Within royal palaces : a brilliant and charmingly written inner view of emperors, kings, queens, princes and princesses ... . n order to keep himself au courajit of publicopinion. His Majesty, however, never takes up a his forefathers he knows nothing of political this is more than compensated by the fact that he is asingularly upright man, and gifted with a rare amount ofcommon sense. The King hates talking politics, and asa rule, avoids conversations with politicians. He loathestheories and always wants to be placed face to face withfacts. He is of an exceedingly gen
Within royal palaces : a brilliant and charmingly written inner view of emperors, kings, queens, princes and princesses ... . n order to keep himself au courajit of publicopinion. His Majesty, however, never takes up a his forefathers he knows nothing of political this is more than compensated by the fact that he is asingularly upright man, and gifted with a rare amount ofcommon sense. The King hates talking politics, and asa rule, avoids conversations with politicians. He loathestheories and always wants to be placed face to face withfacts. He is of an exceedingly generous nature. He likes jewelsand has presented magnificent ones to the Queen, but, likehis ancestors, he has absolutely no artistic tastes. He scarcely 156 WITHIN ROYAL PALACES. knows a Raphael from a Rubens, and like his father andgrandfather hates all music except that of the trumpet andthe drum. Like most of the Princes of his family, his sympa-thies are more in accord with the masses than with the aris-tocracy. He needs to make no effort in order to be cordialwith the mob, and displays almost as much graciousness in. PRIVATE DRAWING-ROOM OF THE KING. conversing with the lower classes as he would in talking withhis equals. This is why he is often nicknamed Le Roi desMarmottes^. He is essentially a democratic monarch, and rather a per-fect sfentleman than a g-rand seigneur. In his youth he was THE ROVAL FAMILY OF ITALY. ir7 always exceedingly delicate in health and appearance, and heremained somewhat frail-lookinor and small in stature. One day, during- the lifetime of his father, a newly-arriveddiplomat was stupid enough to mistake King Victor Eman-uels illegitimate son, the Marquis de Mirafiori, for PrinceHumbert. The Re Ganlant uomo immediately turned onhim and shouted with a thunderinof voice for the edification ofthe gamekeepers and surrounding crowd: No, no, that isthe Prince ; this is Mirafiori; look at him ; it is the blood ofkings mingled with that of the people. Kin
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, booksubjectcourtsandcourtiers
