Do they not remember what they said, wrote and published? I listen in vain for some words from them.... Nothing ... never a word. I am dead, so far as they are concerned.
I am unhappy. They know it, and they keep silence.
Never a thought, a memory for one who confided in them. They are in power—and I am in misery; they are living in their own country—I am an exile. They are Men, and I am a Woman. Oh, pettiness of the human soul!
I think again of all that has been said and written against me in the land of my birth for which I was sacrificed. What errors, what exaggerations, what passions, what ignorance concerning my real self! Nevertheless, taken as individuals, those who attack me and defame me are really good and brave men at heart. But they rend one's soul. Do they not understand what they do?
Has Belgium no conscience? She ranks so high to-day in the opinion of the world, that it seems impossible for her to expose herself to the diminution of her moral glory which will inevitably follow when History goes into the vexed question of the King's Inheritance, and its results in my own case. Can she rightly and peacefully enjoy that which has been unjustly obtained, or more or less greedily seized by her? History will find, as I find, certain ineffaceable words in the address to the Sénat by M. de Lantsheere, Minister of State, touching the Royal Gift of 1901, which all that was best in the Belgian soul then found inacceptable.
I reproduce these words for the contemplation and consideration of all honest men.
M. de Lantsheere spoke as follows in the Belgian Sénat on December 3, 1901, to contest the acceptance by the Chambre des Représentants of the King's Gift, and all that had privately enriched the King:
"I intend to remain faithful to a principle which King Leopold I always upheld and from which he never departed, one which I also upheld twenty-six years ago with M. Malou, M. Beernaert, and M. Delcour, Members of the Cabinet of which I had the honour to be a member—which MM. Hubert Dolez, d'Anethan and Notcomb, chief of those preceding me, who, like others after me, have equally upheld. This principle, which it has been reserved for the law to abandon for the first time, can be summed up in few words. The common law is an indispensable support of the Royal Patrimony. The present project offends Justice.... Two of the Royal princesses are married. From these marriages children have been born. Therefore families have been founded. These children have married in their turn, and have founded new families. These families may very reasonably have expected that nothing detrimental could happen to the hereditary rights which the Code declares unalienable from the descendants.... If, owing to some aberration of which you will give the first example ... you do not respect the laws by which families are founded, ... one universal voice will be heard in Belgium which will curse the dominions which have enriched the nation at the expense of the King's children....
"Do you not think that it will look very disgraceful for Royalty to be exposed to the suspicion of wishing (under the cloak of liberality towards a country) to reserve the means, if not of disinheriting its descendants, at least of depriving them of that to which they are legally and morally entitled? I venture to believe that those persons will serve the interests of the State much more faithfully who insist that she must remain firm in her acceptance of the rights of Common Law, than those persons who uphold the acceptance of the disastrous gift of an unlimited authority. I wish to ignore the possibility of any of these ulterior motives having entered the mind of His Majesty; you must ignore them if they have not already occurred to you; but I know that man's will is variable and certain laws are made in order to prevent possible injustice.
"If at the time of the King's death a point had been made of encroaching on the disposable funds, you would not have had the courage to lay the hand upon this patrimony. Why, then, do you forge weapons which, when the moment is ripe, you will blush to use?