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Show Hps Jwtep mm Jlrs. Van Rensselaer Cruger is one cf the most prominent living American j women. For t,he past 'two years she has been in deep mourning for j her husband, but has been busily writing all the time. Under the pen j ! name of "Julien Gordon" she has penned many well-known novels. : ! She is a great beauty and society leader as well as a writer of note. WITH ITALY'S NEW QUEEN. I , II i if An Hour With (he 5Io-t Bean-tifnl Bean-tifnl Woman in I urope, Who Is Also the Best Hnniress and Spor'tswomaiii By Annette Rierdon Reed. I I Rome, August 6. I shall never forget an audience which it was my privilege i to obtain with the Princess of Naples, j now Italy's Queen. It took place in the spring of 1897, less than six months after the marriage of the Princess to the Prince of Naples. Helene, you will remember, was the daughter of the King of Montenegro and had come down from the moun- I tains with all her native freshness clinging to her. She had none of tht; awkwardness of the country girl, however, how-ever, and I thought, as I looked at her afar upon her yacht, that she was the fairest, most elegant Princess I had ever seen. Helene stands at least six feet tall, and her coloring is very brilliant. bril-liant. Her hair and eyes are dark but her checks are a bright scarlet, painted thus by Nature's own hand. She stood upon one end of the yacht talking to her father-in-law, the lamented la-mented King Humbert, who was her ardent admirer and faithful slave from the first moment he laid eyes on her which vas early in the year 1S94. From 1S94 to 1806 thr Prince of Naples wooed Helene and '. October, 18!fi, nearly four years ago. they were married. THE PRINCESS. My coming was evidently expected, for at a word from a courier, the Princess Prin-cess turned and, speaking to one cf her ladies, walked, accompanied by the woman, to the centre of the yacht where I, hesitating and uncertain, stood awaiting her. I had interviewed Olga of Greece and had gone through with the many ceremonies cere-monies attendant upon an audience with her Majesty. I had also interviewed inter-viewed Queen Marpfherita of Italy and was struck with the simplicity of her ways. She was so utterly different from other European sovereigns. Would the Princess Helene be like her or different! I I bowed as she approached and stood I with both hands at my sides waiting I for the slightest movement on her part. When very near me she held out her hand in such a way that I knew that I was to take it and shake it, as though it were that of any ordinary mortal. The Princess spoke first. "Do you enjoy yachting on the Levant?" Le-vant?" she asked. I replied that I greatly enloved all the country around Italy. "Where do you live?" she asked. "I live in the United States." I replied, re-plied, "but I am from the State of Florida." "Is Florida beautiful?" she inquired. "Yes. Your Highness," I said, "it ia exquisite, as beautiful as Italy." She seemed much pleased at the reply re-ply and after a few more words, in which she invited me to inspect the yacht, I withdrew, most favorably impressed im-pressed with Italy's future Queen. No one at that time thought that the Princess Helene of Naples would so soon become Quen Helene of Italy, the successor to Queen Margherita, the ! Pearl of Savoy. Queen Helene was born January 8, ;VT3, with no very golden spoon in her ..louth. She was the third of seven aughters of Prince Nickolas( Lord of ho Black Mountain Kingdom of Mon-?negro. Mon-?negro. Her father, bravest of men. had high ambitions for his favorite and most beautiful daughter, and when the late Czar of Russia, anxious to win the good will of this small but mighty people peo-ple who held one of the "southern out- . posts of Russia," sent for Helene and made her an inmate of his palace and a protege of the Czarina, with the well understood purpose of marrying her to , his son, the young girl's wildest dreams seemed on the point of becoming realities. real-ities. IN RUSSIA. Did she love the Czarovitch? Well, that is a question upon which the dark-eyed dark-eyed beauty has not opened her lips. But that she loved the idea of one day becoming Czarina of all the Russias, mistress of the most splendid court in all the world, there is no question how she stood there. She would have given her two black eyes and pearly ears for the chance. j The Czarina fell in with her hus- band's idea, and the Montenegrin was treated as kindly and as lovingly as if she were a daughter. She bore herself becomingly, and those who saw her would scarcely have Imagined that she was brought up in a squalid little village vil-lage of 1.000 inhabitants among the Balkans, Cettinje by name, where her father was more like a highland chieftain chief-tain than the ruler of a people according accord-ing to the modern idea of kinsrs. But she had b?en well tutored, and spoke Russian, among four or five other languages, well. and. though she i had never known what it was to have an allowance and fine clothes, she wore the clothes provided by the Czarina as if to the manner born. Wonderful is the adaptability of woman. But it was not to be. Nicholas, the present Czar, would not have it. He looked on the splendid woman, with a face over which men raved and women wept, for its beauty, and the form of Hebe, with admiration, but when it came to marrying her he said no. Instead In-stead he married Aiix of Hesse and Helene of Montenegro went back to her father's court, her great ambition thwarted. It is said that Nicholas later tried to arrange a marriage between his daughter daugh-ter and the King of Servia. Alexander, but that she turned up her nose and declared him to be a nasty fellow, a verdict which nations have echoed. But, though the Russian Nicholas would not marry Helene, he did not wish to be on bad terms with her father. With great tact he and his wife pushed the fortunes of the beauti ful Montenegrin. And it was while she was a guest of the Czarina at their coronation that the engagement with Victor of Naples w.is announced. It is said that the royal lovers met first at Athens, where the Prince, an ardent yachtsman, was cruising. He had been engaged and disingaged in turn with every eligible princess in Europe and had really cared for none. His tastes did not lead him much into the society of women. He loved his yacht. He loved the chase. He loved the arts of war in which he had perfected per-fected himself. But he was believed to be a woman hater. j i A SKETCH OF ITALY'S NEW QUEEN, DRAWN BY AN AMERICAN " GIRL ABROAD. |