Majesty Returns

(See front cover)

Smartly clad in cool fawn colored lounge suit, soft collared shirt and pastel tie, His Most Catholic Majesty, Alfonso XIII, sprucely returned to Spain last week, refreshed and tingling from a plunge into London's famed "Season."*

Even a peevish King would have found it good to be back in Spain. Merry, spanking breezes stiffened the purple Royal Standard above Castle Magdalena, which signified the presence of comely Queen Victoria Eugenie with Royal Infantes/- and Infantas on the seaside at smart Santander. Her Majesty, a granddaughter of Britain's late Queen Victoria, would be pleased to hear the gossip of her native Court, pleased too that King Alfonso had "seen his tailor" in Savile Row so successfully. The tall Infantas would sit upon their taller father's knees like little girls, playing with his mustachios, for their upbringing has been old-fashioned and they are still naive. To arrive peevishly at Castle Magdalena would have been totally impossible.

Alarums. His Most Catholic Majesty was of course urbanely aware that there had been the annual attempt at revolution during his annual holiday, and that the normal alarums had not quite died down. Specifically, the Secret Police were making a great many arrests in Spain, last week, and the Cabinet issued at Madrid a proclamation :

Loyal Citizens!

As in many other summers, and this one especially, since both the King and the head of the Spanish Government are absent from Madrid, intriguers are trying to promote disorders, but the Government is already on the track.

The best way to bring about the failure of these disorders is to have the citizens reprove them, and those who are charged with keeping the public order should severely punish the disorderly elements.

All discipline is lost when those charged with assisting the Government fail to take strict measures to prevent disorders.

Head Absent. The head of the Spanish Government is His Excellency General Don Miguel Primo De Rivera, Marques de Estella and Dictator of Spain. Excitement over His Majesty's return coincided with a furore of curiosity about His Excellency. Gossip-loving courtiers envied King Alfonso more than usual, because he was, last week, perhaps the only man in Spain who could with propriety ask Dictator De Rivera just what is the state of his relations with the Senorita Mercedes de Castellanos (TIME, June 25). When King and Dictator clasped hands, last week, and retired for a most private conference, baffled Spaniards were left in disgruntled suspense 'concerning' the National Scandal.

Maddening Rumors. As everyone remembers, the rich Senorita Mercedes de Castellanos, 47, was courted for several months by the Dictator, who announced his engagement in April, and then publicly broke it off (TIME, June 18) with the explanation that his fiancee had been seen on the floor of the Madrid Stock Exchange accompanied by two noblemen and that such conduct was "imprudent and inexplicable." Since then the Dictator has refused challenges to duel by the noblemen concerned, Conde de Cemira and the Duque de Almodovar, and has been cut by such great ladies as the Marquesa de Urquijo and the Duquesa de Montellano, both intimate friends of jilted Senorita Mercedes de Castellanos.

Last week a symposium of rumors emanating from Spain would have read: "The Sefiorita has entered the Convent of Miracruz at San Sebastian as a nun, except that she has secretly married the Dictator and a public announcement will soon be made. Since the engagement is broken she has returned all his gifts and is keeping them in hopes that he may relent. She is living in seclusion at the Old Private Hotel Miracruz in San Sebastian, heartbroken and joyfully planning the details of a magnificent State wedding to take place next fall."

Each of the rumors thus reducing each other to absurdity was cabled by a U. S. or British correspondent of standing. Spanish newspapers, censored, added by their mumness to spread of scandal by word of mouth.

King, Dictator, President. When spruce, bronzed King Alfonso had conferred with paunchy, florid General de Rivera to their two hearts' content, they chuffed by special train to a remote and unheard of village in the Pyrenees called Canfrane. There a shiny new electric locomotive was hitched to the special, drew it up a terrifically steep grade to an altitude of 3,600 feet, and stopped dead in the very midnight middle of the Samport Tunnel.

Kings and Dictators are never surprised. Neither would have turned a hair had they seen President Gaston Doumergue of the French Republic standing on the other side of the Franco-Spanish border, which bisects the Tunnel. Indeed they did see M. Le President standing there, plump and pink, and wearing a monocle, which he has recently and surprisingly adapted into his ensemble.

Soon the great Samport Tunnel, last and epochal link in the trans-Pyrenean railway was dedicated. The engineering feat can only be called epochal. For two milleniums and more, Emperors, Kings, men and freight have gone around the Pyrenees. Now at last the railroad has climbed and pierced through. Roadways wind interminably up the Pyrenees and over passes, none lower than 5,000 feet; but these trails are more fit for mountain goats than motorcycles and quite impracticable for the average motor car or truck. The late Emperor of the French, Napoleon

Bonaparte, imperially decreed that seven good roads with easy gradients should be built over the Pyrenees, but not one was ever more than well begun. The grades on the new Samport railway are too steep for trains ever to be served by steam locomotives but the giant electrics which have been installed are operated by free power shrewdly filched by turbines from tumbling Pyrenean waterfalls and foaming streams.

A handshake between King Alfonso and President Doumergue symbolized the completely altered relations between France and Spain, historic enemies. Connoisseurs of handshaking were not, however, much impressed. They recalled that King Alfonso once shook the hand of a leper, a foul rotting carcass of a man, who had knelt to His Majesty in the street, superstitiously believing that he could be cured by the "Royal Touch."

The story of that so brave and generously impulsive handshake has become a legend in Spain, but has been vouched for as absolute fact by His Majesty's aunt, H. R. H. the Infanta Eulalia, who always adds that her nephew soaked his hand for days afterwards in powerful disinfectant. The claim that the leper was healed is not made by H. R. H. but is part of the legend.

Causerie? Down and down coasted and shrieked the electric train of Majesty & Excellency. Steam power was again coupled on at Canfrane, and then, as they chuffed toward Santander, a fresh chance for conversation loomed. Among topics most suitable for discussion were: 1) The conferring of the Plus Ultra medal for heroism upon Roald Amundsen (see AERONAUTICS) by the Spanish Government, in advance of any such action by the Italian Government; 2) The respectively vigorous and mild diplomatic protests of the British and U. S. Governments against the recently established Spanish State monopoly of petroleum sales; 3) Continued depression of the Spanish peseta on international exchange, despite drastic bolstering measures by the Dictator; 4) The proposed maiden voyage to the U. S. on August 9, 1928, of the new Spanish Royal Mail liner Juan Sebastian Elcano; 5) The high decision of the Spanish Academy of History to order at once exhumed the remains of the eldest son of King Philip II of Spain, Prince Charles (died 1568), with a view to discovering whether he was poisoned. Purpose: to vindicate the character of King Philip II, who was portrayed forth in a play at Madrid last winter as the poisoner.

Regatta. Whatever was the nature of His Majesty's causerie he arrived at Santander seemingly more spruce and sprightly than ever. Plainly the reason was that King Alfonso, keen on yachting, looked forward with delighted zest to the great International Santander Regatta (see SPORT). In spotless flannels and trimmest cap King Alfonso prepared to award many a cup to the yachtsmen hoving in from Sandy Hook and to announce the donation by Spaniards of a monster bowl to serve as a chief prize at a regatta to be held next year off Los Angeles, U. S. A.

*The London season is May, June and July, when Parliament is sitting, and the aristocracy are at their town residences.

/-Don Jaime, 20, Don Juan, 15, and Don Gonzalo, 13. But the Infante Don Alfonso, 21, Prince of the Asturias, Heir to the Throne, remained under the care of Madrid specialists (TIME, May 14). A victim of the dread disease haemophilia, he suffers profuse bleeding from the slightest pinprick or wound, since his skin when punctured heals with extreme slowness.