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About The Sunday Oregonian. (Portland, Ore.) 1881-current | View Entire Issue (March 14, 1915)
MAKC1I "M, 1J15. 14 id ?3 n - jBone5 JlUab Io isentert j of JKmpisburg reasure? ' an S u L Dm If) mm . :- a- at f !- J" V 1 .f mm v . .-riff-" 1?"" 1 FT-' Z'HM v " ..-i. AUSANNE, Switzerland. A strange story comes from Vienna. I can go to Vienna for dinner and back to Lusanne for breakfast- You understand? The story is not made for expor tation. Call it pure Viennese. Evi dently the retun to Paris of the Aiglon would gh e pleasure to the French, who havi long desired Na poleon's son to re; t beside his mighty father, under thd dome of the In valides. But this rumor is quite other. It does not care, a hang for the desires of the French. For a cen tury the body was'reposed beside that of Marie Louise, his mother, in the mysterious and unexplored vaults of the Kapuziner Church of Vienna and there has always been a superstitious unwillingness to budge it. When Napoleon III arrived in power one of his first acts was to begin ne gotiations for the "return" of the body because the boy was born in Paris and forcibly taken from Paris by the allied Kings. In 1855 the cession was almost agreed upon. In 1857 there was a hitch. The final failure of the project was variously ascribed as cause or effect of the war with Austria in 1850, and later to general hostility; but there would seem to have always been a hidden motive and this story gives an idea of it. Black and grewsome legend to touch so pretty a baby, so unfortunate a youth, yet beautiful because it takes a people's hopes in hand, however strangely. The child's birth, as King of Rome, was hailed by Europe as a guarantee of peace, uniting the Na poleonic war power with the family of Kings. Truly, this is different. . Son of Napoleon, heir of the em pire, born in the Tuileries, the Aiglon lived three years in France, baby idol. After Napoleon's abdication the allies confided him to the Emperor of Aus tria, his grandfather. He never saw France again. But, just as Napoleon at St. Helena continued begging for his boy in vain, so the common people of France continued buying copies of his various portraits, whose supply never equaled the demand. The legend is that he was "killed by kindness." Growing up a gilded princeling in a corrupt court, he was led into pleasures weakening to his tender years, while cunningly deflected from healthy exercise. Rostand makes him turn the danger, nobly aided in secret, though too late. There Is no need to believe that the danger ex isted. The heroic explanation of the Aiglon's death is quite sufficient he died of sorrow. He had the education of an Arch duke of his time. He was not pre vented from reading about his father and his campaigns. On the other hand, they kept him isolated, strictly, from France, the French and all Bona partist sympathizers. The Aiglon lived in a gilded prison. So living, he developed a veritable cult for his father, and desired only to resemble him. Recognizing that he could not begin as Emperor of the French though aware that he had been proclaimed Napoleon II by the Chamber of the Hundred Days he craved for the throne of Poland or Greece, successively promised and withheld from him. Colonel of a sim ple Austrian regiment, he was not even allowed to command his men. They feared that the Napoleonic genius might blaze out in him. He hoped it might. He mourned to death, at 21, be cause he lost his hope. And now for the strange story of Vienna: He sleeps in the black Kapuziner- crypt, along with casemated Era perors and Archdukes. For outsiders the dismal labyrinths have harrowing yet fascinating reputation. The end less vaults under the court church are ostensibly connected with the palace by broad subterranean passages, used bv the court on great funeral occa sions. In them, during the Kossuth a Hapsburg but a great black. strueeles. a band of Danubian con- from Bohemian. Polish and Magyr cient iron key. federates, seeking entrance to kidnap magnates, dark riches, unclean, to be "The key of Black Mathias!" said the Emperor, was treacherously per- purified only by some noble use. ' an aged, doddering valet. When they mitted to penetrate half way and then None of the succeeding Emperors asked him why he said it, he replied, mowed down by cannon. Their have found them. "My father served the castle back 300 shrieking ghosts are said to dash con- Many sought. years. It would be strange if I fusedly through a maze of secret Horrible tales are told of lost en- should not know the key of Black passages, but in remote chambers gbieers. Mathias 1" And not another word these common or garden ghosts are They say, even, that a later Em- could they get out of him. themselves, terrified by gibbering peror added to the hoard, or, rather,: And one more thing Vienna tells wraiths, who exceed them in horror. salted down a supplementary treasure, about the Aiglon. J oseph Balsamo, What are they? Suffering spirits it was that Duke Francis of Lor- the famous Count Cagliostro who pre- of faithless palace servants, lost 500 raine who, marrying Maria Theresa, dieted the French revolution and so years back, hunting for "the treasure." became Emperor, but did not resign, the fate of so many of its actors, The treasure! He devoted his talents and oppor- finally perished in the Castle of St. "The" treasure! There is certainly tunities to vast financial speculations. Angelo, Rome. Wandering from a treasure. The Capuchins crypts are They netted him some $40,000,000, France after the adventure of the ruled, they' say, by the terrible dead they say, on which he spent five years Queen's necklace, he was temporarily Emperor Mathias, who guards forgot- in liquidating, very skillfully, into gold imprisoned in Vienna. How he es- . ten crown jewels, chests of ancient and jewels. In any case, it was not caped has always been disputed, but booty, bags of diamonds and rubies, found after his death. it would seem that he impressed a barrels of coined gold and ingots, loot And it is useless to seek it in the cousin of the Emperor by revelations of the Turks at the doors of Vienna, cyrpts. and predictions. Among other things, treasure ot Venice, tribute wrunj Tradition tells that the treasure they told him of the treasure which ft & VfT "'iSii-. -.'.'Vj; 7 S Vtf'-Hf fr:0 ISP v i vZS I . is 'its ? 'v as-'- u C3 V-A f 'T - ' it ' Y1 Sic 'Z cf. IIIWMWHHiIIMI "' ' rr SSl'i v.T;rJxvCXVeASXs: - ;v I 'if 'iz riff- Pm T1'- WWW I: mi will come to light unexpectedly, and only on a particular occasion when the Hapsburg dynasty has vital need. Also, in the cyrpt, dwells the skull. What skull ? Nobody knows. It is the skull. It warns the Hapsburg family just before they die. It is unique. The doomed one finds the skull lying on his bed. They carry it back, with fearful veneration, to the Capuchin vaults. Then the warned one makes his will. In such surroundings lies Napoleon's son, half French by blood, all French by birth and spirit. What has he to do with these old Hapsburg skulleries ? Why, this and here comes in the queer part. The day before the 1 AiHnn's dpath thev found lying on his bed, not the skull for he '' tit r. ' MM fflP, O' UJi lr-y.Mfi HI 'J -r. m. m 'St was not U lJ mmm ought to be discovered, unexpectedly, in the great need of the Hapuburgs. and asked him for a calculation of the dato when need and discovery fould coincide. His reply was inex plicable "When the boy goes home." How connect it with the Aiglon? 1'he Aiglon was not born. Men shrugged their shoulders. Aus tria was prosperous. , And through th century no wars, however, unsuccess ful, threatened the dynasty with vital need. The Great Napoleon married into the family. The birth of a son was joy to Europe. His death was probuhly no less a joy. And the ad venture of the key was forgotten as a servants' mystery. Nowadays, however, Vienna is in fever. The enemy advances. Sedition is in the Empire. The dynasty is threatened. The most fantastic rumors find be lief. The dynasty is threatened. Now is the time for the treasure. All becomes clear. The boy is the key to the treasure aye, the dead by whose birth was hailed 100 years ago as Austria's boy. The treasure is in the crypts. The boy is in the crypts. Where is the big, black ancient key of Black Mathias? Nobody knows. No matter. "Whe:i the boy goes home," said Cagliostro. It is obvious, argues Vienna. The boy is Napoleon's son, and home means Paris. Whether or not th French want him, in removing the Aiglon from the crypt.-;, the treasure will-be found. A crumbling wall, a sunken slab, or other accident will show it.