PRESENT ROUMANIAN LEADERS AND THEIR POLICY.
The King--Customs of the Court--The Queen--Her attainments--Extract from her poetry--Madame Rosetti--Her patriotism and adventures--M. Constantin A. Rosetti--His career and public services--M. Bratiano--Other leaders of public opinion--The party of progress--Their past foreign and domestic policy--Geographical boundaries--Panslavism and Panroumanism--The future policy of Roumania--Growth by pacific means--(Note: Comparative values of Russian, Turkish, and Roumanian securities)--Roumania and Great Britain--Conclusion.
We have passed in hasty and imperfect review those features in the national life of Roumania which we believed would be of interest to our readers, and will now endeavour to present to them sketches of a few of the persons of distinction who are forming public opinion, and are the leaders of progress in the country, premising, however, that there are many omissions, due partly to our own ignorance, and partly to the fact that the discussion of the merits and demerits of some of the public men would not have been fitting in this treatise.
By his rank and patriotism, and not least by his extensive knowledge, his Majesty King Charles is entitled to our first consideration. Of his political career we have spoken in our historical summary, and little more need be added. He was born on April 20, 1839, and is therefore about forty-three years of age. On November 15, 1869, he married Pauline Elisabeth, Princess of Wied, who was then about twenty-six years old; but, unfortunately, the sole offspring of their union, a little girl, lies interred in the grounds of the Asyle Hélène. The King is a handsome man, rather above the average height, and, so far as his regularly formed features are concerned, he might belong to any nationality of Western Europe. He usually wears a somewhat severe expression, but the moment he begins to converse this at once disappears. His manner is quiet and earnest, although he often warms into enthusiasm, and he has the happy faculty of placing all with whom he comes into contact at perfect ease. He possesses a wide range of information, and speaks with evident knowledge on all matters of interest to his subjects or to civilisation. Of course he is well acquainted with his adopted country and its resources, takes a lively interest in its trade and capabilities; and so far as the geographical configuration of Roumania is concerned, he not only knows all about the level country, but has either ridden or walked through every part of the Carpathians. His scientific knowledge is such as one might expect in an educated German, and is chiefly of a practical kind. He is deeply interested in arboriculture, about which he knows more than many who are entrusted with the care and fate of the vast woods that clothe the mountain districts, and he has often pointed out to such persons errors in their mode of felling timber. In private life the King is hospitable, genial, and very regular in his habits; he is a devout Catholic, but a constant attendant upon the services of the Greek Church.