Family Finances

Old Wilhelm, proud head of the House of Hohenzollern, called his five sons home last week. Up the curving carriage drive of the staid villa at Doom in Holland most of them came--ex-Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm. Eitel Friedrich and August Wilhelm ("Auwi"). Old Wilhelm talked plainly. He had summoned them because the excitement of his 75th birthday had passed and he was feeling old. When, as and if he died, he wanted certain dignities at his funeral. He was not well. What of the House? What of that long lost country and that long lost crown? "We," he said, "are the divinely ordained rulers of Germany. The Nazis have nearly finished their work of making Germany ready for us. We must soon go home." Then he let out the real reason for the family council. His fortune (estimated at $175,000,000), hard hit by the fall of the dollar and pound, had dwindled sadly. Final blow was Germany's embargo on money except in minuscule amounts. Old Wilhelm was not getting his German rents. His secretaries were commuting between Doom and the Reich, bringing out all the cash the law allowed at each trip. Still it was not enough. In fact, the man whom Germans used to think of as their richest countryman was hard up. A Kaiser no longer, he was still the head of a Royal House, responsible for the miniature court at Doom, the princelings and the horde of poor relations. The solution, old Wilhelm concluded, was to move to Germany to collect the rents and later, perhaps, the crown and country. The walls of the quiet room were crowded with mementoes of the great days before 1918. Potsdam was only 16 years and 350 mi. away. Listening to their father's proud boasts, the sons felt 16 years younger but they looked doubtful. Last week Belgium's Chamber of Deputies raised King Leopold's civil list allowance from 8.000,000 francs ($375.000) to 12.000.000 francs ($560.000) per year. To his father's relict. Queen Mother Elisabeth, the deputies voted 2,000,000 francs ($90,000).

Britain's House of Commons was planning to raise King George's civil list allowance from -L-420.000 ($2,140,000) to -L-445.000 ($2.270.000) a year.

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