Marriage Candidate

After reading through the materials, Franz had to admit that Friedrich's luck was truly terrible. There were simply too few suitable matches for him, leaving virtually no room for choice.

Given the current international situation, the Russian imperial family was still the most suitable marriage partner for the House of Habsburg, but unfortunately, they had no princesses of the right age.

Alexander II's daughters were already married, while Alexander III's daughters had not even been weaned yet. Whether they would survive was still uncertain, and Friedrich obviously could not wait that long.

The French imperial family had no princesses either, though that did not matter. The Bonaparte Family had never been within Franz's consideration to begin with.

As the stronghold of conservatism, the Austrian people simply could not accept a future empress from a nouveau riche background—or rather, the Austrian nobility could not accept a woman of insufficiently noble blood becoming the wife of the heir apparent.

The Bonaparte Family had risen too recently. Moreover, Napoleon I had offended far too many people, while Napoleon III had been an elected emperor. Both challenged the traditional system of hereditary bloodlines.

In the eyes of legitimate aristocrats, that was an illegitimate seizure of power. The Bonaparte Family was thus excluded from Europe's aristocratic circles. Even with the French Empire shining like the noonday sun, they still had not been accepted into the mainstream circle.

As beneficiaries of the hereditary bloodline system, the House of Habsburg naturally opposed heretics like the Bonaparte Family.

Empress Helen asked, "Franz, which of these do you think is most suitable for Friedrich?"

Franz said, "Let's use the process of elimination. Any granddaughter of Queen Victoria, and any of their descendants, are out of consideration."

There was no helping it—hemophilia was not something they could afford to provoke.