHAPTER XXX
MY LIFE AT COURT BECOMES UNBEARABLE
Laughter a crime--Disappointed Queen lays down the law for my
behavior--Frederick Augustus sometimes fighting drunk--Draws sword
on me--Prince George would have me beaten--To bed with his boots on.
DRESDEN, _January 5, 1895_.
Ever since the Shah left I have been the object of criticism, suspicions
and down-right attacks by the pretty family I married into. These pages
witness that I tried to conform to the absurd notions and comply with
the narrow-minded idiosyncrasies of the Royal Wettiners. I give it up.
It can't be done, and I won't make another effort at pleasing my
relatives-in-law, who adjudge laughter a crime and the desire to make
friends a bid of lewdness.
Prince George invented the phrase, "Louise is over-desirous to please,"
and Queen Carola paid me a state visit to acquaint me with the new
indictment.
"Good gracious," I said to Her Majesty, "is that all? I thought of being
accused of 'sassing' the Archangel Gabriel. As to desire to please,
that's exactly what ails me. I love to please. I love to see people
happy. I love to make friends."
"My dear child," said the Queen, "you haven't the slightest notion of
royal dignity. You talk like a _cocotte_. It's a Princess's place to be
honored, to be held in supreme esteem."
Poor old woman! She was never pretty, never was made love to, never had
admirers, legitimate or otherwise; she thus became impregnated with the
fixed idea that to be fair and to be loved for one's fairness is
frivolous, if not altogether reprehensible.
* * * * *
_March 10, 1895._
Frederick Augustus drinks. He says I drive him to drink by my attitude
towards his beloved family. What the beloved family does to me doesn't
count, of course.
Drinking was one of the vices of his youth. Love for me cured him of the
dreadful habit. As this love wanes, the itch for alcohol increases.
I can't do anything with him when he is drunk, and at such times I am
afraid of him. He both nauseates me and frightens me. Sometimes he comes
home "fighting drunk." The fumes of wine, beer and _Schnapps_, mixed
with tobacco, upset my stomach and I try to avoid his coarse embrace as
any decent woman would.
What does this royal drill-ground bully do? He unsheathes his sword and
threatens to cut my liver out, unless I instantly doff my clothes and go
to bed with him.
Prince George's evil counsel wasn't powerful enough to procure me
beatings, but my husband's military education, his love of discipline,
backed by alcohol, thrusts a sword into his hand, and, if I refuse to
comply with his atrocious demands, I am liable to be treated like so
many "mere" civilians that are sabred in the public streets for refusing
to do some spurred and epauletted blackguard's bidding, or entertain his
insults.
If the Socialists, who are forever railing against these self-same army
poltroons, only knew it! An Imperial Highness threatened like a small
"cit" with a four-foot sword in the hand of a drunken Royal Highness and
dragged to a couch with no more ceremony than a street-walker passing a
Cossack barracks!
The howl that would go up in the Diet, or the _Reichstag_, the fulminant
denials by prince and king and government! And if I really did get hurt
in one of these fracases, Frederick Augustus would be sure of a "severe
reprimand" by father and uncle, and perhaps by the Kaiser, too, but
would that heal my wounds, would it save me from death? Would it even
prevent Prince George from saying that I myself was to blame?
No, no, I like a whole skin and prefer an embrace to a sword-thrust any
day, like my ancestress, the Queen of Naples, who consummated the
marriage forced upon her on the spot and in sight of the army rather
than have her head cut off. Too bad she was hanged in the end despite
her complacency.[5]
Indeed, if Frederick Augustus shows the mailed fist, I don't stand on
ceremony, but I do wish he would take his boots off.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 5: Joanna I, Queen of Naples, a pupil of Petrarca and in many
respects an enlightened ruler. She issued the first laws and regulations
regarding prostitutes. Hanged by order of King Louis of Hungary, after
her defeat in battle, July, 1381.]
CHAPTER XXXI
PRISON FOR PRINCES THAT OPPOSE THE KING
Duke of Saxony banished--Cut off from good literature even--Anecdote
concerning the Grand Dauphin and his "kettledrums"--A royal prince's
garrison life--His association with lewd women.
DRESDEN, _September 1, 1895_.
I have once more come to the conclusion that the agreement I made with
Leopold, to dissimulate my real feelings, was the sanest decision I ever
formed, for, while _lettres de cachet_ are a dead measure as far as
ordinary mortals go, kings still wield that awful and mysterious abuse
of power in the family circle.
There is a distant connection of our "sublime master," the King,
lingering, without process of law, in a state prison. Duke of Saxony is
his title, and he is quite rich in his own right. Some six or eight
years ago he raised his hand against the King after the latter struck
him.
It was suggested that he had better make away with himself, and a
revolver and poison were conspicuously displayed in the room where he
was held captive.
The Duke said "nay." He thought he could "brass" it out. But the
assembled family council taught him that, while the world at large was
_fin-de-siècle_, royalty still lived in the traditions of the eighteenth
century. It empowered the King to banish his kinsman to a lonely country
house, styled castle by courtesy, and he is confined there even today,
with the proviso, though, that he may use the surrounding
hunting-grounds. Otherwise he lives in complete seclusion, separated not
only from all his friends, but from the very classes of society to which
he belongs by birth and education. And he is still a young man.
I believe they are trying to drive him mad, once as a punishment, and
again to secure his fortune the quicker. To the latter end, he is denied
all books that give him pleasure and are liable to improve his mind.
Bibles, Christian Heralds, the Lives of the Martyrs, or the Popes,
galore, but never a Carlyle, Shakespeare or Taine, which he demands
regularly.
The Duke is dying of _ennui_, they say, and to kill time engages in all
sorts of manual labor. When he gets tired of that he blows the trombone.
"Of course he would prefer a pair of kettledrums," said my cousin
Bernhardt of Weimar, to whom I am indebted for the above.
"Kettledrums?" I asked.
"I mean those the Grand Dauphin, called 'Son of a king, father of a
king, never a king,' was so fond of, and which he finally married in
secret."
I looked bewildered.
"You are a very ignorant girl," said Bernhardt. "Never heard of the
prodigious bosoms of _Mademoiselle_ Chouin?"
"They won't let the Duke marry?" I queried.
"Not even temporarily," said Bernhardt. "And they are trying the same
game on me. My garrison--a dung-heap. The people there, males and
females, entirely unacquainted with soap and water. Nothing in the world
to do but drink and gamble."
"That reminds me. What are you doing in Dresden?"
"With Your Imperial Highness's permission, I came to see my girl."
"Who is the lady?"
"No lady at all. Just an ordinary servant-wench, but prettier and more
devilish than a hundred of them."
"Bernhardt!"
"What would you have me do, Louise? I haven't money enough to keep a
mistress, and King and Queen certainly won't keep one for me. I wish I
had lived a hundred and fifty years ago, when every lady of the court
was expected to entertain the royal princes, the Palace footing the
bill."
CHAPTER XXXII
PRINCE GEORGE SHOWN THE DOOR BY GRAND-DUCHESS MELITA
A royal lady who walks her garden attired in a single diaphanous
garment--Won't stand for any meddling--Called impertinent--My
virtuous indignation assumed--A flirtation at a distance--An
audacious lover--The Grand Mistress hoodwinked--Matrimonial horns
for Kaiser--The banished Duke dies--Princes scolded like
school-boys.
DRESDEN, _February 5, 1896_.
At last Prince George got his deserts, and got 'em good and heavy. There
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