Word: boringly
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Republic of '73. Ancient Maria Isabel is one of the few living Spaniards who remembers vividly Spain's first Republic. In 1873 indomitable Maria Isabel (her father bore the surprising name, for a Bourbon consort, of Francis of Assisi) was a young woman of 22, already two years a widow. In 1868, the year of her marriage, her mother Queen Isabella was driven from the throne by an army mutiny. Liberals then proudly announced that the "spurious race of Bourbon" had disappeared forever...
Burton's soldier father was glad to further his son's military ambition, but was too poor to buy him a commission in a crack regiment. Young Richard had to be content with the native army of the East India Company. But the routine of army life soon bored him; he was always putting in for risky assignments: investigations in disguise among the natives, a journey to Harrar in Somaliland, whence no white man had ever returned; searching for the source of the Nile (his companion Speke got the credit for discovering Victoria Nyanza, but Burton led the expedition...
...Purcell-Jones, apparently another member of Britain's languid gentry, contributed a roomful of slightly improper drawings of ladies and gentlemen in fancy dress in which he combined the manners of Aubrey Beardsley, Botticelli, Benozzo Gozzoli and Florenz Ziegfeld. His pictures bore such titles as: La Chevalier (sic) de la Jarretière, Lady Woudnaught, Sir Adam Coudnaught, Odalisque, Lady Couch. Prince Henry and his cousin-countess showed views of France, Africa, Egypt and New York, painfully wrought...
...Ursulines, as every good Catholic knows, are a teaching order of nuns (established 1572). Mere Marie de l'Incarnation (1599-1670) was born in Tours, named plain Marie Guyard. At 17 she married a M. Martin and bore him a son. Not till her husband was dead and Marie was 32 did she enter the Ursuline convent. There her mysticism and executive ability marked her for a super-nunnish career. When the call came for volunteers to go to Quebec, Mere Marie heard it and went...
...Chamberlain had three wives. The first two (cousins) each bore him a son, and both unfortunate mothers died in childbed. No. 1 son by No. 1 wife is Sir Austen Chamberlain, famed Nobel Peace Prize winner (TIME, Dec. 20, 1926). Many people privately consider him an affected blockhead, the husband of one of the smartest "political wives" in Europe. Austen copied his father in all ways as best he could (omitting only the 19th Century orchid); he made a name once as great as that of his friend Briand; and he retired with the Garter...