Evening Star Newspaper, June 10, 1923, Page 76

- Luck, Courage, Alertness Help Writer Who Ming QU Fl\ WILHELMINA WITH HER HUSBAND AND LITTLE DAUG! TER. THE STORY TOLD BY XPERIENCES WTIILE WAITING 1. SIR PHILIP GIBBS ABOUT HIS IN THE HAGUE TO WRITE THE STORY OF THE BIRTH OF THIS PRINCESS THROWS SOME AMUSING SIDELIGHTS ON THE GREAT AND NEAR-GREAT OF HOLLAND. BY SIR PHILIP GIBBS WAS at the b, look back particular me that gratitude Rave considerable with sterpleces of Dutch art and the beauties of Dutch cities also learned to read Dutch wi case, owing to the long de Wilhelmina's event be it acqualntance the m arrival of daughter. For som . the great a pro- portion to world events, this expec- tatfon of an hefr to the Dutc throne was considered enormous nolitical of Queen time before new of the prince. agents came from all parts of Europe to the little old city of The Ha and I had among my brothers of the pen two of the best known urnalist in Furope, one of whom was ndovie Nodeau of Le Journal end the other Hamilton Fyfe of the D v Mail. Every night in the old wh palace of The Hague we three, and »ix others of various nationaliti were entertained at banquet the rooms of the queen’s chamberlain, the Jonkheer Hee who had placed his rooms at our disposal Flunkeys in royval i ¥, with powdered wigs and stockings, conducted us with candles to a well- spread table, and always the queen's chamberlain ced to us sol- emnly in six languages: “Gentlemen, the happy event will take place to- morrow Tomorrow came, a month of tomorrows, but no to the throne of Holland. Three times, owing to false rumors, the Dutch army came into the streets and drank not wisely | but too well new-born prince | who had not Ludovic Node: Hamilton Fyfe and T explored Holland, learnt Dutch, and saw the lime tree outside the | palace become heavy, with foliage, though it was bare at our coming. * ox ok % HE correspondent of The Times had a particular responsibility hecause he had promlised to telephone to the British ambassador, who, in his turn, was to telegraph to King | Edward, at any time of the day or| night that the event might happen. But the correspondent of the Times, | who was a very young man., and! “fed up” with all this baby stuff. | absented himself from the banquet one night. In the early hours of the | morning, when he was asleep at his | hotel, the queen's chamberlain ap- peared, with tearg running down hls cheeks, and announced In six languages that a princess had heen horn. Tt was Hamilton Fyfe and I who gave the news to the Dutch people. As we ran down the street to the postoffice men and women Ccame out onto the balconies in their night attire and shouted for news, “Princess! Princess!” we cried. An hour later The Hague was thronged with joyoys, dancing people. That morning the ministers of state linked hands and danced with the people down the main avenue—as though Lloyd George and his fellow ministers had performed a fox-trot in White- hall With .quaint old-world cus- toms, heralds and trumpeters an- nounced the glad tidings, alfeady known, and driving in a horse-cab to watch 1 had a fight with a Dutch photographer who tried to take pos session of my vehicle.' That night the Dutch army rejoiced, bolsterously. Although | cannot boast of fa- millarity with emperors, Mke Oscar Hrowning. and have been more in the position of the cat who can look at a king, according to the proverb, I can claim to have heard one crown- ed head utter;an eplgram on the spur of the moment. next Cor importance, as spondents in van annou and eir But the king—a tall, fat old with long nose and little shifty like a rogue elephant—"spotted once as an Englishman, and. ing me up to him, chatted ivilly in my own language. he spoke without an accent. At that moment there arrived the usual characfer who always does ap- pear at the psychological moment in any part of the world’s photographer of Daily Mail. Ferdinand of Bulgaria had a parti ular hatred and dread of camera men. belleving that he might be as- sascinated by some enemy pretending to “snap” him. He ralsed his stick to strike the man down and w reagsured when I told him that he was « harmless Englishman trying to carry out his profession as a pre: photographer. “Photography said the king ease.” at call- which is not a profession.” “It's a damned dis- 1 made another uninvited appear- ance among royalty. and to thiy day blush at the remembranace’ of my audacity, which was unnecessary unpardonable. It when King George and Queen Mary opened the shibition at the White City at'Shep herd’s Bush, London. They had made a preliminary in- spection of the place en a filthy day, when the exhibition grounds were like the bogs of Flanders, and when the king. with very pardonable irri- tation, uttered the word “damn!” as he stepped Into a puddle which splash- ed all over his uniform. “Hush, George!” sald the queen. “Walt till we get home!” On the day of the opening vast crowds had assembled in the grounds, but were not allowed to enter the was very | drama—a | only and | THE Englis}x Journalist Gives Character Sketches of Kings and Queens Hé Has Met—Ministers of State in an Imitation of the Snake Dant_:e—Ferdinand of Bulgan'a Utters an _Epigram——Queen Mary Cautions King George to Wait Until He Gets Home When Moved to Strong Language. SUNDAY L d STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, JUNE 10, I Nation's Tribute to King Edward and a Prophecy of War. was satisfied that I was one of them. | As I was in a new silk hat and tail | coat T looked as distinguished as a French minister, or, at least, did notl | arouse suspicion. The only member of the party who noticed my step | across the rope Sir Edward Grey. | He did not glve me away, but smiled | |at my cool cheek with the suspiclon | | of o wink. As a matter of fact, I was | | not so cool as T looked. I was in an awkward situation, because all the | royal party and their company were | busily engaged in conversation, with | the exception of Queen Alexandra,| who. being deaf, lingered behind to | | study the showcases instead of con- | versing. Having no one to talk to, I naturally lingered behind also, and | (hus attracted the kindly notice of | the queen mother, who made friendly | about the exhibition, not | aring my hesitating answers. For the first time 1 saw a royal re- | ception by, great crowds from the | point of view of royalty instead of the | white sea of faces, indis- | tinguishable, individually, but one big, | staring. thousand- ed face, shouting | and_waving all its pocket handker- | . while bands played “God Save | & and cameras snapped and | operators turned thelr han- | remarks crowd-— | chie the K cinema dles. “When 1 returned to my office T {ound{ the news editor startled photographs of his correspondent | walking solemnly beside Queen Alex- | andra French minister | | made a formal protest about his fil- | treatment 7ING EDWARD was not friendly to press correspondents, especial- | Iy if they try to peep behind the scenes, but many times I used to go down to Windsor. sometimes to his garden parties, and often when the German e ereign was a guest at the castle. I had the honor of acting as one of |a bodyguard. in a very literal sense, to ! King Edward on the day he won the Derby. When Minoru won, a hundred thousand men broke all barricades and | nade a wild rush toward the royal stand, cheering with immense enthu asm. According to custom. the winner had to lead his horse, and without | Lesitation King Edward left the safety | of his stand to come on to the course amidst the seething, surging, stamped- ing of roughs. The Prince of Wales, now King George, looked very nervous, for his father's sake, and King Idward, though outwardly calm, mass peror or some other sov- | was obviously moved to great emotion. T heard his quick little panting breaths ie in real danger because of the enormous pressure of the foremost mob being pushed from behind by the tidal wave of excited humanity. The king's detective shouted and used his fists to keep the people back, as involuntarily they jostled the king. The correspond- ents, photographers and others linked arms and-succecding in keeping a little air space about the king until he had led his horse safely inside. By a curlous freak of chance, I and a young collegiate on the sarue paper— | the Daily Cironicle—were the first peo- ! ple In the world, outside Buckingham | Palace, to hear of the death of King| Edward, > i The official bulletins were grave, but | not hopeless, and the last issued on the | night of his death was more cheerful. | All day I had been outside the palace, pwriting in the rain under an umbrella long’ description of the amazing | | scenes which « showed the depths of | emotion stirred In the hearts of all | classes by the thought that Edward | | VIT'was passing from England. | I believe, now that beyond the hold | he had on the minds of great numbers | of the people because of his human qualities and the tradition of his states- | manship and “tact” there was an In- itake a |drive into the palace yard, and go to |the only vehicle allowed inside the FOUR GENERATIONS OF THE BRITISH ROYAL FAMILY. VICTORIA HOLDING HER GREAT-GRANDSO! PRINCE OF WALES. STANDING: AT LEFT, HER SON, KING EDWARD VIL ENT/ KING GEORGE V. |the office and prepared to go home, | but the news editor sald, as news edl- | tors do: “Sorry, but you'll have to spend the night at the palace—in case | {of anything happening.* * ok % & i I WAS tired out and hungry. 1 protested; but in vain. They only concession to me was that I should| colleague named Eddy to| share the vigil outside the palace. | Eddy protested, but without more | avall. Together we dined, and then| declded to hire a four-wheeled cab, | sleep as comfortably as possible. This 1dea proceeded according to plan. By favor of the police, our old cab was courtyard of the palace, though out- side was parked an “immense con- course” of automobiles in which great folk were spending the night. Eddy unlaced his boots and pre- pared to sleep. I paced the court- yard, smoking the last cigarette and watching the strange picturs outside. | Suddenly a royal carriage came very quietly from the inner court- yard and passed mo where I stood. The lights from a high lamp-post flashed Inside the carriage, and T saw the faces of those who had been the Prince of Wales and Princess | Mary. They were dead white, and | exhibition bufldings until the royal|tyitive sense in the nation that after | party had passed through. The Dress pig geath the peace of Europe would were kept back by a rope at ‘m’ibe gravely disturbed by some world entrance way, In a position from|war. I remember that thought was which they could see just nothing at|expressed to me by & man in the crowd, all. 1 was peeved at this lack of con- deration for professional observers, and when the royal party entered and a’cordon of police wheeled across the | great hall to prevent the crowd from following I stepped over the rope and joined the royai procession. As it happened, the police maneuver had | who said. don!" It was a great, ever-changing crowd { made up of every condition of men and| women in London—duchesses and great ladles, peers and costers, actresses, beg- gars, workingwomen, foreigners, poli- tictans, ‘parsons, shop girls, laborers “After Edward—Armaged- | their eyes were wet and shining. I hurried to the four-wheeled cab. “Eddy!” 1 said, “T believe the king is dead!” Together we hurried to the equer- ries’ entrance of the palace and went inside through the open door. 1 spoke to one of the king’s gentle- men, standing with his back to the fire talking to an old man whom I knew to be the Belgian minister. “How 13 the king?" T asked. KING EDWARD AND QUEEN 'ALEXANDRA. WITH WHOM SIR PHILIP GIBBS NONCHALANTLY STROLLED WHEN THE FRENCH AMBASSADOR WAS CUT OFF, BY.MISTAKE, BY THE POLICE CORDON DRAWN UP TO PROTECT THE ROYAL PARTY FROM THE CROWD, GIBBS MANAGED 1t-was in the war between Bulgaria and Turkey of 1912, and I was stand- on the bridge over the Maritza river at Mustapha Pasha (now the new houndary of the Turks in Europe) when Ferdinand of Bulgaria arrived with his staff. Because of the cli- mate. which was cold there, I was wearing the fur cap of a Bulgarian asant, a sheepskin coat, and leg- andy helieved -myself ta . he boroughly, disguised as & Bulgar. ns. TO SLIP THROUGH THE LINES. cut off one of the party, a French minister of state, who, knowing no word of English, made futile éndeav- ors to explain his misfortune, and received in reply a policeman’s elbow in his chest and the shout of “Get back there! I took his place. The king's de- and men of lelsure, all waiting and watching for the next bulletin. At 8 o'clock, or thereabouts, I went into the palace with other press men, and Lord Knollys assured us that the king was expected to pass a good night, and that no further bulletins. would bhe issued until the following morning. 1 He looked up af the clpok with & queer emotional smile, which was not of mirth, but very sad. “Sir,” he sald, in a broken voice, “King Edward died two minutes ago.” 4 The news was confirmed by an- other offcial. Kady and 1 hurrled R i R L DR ST TR, | tographic orgy about his deathbed. QUEEN THE PRESENT LATER AT RIGHT, HER GRANDSON, THE PRES- courtyard. From the Buckingham Palace Hotel I telephoned the news| to the Daily Chronicle office. * * The offictal bulletin was not posted at the gate until an hour later, but when I went home that night I held THE _BODY OF KING EDWARD AND ANOTHER REPORTER WERE THE FIRST PERSONS . 923—PART 5. alted idealism, but was perhaps woven with the genial wisdom of a man who had seen life in all its comedy and {llusion,, and had mel- lowed to it, stood high in the imag- ination of the world and in the af- fection of his people. Now he lay | | with his scepter at his feet, asleep | with all the ghosts of history. | His death chamber was disturbed by what seeméd to me an outrageous invasion of vulgarity. In life King Edward had resented the click of the camera wherever he walked, but in death the camera men hkd their will of him. A dozen or more of them | surrounded his bed, shapping him at | all angles, arranging the curtains | tor new effects of light, fixing their enses close to his dead face. There | was something- ghoulish in this pho- | The body of King Edward was' removed to Westminster Hall, whose | timbered roof has weathered seven centurfes of, English history, and there he lay in siate, with four guardsmen, motionless, with re- versed arms and heads bent, day and night, for nearly a week. | That week was a revelation of | the strange depths of emotion etir- | |red among the people by his per- sonality and passing. - They were permitted to see him for the last | time, and, without exaggeration, millions of people must have fallen linto line for this glimpse of the | dead king to pay their last homage | From eafly morning untfl late at| | nlght unceasingly there were queues | of men and women of all ranks and olasses, stretching away from West- | minister Hall across the bridges, moving slowly forward. There was | no preterence for rank. Peers of the | realm and ladies of quality fell into | line with laboring men and women, ! slum folk, city folk, sporting touts, actors, women of Suburbia, raga- maffin boys, coster girls and all man- ner of men who make up English life.” History does not record any such demonstration of popular hom- | age, except one other, afterward, | when the English people passed in | hundreds of thousands before the | grave of the unknown soldier in| Westminister Abbey. o x o | T Windsor, in St. George's Chapel, 1| 41 saw the burlal of King Edward. His body waa drawn to the castle on a gun carriage by bluejackets, and the | music of Chopin's Funeral March, that ecstasy of the spirit triumphing over death, preceded him up the castle hill. Against the gray old walls floral trib- utes were lald in masses from all the les With Roya EC ST e CZAR FERDINAND OF BULGARIA. WAR, SIR PHILIP GIBBS WAS WITH CZAR FERDINAND WHEN AN E APPROACHED. THE RULER WAS GE A WEAPON, AN OND BALKA! CAMOUF! stitution, and jeer at all its pomp and pageantry. One's democratic soul may all room of antique furniture, but some- thing of the old romance of its meaning, something of its warmth and color in the tapestry of English history, some- thing of that cod of chivalry and knighthood by which the king was ded| cated to the service of his people, stirs in the most prosaic mind alive when a Xing Is crowned again in the abbey church of Westminster. ‘The ceremony is indeed the old rit- ual of knighthood, ending with the crowning act. The arms and em- blems of kingship are laid upon the altar, as when a knight kept vigil He is stripped of his outer garments and stands before the people bare of thrust its ritual into the lumber Ity WHILE COVERING THE SEC- CONVERSING SLISH CAM AMAN FRAID THE CAMERA MIGHT IBBS EXPLAINED MATTERS. D n hungry human nature, left them for a few minutes while I walked to the end of the gallery to see anothe aspect of the picture below. When came back, my sandwiches had disap peared. I strongly suspected, without positive proof, a famous lady novells who Was in the next seat to mine. I was a deplorable tragedy to me. after the ceremony I had to write whole page for my paper and thers was no time for food (Copyright, 1823, by Sir Phili rights reserved Gibbe, A Strength of Insects. AT intervals there appear aocounts setting forth the prodiguous strength of insects. Their muscula force is usually compared with thel size by ting, for example, that a flea can leap so many times it own length and that an ant can drag 8o many times its own welght. Ther it is sald that man, If he were strong in the same proportion, could jumr so many rods or lift so many tons | These comparisons, according to th: | eminent French investigator Robida | are misleading. cles, In his opinion, it is interesting t consider solely from a mechanica standpoint these comparisons betwee: the muscular strength of man and that of insects. Strictly from ‘thi standpoint they are by no means ex traordinary, and are only one of the forms of what has been called “the conflict of squares and cube: The law is well known—volumes decrease in more rapid ratio than surfaces. The force that a muscle can ex: depends on its section—that is, on & surface—although its capacity for doing work depends on its volume as is logical. Here is the explana tlon of the astonishing strength of insects. As an example, compare two mus that of a man and that of ar VII LYING IN STATE TO KNOW OF THE KING'S DEATH. a copy of my paper, which had caught the country editions, with the life and | strong fi the air. On the castle slopes | plicity as a common man death of King Edward VIL * x x ok ON the day following the death of King Edward I obtained permis- sion to seo him lying In his death | Ghapel, and it was a fordign king and | 0921 7ot The little goom had crim- | chamber. son hangings, and bright sunlight streamed through the windows upon the bed where the king lay with a look of dignity and peace. I was profoundly moved by the sight of the dead king, who had been so vital, so full of human stuff, so' friendly and helpful in all affairs of state, and with all conditions of men who came within his keq. In spite of the severe discipline of his youth'in the austere tradition of Queen Victoria—perhaps because of that—he had broken the gloomy spell of the Victorian court, with its puri- tanical narrowing influence oh the social life of the people, and had re- stored a happler and more liberal spirit. Truly or not,-he had had, as 2 young Prince of Wales, the reputa- tion of being very much of a “rip,” and certain scandals among his pri- vate friends, with whfch his name was connected, had made many tongues wag. But he had long lived all that down when, in advance mid- dle age, he came to the throne, and no one brought up against him the heady indiscretions of youth. He had played the game of king- ship well and truly, with a desire for his people’s peace and welfare, and had given a new glamour to the crown, which had become rather dulled and cobwebbed during the long widowhood of the old queen. In popular imagination he was the author of the entents cordiale with Franoe, which seemed to be the sole guarantee of the peace of Europe agatst the growing menace of Ger- many, though now we know that it had other results. Anyhow, Ba- 4 VIL by shme_quality of char- tectives hiad counted his chickens and| - With that good news I went back Lo |out of the palace and ran ous of taafacter which was mot based on ex- A 4 | people and thetr scent was rich and| where sunlight lay, spring flowers were | blooming, as though to welcome this homecoming of the king. Kings and | princes from all nations, in brilllant uniforms, crowded into St. George' emperor who sorted them out, put them | into their right places, acted as master of ceremontes and led forward Queen Alexandra, as though he were the chief mourner, and not King George. It was the German kaiser. The Iings of Spain and Portugal wept unaffectedly, ltke two schoolboys *who had lost their father, and, indeed, this burial of King Edward in the lovely chapel, where so many of his family lle sleeping, was strangely affecting because it seemed like the passing of some historic era, and was 8o, though we did mot know it then, certainly. _ 1.saw George V proclaimed king by garter King-at-arms and his heralds in their emblazoned tabards, from the wall of St. James’ Palace. Looking over the wall opposité, which inclosed the garde: of Mariborough House, was the young Prince of Wales, with his brothers and sister, and that boy little guessed then that this was the beginning of a new chapter of history which would make him & captain in the greatest war of the world, where he would walk in the | midst of death and see the flower of ‘English youth out down &t his side. The task feil to me of describing the coronation of the new king in West- minster Abbey, and of all the great scencs of which I have been an eye- witness this remains in my memory as the most splendid and impressive. As a lover of history, that old abbey, which has stood as the symbol of English faith and rule since Norman days, is to me WESTMINSTER HALL. SIR PHILIP GIBBS | JTSIDE OF THE ROYAL HOUSEHOLD all the apparel which hides his sim- * X koW | HERE was & dramatic moment when this unclothing happened to King George. Ths lord chamberlain untis the bows and kuots of his cloak and surcoat and the cere- | mony was held up by an awkward pause. But he was a man of action and pulling out a clasp-knife from his pocket, slashed at the ribbons till they were cut. Looking down the great nave from | a gallery above, I saw the long purple robes of the peers and peeresses, the | rows of coronets, the little pages, like | tairy-tale princes, on the steps of the | sanctuary, the Prince of Wales him- | self 1tke a Childe Harold, in silk doub- | let and breeches, the archbishop and bishops, kings-at-arms and officers of state, busy about the person“of the | king who was as helpless in their hands as a victim of sacrifice, cloth- ing him, anointing him, crowning him, before the act of homage in | which all the lords of England moved | forward_In their turn to swear fealty | to thelr ltege, who, in his turn, had | sworfl to uphold the laws and liber- tles of England. A cynic might scoff. But no man with an artist’s eye, and no man with Chaucer and Shakespeare in his heart, could fail to see the beauty of this mediaeval picture, or fail to feel the old thrill in that heritage of an- clent customs which belong to the| heart of England. - 1, at least, was moved by this senti- ment, being, in those days, an incur- able romantic, though the war killed | some of my romanticism. But evin ! romance is not proof against the ma- | man's | forty always a haunted place, filled with a terfal needs of human flesh and as the myriad ghost of the old vital da: And | ceremony went on, hour after hour, I the coronation of an English king, in|[felt the sharp bite of hunger. We its ancient ritual; blots out modernity, |had to be in our places in the abbey and takes one back to the root-senti- |by half past seven that morning and meit of the race which 1§ our blood and | keep them until 8 in the afternoon. I herltage. One may, in philosophical jhad come provided with half a dozen moments, think Ringshlp an outworn, ln-l andwiches, but with a foolish trust | insect, the latter one hundred times | shorter than the former. It is evi- | dent that the insect's muscle will be 11,000,000 times lighter than the man's while its section, and consequently the force it can exert, will be only 10,000 times less. The conclusion is that since a can lift 62 pounds, the insect will 1if; 10,000 times less, or 154 grains, and one gets the impressive spectacle of an insect lifting more than one hun dred times its welght. In fact, the smaller the insect is the more it wi astonish us by an appearance of ex traordinary strength. But it is no longer the same if one examines the mechanical work effect ed. The muscle of the insect, sur posed to be one-hundredth of a man in linear dimensions, furnishes, whe it contracts, a force 10,000 times less than the human muscle, exerte through a space one hundred times smaller. Moreover, it seems (just as wi machines where the smaller are pr: portionately weaker) as if the ! sect's muscle, instead of surpassin: infinitely, notably inferc to it in quality. Take the flea’s jump, for instance By its muscular contraction it gives to its mass a movement capable of raising it twelve inches. Man ca raise his own weight about five fee by leaping. For equal weight the human muscle thus furnishes flva times more work than that of the flea in a single contraction. n “Well of Montezuma.” AMove the many natural curios ties of Arizona, one that is no’ | often visited by tourists is the singu lar bowl-shaped depression in. Ya pai county, called “The Well of Mon tezuma.” It is. nearly circular, and between 500 and 600 feet in diameter at the brim. It lies in the midst of a nearly level area. The sides are vertical to a depth of thirty o feet. Below they merge into a sloping shape, which extends down to a circular pool of water, alleged | by popular tradition, as are so many other not very deep areas of watcr to be bottomless. This remarkable formation has usually been described a “pit crater” of volcanic origin, the result of the falling of the roof of a cavern, formed In the limestone strata by running water. The water of the pool, it is sald, flows out through a subterranean channel into the valley of Beaver creek. ‘