drew from Prince Charles the proud reply: "The Rumanian Army, which
fought so gallantly before Plevna under the eyes of the Czar, may be
annihilated, but will never be disarmed." But he nevertheless
recognized the futility of resistance to the Russian demand, and
exerted himself to calm the national excitement. In later years the
breach was partially if not wholly healed.

Of the more material achievements of his reign there is little space
to speak. The best record of his life is to be found in the present
condition of the country--_si monumentum requiris circumspice_. His
furtherance of the petroleum industry, of the export of grain, timber
and other agricultural produce, the building of the great bridge over
the Danube at Tchernavoda, and the extensive harbor at Constanza, the
network of railways, the immense system of fortifications defending
the capital, and the line Fokshani-Galatz--all these and much more are
mainly his work.

Little is yet known of the action of King Charles in the last crisis
of his life. It is a strange coincidence that just as the
Franco-German war of 1870-71 brought him into conflict with the
Francophil tendencies of his subjects and led to his offer of
abdication, so the present war should again have engendered rumors of
his abdication on account of his alleged antagonism to the national
desire for the acquisition of Transylvania and the Southern Bukovina,
which are peopled by more than 3,000,000 Hungarian and Austrian
Rumanes. The Rumanian people felt that the hour for the liberation of
their kindred had struck. Russia is understood to have invited Rumania
to occupy the desired territory. But King Charles, who brought and
kept Rumania within the orbit of the Triple Alliance, was, as a
Hohenzollern and a German Prince, averse to hostile action against the
German Emperor and the Emperor Francis Joseph. It is, moreover, stated
that he was bound by his word of honor never to take the field against
a Hohenzollern cause.

The late King Charles married, in November, 1869, Princess Elizabeth
of Wied, the gifted "Carmen Sylva," whose brilliant literary and
artistic talents have gained her a worldwide reputation. The only
child of the marriage, the infant Princess Marie, died in 1874--a
bereavement that ever left a note of sadness in the lives of her
parents.

THE NEW KING.

King Ferdinand, who now succeeds his uncle on the throne of Rumania,
was born in August, 1865, and, like his predec