Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 98, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 April 1910 — RANK IN EUROPEAN TITLES. [ARTICLE]

RANK IN EUROPEAN TITLES.

Inbject Glrlw Know Leu About than Geeae Do About Arithmetic. American girls desirous of marrying titles should be able to distinguish and know how to-pick out the real goods. American girls know less about titles than geese about arithmetic, says Hrolf Wisby in the Smart Set. It makes no difference that French titles are of no account since the republic; the export heiress will Insist on marrying one in preference to any other. Believe me, these geese had rather be styled madame la marquise or madame la princess any day, no matter how rotten the family antecedents, than try to annex what in Europe is understood by a great and noble rank, and metamorphose into a frau baroninn or even a frau graftnn. This stupid misconception is founded on a rather innocent enough misconception. The American girl is ambitious to marry as near the throne as possible. The family dictionary encourages her fairy-story illusion that dukes and princes are somehow in the train of royalty, whereas barons and counts are out of it. That settles it; she will go gunning for the princely label, no matter how mean and ill-de-scended, for it is the outside of the apple, and not the core, that counts here. She ignores baronial titles, unaware that many of them are of more than present princely rank —that is, ancient princely rank—and more closely affiliated with the crown, in many instances, than many high sounding ducal titles. If you tell her that imperial genealogists consider a baronial title, like that of Freiherr von Riedesel, one of the highest in the empire, she will take it as a joke. She fe constantly confounding the' two decisive elements that determine the value of a title—namely, the nominal rank and the heraldic status. She cannot conceive of the title prince or duke as being of low lineal status, nor can she be made to see in the rank frelherr or graf the highest status of nobility extant.