Page:Charles von Hügel (1903 memoir).djvu/96



enjoyments to others. Three times a week these beautiful gardens, with their splendid hot-houses, containing a large collection of rare orchideous plants, were thrown open to the public. Thus the poorest as well as the highest in the land could resort to them for instruction or for amusement. The present Emperor of Austria and his brother, the ill-fated Emperor Maximilian, often and often in their childhood visited Hietzing, and always with delight. It was during that period of tranquillity that the Baron founded the Vienna Horticultural Society, which, under his active and intelligent presidency, increased and prospered rapidly. The first exhibition of flowers in that capital took place, under his auspices, in his own grounds, and he only resigned his office of president in 1850, when he was appointed Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary at the Grand Ducal Court at Florence. Up to his death he retained the honorary presidency of the Society, which owed to him its origin, existence, and development, and annually awarded a prize of twenty ducats to its flower exhibitions.

Between the year 1847 and the date above referred to, when the Baron von Hügel reentered on his diplomatic career and proceeded to Italy, many changes occurred in the tenor of his life which must be briefly mentioned here. In August 1847 a young guest came to his fairy abode, whose heart after a very short lapse of time was entirely won by the host, whose merits, great attractions, and affection made her overlook completely the vast difference of age existing between them, and in her earliest girlhood she gladly accepted the hand of Baron von Hügel. During an engagement of four years, and then a wedded life of nearly twenty years, she devoted herself to him with a strength of attachment which never experienced the shadow