Rensselaer Republican, Volume 13, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 April 1881 — Prince Rudolph's Wedding. [ARTICLE]

Prince R udolph's Wedding.

Crown Prince Rudolph, says a Vienna correspondent, will hunt the’ roebuck on Count Schonborfi’s hunting grounds as soon as he returns from his.eaatern journey In Kaj. * After that, it is mid, he will write a journal containing all his impression de voyage, and will publish it and, like h s two other books, present it to a select circle. This does not look aa if the marriage was to take place that month and yet it has been generally reported that everything is being prepared for the wedding In May. ’ I am-told that the Princess Stephanie, to please her future mother-in-law, is becoming s very good horse-woman, and that she spends several hours a day In the rid-ing-school. Bhe is also learning Bohemian and Hungarian, and is therefore certainly not liying an idle life, for we must suppose that she often writes to her intended. When she was in Brussels the lest time tbe queen used to arrange musical entertainments for a very select circle, during which she sang her charming songs. The young couple were allowed to sit aside on a sofa and Were not expected to take any notice <>f the company If they choee to have a chat to themselves. The Princ*ss of Flanders has had a beautiful present prepared for tJbe young bride, —a fan of wrought gold, bearing a fine painting by Dell’ Acqua, a roccoco wedding, the shepherd bridegroom resembling Crowb Prince Rudolph, the shepherdess Princess Stephanie. I have seen a splendid piece of work made by the fairy fingers of the laceworkers of Bohemia, which is to be a wedding gift to Princess Stephanie. In an enormous album-llko box of embrAklered green velvet, whioh opens and displays two equal sides, lies a lace skirt-front, a large collar and a pair of broad cuffs. It is impossible to decribe the beauty of the work. The tablier or skirt-front is meant for a dark velvet court-dress, of course. It is tho old Venetian laoe, every inch of which is the produce of needle and thread, without the aid of any other implement. The lace is a quarter of an inch thick, many parts of the splendid design being In relief. It is almost* Incredible, ana yet true, that six girls have completed this work in about a year’s time. In summfer they sit In front of their houses to catch all the light they can. and in winter when the days are short they have a large glass globe full of water In front oi a tallow candle, and in the small patch of bright light which prisms tnrow out they do their light work. Americ&ns can not possibly imagine the dreadful poverty of the districts of the Erzgebirg, where these girls live. ' Any other people would starve there There are about thenty thousand lace-making g.rls and women with families who earn from sto 10 cents a day. They have no ground to till, only little bits of garden where they grow a few potatoes. At the beginning of the century the mines were exhausted aad given up. No new industry has replaced the old, and every year large numbers of these people foil prey to typhus caused by hunger.- The people are clean and as highly cultivated as they can be In their condition of poverty. Great efforts are being made-for reviving the old lace industry in the country, but the government can not or will not grant the funds necessary for com-’ raencing the industry on a large scale. The lace-makers have not the means to emigrate. When I visited those parts last autumn I was told of an instance of government’s short-sighted-ness in the matters of public welfare. One of the small villages in the poorest districts had for about sixty yfars seut numberless petitions to tne government for a small church, divine service being held by a priest in a barn, there being no other building suitable for the purpose. At last the poor villagers received a promise of a church, aud very soon afterwards an architect arrived with his plans and Jiis work-people, and greatly surprised* the villagers by layjng foundations for a-very large building. The villagers eagerly watched tne growth of of the work until the church was half built aud a fine belfry was beginning to show against the sky. In the meantime they had made friends with the architect, and when they asked him whether ne knew why such a very large church was being built for about one hundred parishoners he shook his head and deemed it prudent to inquire of the authorities why indeed so much was being expended upon that poor Bohemian village. The mystery was solved in no very pleasing way to the government. A large village in Sty ria had also petitioned tor a church, and as chance would have it that Styrian village bore the same name as tne Bohemian one; the plans had been exchanged by mistake, and the village with several thousand inhabitants has now a very small church, only large enough to hold two hundred people, while our little Bohemian village glories in what It calls its minister. This happened only three years ago, and the churches are there to prove that my story is a true one.