Marriage of Crown Prince Rudolf
Both Franz Joseph and Elizabeth were very proud of their only son, whose
winning ways and kindness of heart had made him wonderfully popular with
all classes. He had inherited his mother’s impatience of restraint as
well as her literary and artistic tastes, and, like her, cared little
for people of his own rank. His own intimate circle was composed of
poets, artists, and journalists, and he had an enthusiastic friend and
teacher in the celebrated naturalist, Brehm. According to the custom of
Austrian princes, he had been required to learn some trade and chose
that of printing, but he possessed a marked talent for writing and
published several books of real merit. He adored his mother, and the
relation between them was one of the closest confidence and intimacy,
but Elizabeth’s love for her son did not blind her to his faults, and
she fully realized that he had all his father’s youthful susceptibility
and love of pleasure. Both she and the Emperor were agreed as to the
necessity of his marrying early, not only to insure the succession, but
also because they hoped it would steady the rather wild and headstrong
young prince. Franz Joseph, however, had political advantages most in
mind in the choice of a wife for his son, while Elizabeth was chiefly
concerned as to his prospects of domestic happiness. She felt the
importance of his marrying some one with sufficient beauty and
intelligence to restrain his somewhat errant fancy and win his respect
as well as affection.
There were but few marriageable princesses in Europe at that time
(Rudolf was then in his twentieth year), and the Emperor’s choice was
far from satisfactory to Elizabeth, for it fell on the Belgian princess
Stephanie, a seventeen-year-old girl of very ordinary mind and not at
all attractive in appearance. Elizabeth had no liking either for King
Leopold Second of Belgium or his wife, an Austrian archduchess, who
played rather an unenviable role at her husband’s court, and bitterly
opposed the match; but the Queen’s sister, the Archduchess Elizabeth
(mother of the Queen Regent of Spain and a favorite cousin of the
Emperor’s) brought all her influence to bear in her niece’s favor, and
the Empress’ objections were overruled, Rudolf himself, meanwhile,
seeming to regard the whole affair with perfect indifference.
The wedding took place May 10, 1881. All through the festivities that
preceded the great event Elizabeth played her part perfectly as mother
of the bridegroom, though her cold and distant manner toward her future
daughter-in-law as well as the King and Queen of Belgium was only too
evident. Part of the ceremonies consisted of a state procession through
the streets of the capital, and during the whole progress she hardly
spoke once to Queen Henriette, who rode beside her, but sat erect,
bowing continuously in acknowledgment of the cheers of the populace,
with a look almost of absentmindedness on her lovely face. In the middle
of the marriage ceremony her self-control gave way completely, however,
and she burst into a violent fit of weeping. This was her last public
appearance in Vienna.
Gay, frivolous, and fond of admiration, Stephanie was a princess to
please the taste of the Viennese. Her arrival at court was hailed with
delight, and when on the third of September, 1883, a daughter was born
to the young couple, the public enthusiasm was a proof of their
popularity. A change in the relations of Rudolf and his mother after his
marriage was inevitable. Though he continued to make her his confidante,
she was not long in discovering that he was far from happy in his
marriage. Wretched over this unfortunate state of affairs and feeling
less at home than ever in the Hofburg, she now rarely visited Vienna,
sometimes spending only a few weeks there in the winter.
[Illustration: _CROWN PRINCE RUDOLF_]
She had never liked the Hofburg nor Schönbrunn, where the Emperor always
spent the spring months, and now determined to have a residence of her
own somewhere in the neighborhood of the capital. The spot chosen was
the beautiful park of Lainz, hidden from the public gaze by high stone
walls and further protected by a thick, impenetrable hedge surrounding
the gardens. During the two years that “Waldesruhe,” as she called the
Schloss, was being built it was rigidly guarded from intrusion of any
kind, and even after it was finished no one but the servants and the
family were allowed to enter the park or gardens. The building itself is
in the style of the Renaissance, the _façade_ adorned with balconies and
terraces which in the Empress’ time were always a mass of flowers. A
wide marble staircase covered with red velvet carpet led to the first
floor, which contained the apartments of the Emperor and Empress,
connected by a great salon or reception hall. Elizabeth’s spacious
sleeping chamber was on the corner, with two windows to the east and two
tall ones to the south, giving upon a balcony. The bed was placed in the
centre of the room, protected at the head by a large screen, upon the
reverse side of which was a painting of the Virgin Mary. A figure also
representing the Blessed Virgin stood in one corner, holding in her
hands a magnificent antique rosary. Opposite the bed was an exquisite
statue of Niobe, the pedestal buried in growing plants and lighted with
green incandescent lamps so arranged that as the Empress lay in bed she
could see no light in the room but the green glimmer that fell on the
Niobe. Breakfast was served on the balcony, which was like a flower
garden. Here too in later years she placed a favorite work of art, a
small reproduction of the marble statue of Heine made by the Danish
sculptor Hasselriis for her villa Achilleon at Corfu. Adjoining her
bedchamber and also giving upon the balcony was the Empress’ study,
filled with photographs of her family and friends, and a picturesque
litter of casts, sketches, bronzes, souvenirs of travel, and porcelain
vases filled with flowers. Over the great square writing-table hung a
striking portrait of her cousin King Ludwig Second of Bavaria. A fire
was always burning on the wide hearth, and the Emperor and Empress used
often to sit there together in the evenings watching the glowing logs
and talking over the events of the day. The guest chambers and
apartments of the Archduchess Marie Valerie were on the floor below, as
was the Empress’ gymnasium. Physical exercise was so necessary to her
that she always had a room fitted up in this way wherever she happened
to be staying.
Another favorite retreat of Elizabeth’s was Miramar, the Emperor
Maximilian’s palace, where for several years after his death she used to
make frequent visits. Built of the purest white marble, it stands on a
rocky promontory overlooking the sea, and near by is the pavilion used
as a residence by the Empress Charlotte when she returned from Mexico a
widow and hopelessly insane.
At the time Elizabeth was first sent to Corfu to recuperate, the beauty
of the country made a deep impression upon her, and her love for the
shores of Greece after repeated visits in later years decided her to
build a villa upon the island, the planning and furnishing of which
should reflect her own individual taste. Near the idyllic village of
Gasturi accordingly there rose the masterpiece of architecture which she
called Achilleon. It stands on a hill facing the sea, the slopes of
which are covered with olive and lemon trees and laid out as gardens on
wide terraces. The house contains one hundred and twenty-eight rooms,
filled with treasures of Greek and Pompeian art, and there are
accommodations in the stables for fifty horses. All the rooms are filled
with classic treasures. The Empress’ own apartments were entirely apart
from the rest of the building, with a private entrance so that she could
come and go at will. She used to rise at five and after her bath would
go for a walk, usually alone, with a book under her arm. The mornings
were devoted to study, the afternoons to long rambles. She knew every
road for miles about, but loved best to explore the steepest and most
dangerous mountain paths, the silent grandeur and beauty of the heights
seeming to soothe for a time the restless cravings of her spirit. At
nine she would retire after another bath in the marble basin which was
brought from the Villa Borghese in Rome. Heine’s Book of Songs was
always under her pillow, and often she would rise in the middle of the
night, unable to sleep, and wander about through the dark avenues. At
Achilleon, as elsewhere, she was most anxious to escape observation, and
a high wall of marble with a screen of olive trees hid the palace from
the public gaze. It was not people, however, that she disliked so much
as being the object of their curiosity.
“All I ask of people,” she often said, “is that they will leave me in
peace.”
She was always kind and gracious to the poor, and the peasants used to
kneel in the dust before her when she approached, calling aloud in their
melodious language, “O Queen of Beauty, may God bless thine every step!”
All heads were uncovered when she passed, and the children who watched
for her coming would run to meet her with their hands full of blossoming
orange and almond boughs. On the heights above Achilleon stood a
monastery where she often used to go and talk with the monks. She asked
one of them once if he ever went to the village.
“There is always the marketing to do,” he answered. “Man is but human,
and the body suffers from cold or hunger; but except for that, what
should one do in the village? It is far better and more beautiful up
here.”
“That is true,” said the Empress; “undoubtedly you have chosen the
better part.”