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[ROYALTY IN EXILE.]
BY THOMAS PARKE GORDON.
In olden times thrones were very unstable affairs, and kingdoms were overthrown in a twinkling. Readers of ancient history will recall many such instances of the downfall of earthly grandeur.
Alexander the Great overthrew Darius in the plenitude of his power; the Emperor Aurelian destroyed Palmyra and led Zenobia, the queen, in triumph to Rome, where she ended her days in peaceful retirement.
Rome, when mistress of the world, overthrew hundreds of monarchies, and killed or sent into exile innumerable kings. In the days of her decline, the people deposed their own rulers at such a rate that the imperial purple was finally put up at auction by the soldiery.
In later days, monarchies became more secure; but kingdoms were nevertheless overturned, and several royal rulers sent into exile, when not more severely punished. But, with passing years, revolutions became more rare, until Napoleon began his wars of conquest, and deposed kings as if they were playthings.
Since Napoleon's downfall, revolutions have become still more rare; yet monarchies are so many, and republican ideas are growing so rapidly, that scores of deposed rulers are in exile, pining for the days that will never return.
Perhaps the most notable is the Count of Paris, who recently paid a visit to this country. The count, it is true, has never reigned, so he cannot be said to have been deposed; but he claims descent from the Bourbon kings of France, and seeks to revive the ancient rule.
He is a resident of England, and is in easy circumstances. He has a rival for the throne in Prince Napoleon Bonaparte, who lives in luxurious exile in Switzerland.
Prince Napoleon's father was a brother of the great Napoleon, and he hopes that some day the people of France will recognize him as their ruler.
England gives refuge to another exile in Eugenie, the widow of Napoleon III, who resides at Chiselhurst, and who makes no pretensions to royal grandeur. Since the death of her son by Zulu assegais she has lived the life of a recluse.
Paris shelters the exiled Isabella, Queen of Spain, who takes her downfall philosophically. She is rich, and passes her time between Paris, Nice and Boulogne in social enjoyment.
In the same city lives Don Carlos, a pretender to the throne of Spain. He traces his descent from Carlos, the second son of Charles IV, born 1788.
The original Carlos began the insurrection business in 1825, and, after being repeatedly defeated and banished, died at Trieste in 1855. His son Don Carlos continued to make periodical attempts to regain the crown, but died in 1861, leaving no direct heir.
The present Don Carlos, the nephew of the above, has headed four insurrections and has many followers, but no one believes that he will ever be more than an aspirant.
Dom Pedro, the deposed Emperor of the Brazils, lives in Portugal, and is the most unhappy of ex-rulers. The death of his wife followed close upon his exile, and he longs to return to Brazil, if only to die. He has refused the gratuity offered him by the infant republic, and not being wealthy, the future looks rather dark for him.
When Italy was united, a number of petty sovereigns were deprived of their crowns and now wander around without any particular aim in life. Unlike an ex-President of the United States, an ex-king cannot go to work, and, if he has not saved any money, must depend on charity for a living, unless he can marry a rich wife.
Austria has taken care of several rulers of the Tuscan provinces, and the Italians are generous enough to see that none of them starve.
Paris is a notable refuge for royal exiles, and some of them are engaged in anything but kingly pastimes. A prince of Georgia drives a cab, and one of the best police agents is a scion of the royal house of Poland.
Among the curiosities of Paris is Orelie, King of Araucania. Originally a poor lawyer, with a taste for adventure, he made his way to Chili, and thence to a remote section of the republic, where the Araucanian Indians live. He won their good will to such an extent that they elected him king, and for several years he ruled over them. Then the Chilians started a war and Orelie I decamped. In Paris he still calls himself King of Araucania, and makes a precarious living by selling titles of nobility to gullible or vain people.
Another exile, more meritorious, is Francesco, King of Armenia and Prince of Jerusalem. It has been many years since Francesco's ancestors were driven by the Turks from the throne of Armenia, but there can be no doubt whatever of the royal antiquity of the family. Descended from a bold crusader, they held the kingly rank for centuries, until the rise of Mohammedan power in the East made them exiles. Russia, for many years, gave the titular prince a pension, but this was dropped about forty years ago, and since then the kings of Armenia have had a very hard time of it. The present king is a waiter in a small restaurant near Versailles. He is a quiet fellow, and does not parade either his pedigree or his misfortunes.
There can be no doubt that the number of royal exiles will increase with the passing years. The trend is all one way. Monarchies are giving way to republics all over the world, and once the people have the power in their own hands they will not relinquish it. Revolutions, however, nowadays are peaceful, and kings may thank their stars that they are no longer in danger of losing their heads along with their crowns.
[A HAPPY NEW YEAR.]
Nature has made no marked division between the new year and the old, and there is practically no difference in weather between the last week in December and the first week in January. Perhaps it would be more logical to have the year begin with the vernal equinox, but practically it makes no difference at all. The year begins on the first day of January in all Christian nations except Russia and her dependencies, and it is not likely that any change will be made in future.
Yet, although there is no natural division, custom has made one that we cannot help but notice. In the business and financial world the end of the old year marks a distinct epoch, and the first of January is the beginning of new accounts and new books. There is a general brushing up, so to speak, and a number of new rules enacted, even if they are never enforced.
There seems to be no reason why there should not be a moral brushing up, as well as a business one. On the first of January, why should not every one take an account of stock? Why not foot up all the good and bad done in the old year, and find out on which side the balance lies? If bad, it is a subject for correction; if good, it is a matter for congratulation.
It is not necessary for one to make the footings public, any more than a business man takes the outside world into his confidence, but a perusal may do a wonderful amount of good. Indeed, it is the only way by which one can learn to avoid a repetition of the errors of the old year.
The first of the new year is called "happy" doubtless on account of the good resolutions which inevitably spring from a contemplation of the past. It is the one day in the year when every right-minded person at least tries to do good, and it is an axiom that to be good is to be happy.
Another reason springs from the time-honored custom of calling and renewing old acquaintances, and thus reviving many happy memories.
Let no boy or girl be laughed out of making good resolutions on New Year's Day. To make a resolution and keep it for a single day is better than to make none at all, and it renders each successive resolution easier to make and keep. But good resolutions may be kept, and then, indeed, the new year will be a happy one.
Resolve, then, on New Year's Day to be something better and nobler than you have been in the old year, to correct some fault or develop some virtue; resolve to make some one's life brighter, or to do good in some way, however humble, and you will find your reward in a happiness equal if not superior to that which you have bestowed.
[ICEBERGS.]
BY J. V. HAY.
It may sound strangely to the average reader to say that icebergs are more numerous in warm weather, but such is the fact. Of course they are formed in winter, but it takes the summer sun to set them adrift and send them floating on the ocean, a grand sight to look at but a fearful menace to vessels.
Icebergs are born every day in every month, but most of them remain in or near their native waters for a long time before they escape and wander to the great lanes of travel between here and Europe.
The bergs seen last summer are from two to ten years old—that is, they have had an existence individually for years, though the ice from which they are formed is much older, some of it possibly having been frozen first a thousand years ago.
Icebergs are born of glaciers, and four out of five of the floating bergs on the Atlantic come from Greenland. A glacier is a river of solid water confined in the depressions running down the mountain sides.
Soft and powdery snow falls upon the summits, and though some is evaporated, the yearly fall is greater than the yearly loss, and so the excess is pushed down the slope into the valleys which possibly at the time are covered with green and have afforded pasture lands for cattle.
The snow gathers in the high valleys and every day undergoes some degree of the change which finally transforms it into ice. Slowly, very slowly, in some cases only a foot every year, this frozen river flows downward. Nothing can stop it, nothing can even check it.
The process is the same in Switzerland and Greenland, only in Switzerland the glacier melts when it reaches the lower valley and feeds rivers; in Greenland the glacier slides into the ocean, breaks off and becomes an iceberg and floats away.
One of the incidents of an ordinary Alaskan cruise along the coast is to see the glaciers break off and fall into the water. They are far more beautiful than the finest of the glaciers of Switzerland, and in size they are so great that the largest Alpine glacier would make only a fair-sized nose, if it could be taken bodily and placed upon the face of one of the Alaskan giants.
At Glacier Bay icebergs are being born all the while. Muir Glacier, the largest that dips into the bay, presents a front of 5000 feet. It is 700 feet thick, five-sevenths of it being under water. It extends back for miles and miles.
Each day the central part moves 70 feet into the sea, the discharge every twenty-four hours being 140,000,000 cubic feet of clear ice. As this great quantity cracks into pieces from the glacier, the bergs of the North Pacific begin their life. The separation from the larger mass and the plunge into the sea cause terrific noises.
The interior of Greenland is a solid mass of ice. In fact, some people think that at about the central part of Greenland there is a high mountain, around whose sides there has grown through the centuries an enormous glacier, sending down in every direction branch glaciers that extend to the coast. It is known that the only part of the land which is not covered completely by ice is a narrow belt around the shore.
Crossing this belt at hundreds of places are the glaciers. Some are only a few hundred feet wide and 50 feet thick, while others are several miles wide and measure 1500 feet from surface to bottom.
All of these ice streams are making their way to the sea, and as their ends are forced out into the water by the pressure behind, they are broken off and set adrift as bergs.
Ensign Hugh Rodman, of the United States navy, in his report on the "ice and ice movements in the North Atlantic Ocean," explains many interesting things about ice and bergs.
Once the glacier extends into deep water, pieces are broken off by their buoyancy, aided possibly by the currents and the brittleness of the ice.
The size of the pieces set adrift varies greatly, but a berg from 60 to 100 feet to the top of its walls, whose spires or pinnacles may reach from 200 to 250 feet in height and from 300 to 500 yards in length, is considered an average size berg in the Arctic. These measurements apply to the part above the water, which is about one-eighth or one-ninth of the whole mass.
Many authors give the depth under water as being from eight to nine times the height above. This is incorrect, and measurements above and below water should be referred to mass and not to height.
It is even possible to have a berg as high out of water as it is deep below the surface, for if we imagine a large, solid lump, of any regular shape, which has a very small, sharp, high pinnacle in the centre, the height above water can easily be equal to the depth below. An authentic case on record is that of a berg grounded in the Strait of Belle Isle, in sixteen fathoms of water, that had a thin spire about one hundred feet in height.
Each glacier in Greenland, so far as any estimate has been made, is the parent each year of from ten to one hundred icebergs. When these bergs have plunged into the Arctic Sea, they are picked up by the Arctic current and begin their journey to the North Atlantic. But there are thousands of them afloat; they crowd and rub against each other and frequently they break into smaller masses.
Many go aground in the Arctic basin; others get to the shores of Labrador, where from one end to the other they continually ground and float. Some disappear there, while others get safely past and reach the Grand Banks.
According to Ensign Rodman, the ice of bergs, although very hard, is at the same time extremely brittle. A blow of an axe will at times split them, and the report of a gun, by concussion, will accomplish the same end.
They are more apt to break up in warm weather than in cold, and whalers and sealers note this before landing on them when an anchor is to be planted or fresh water to be obtained.
On the coast of Labrador, in July and August, when it is packed with bergs, the noise of rupture is often deafening, and those experienced in ice give them a wide berth.
When they are frozen the temperature is very low, so that when their surface is exposed to a thawing temperature the tension of the exterior and interior is very different, making them not unlike a Prince Rupert's drop.
Then, too, during the day, the water made by melting finds its way into the crevices, freezes, and hence expands, and, acting like a wedge, forces the berg into fragments.
Much of the ice encountered at sea is discolored, and often full of dirt and gravel, while not infrequently stones are found imbedded in it.
Along the shores of Labrador, where there is a large rise and fall in the tide, ice is brought into contact with the bottom, and mud and sea-weed are frozen in with it, while at times landslides precipitate large quantities of dirt and stones on its surface.
As the ice leaves the coast and comes to the southward, it brings these burdens with it, which are deposited on the ocean bottom when the ice melts. As this melting occurs to a great extent over the Grand Banks, it would seem that the deposit from the field ice would be greater than that from bergs.
It is hard to understand why bergs should have foreign substances frozen into them, as they are formed from snow deposited on the frozen surfaces in the interior of Greenland, and hence their thickness is added to from their upper surface.
It is possible that in their journey south in the Arctic current they accumulate more or less foreign matter by having it ground into their bottoms; but this does not seem probable, as it is hard to force gravel into ice and give it a permanent hold, while mud accumulated in this way would soon be washed out.
Then, too, the largest bergs find their way around the edges of the Banks, and do not cross, on account of their draught, for only an average-size berg crosses the Banks.
["1891."]
BY REV. PHILIP B. STRONG.
|
Dear "1890" is no more! The year has gone like years before. With feelings foreign, sure, to none, I write an "1891." What lofty vows, what high resolves, The wakened soul to-day revolves! Will they endure, as now begun, Through all of "1891?" Oh, may more kindly words be said Than in the twelve-month that has fled; Far better, braver deeds be done Than then in "1891." What hath this year of loss or gain? Who knoweth? What of boon or bane? Life's thread may bright or dark be spun, Ah, shrouded "1891!" But faith is strong though sight is dim; We gladly leave the days with Him, And, trusting, wait the sands to run Of hopeful "1891." |
