after the war as a reward for the suffering of the Romanian people was written by Știrbey. Marie pressed Ferdinand very strongly to promise land reform and universal suffrage, which he agreed to despite his own fears of the implications of such promises. The oldest of Marie's children, Crown Prince Carol (the future King Carol II) was well aware of his mother's affair with Știrbey, which was a source of much tension as Carol utterly hated "the White Prince". At a reception at the Royal Palace in 1920 hosted by the queen, one visitor noted: "She had a dress, a very long dress with a train in velvet with her magnificent pearls. She was in a corner of the throne room, and Barbu Știrbey was next to her, discussing something. They were not looking at each other, they were looking at the crowd. It was an extraordinary sight...They were such a magnificent pair. She was so beautiful and he was so handsome. They had such an extraordinary allure, grandeur and distinction...The best proof is that after more than fifty years I can still see them as if it happened last night". Știrbey's relationship with Marie was an important factor in Romanian politics as he favored the National Liberal Party led Brătianu, and during the reign of King Ferdinand the Crown was notably in favor of the National Liberals. In turn, much of the hatred that Carol II was to display as a king towards the National Liberals stemmed ultimately from his hatred of Știrbey. National Liberal grandee The Crown Prince Carol greatly resented his mother's relationship with Știrbey, and it was Știrbey who in the 1920s pressed the strongest to have Carol either renounce his relationship with his mistress Madame Lupescu or have Carol renounce the throne in favor of his son by Princess Helen of Greece, Prince Michael. Știrbey favored the National Liberal Party (which despite its name was the conservative party, representing the interests of the nobility and the industrialists) as the natural ruling party in Romania, not the least because the leader of the National Liberals, Brătianu, was his brother-in-law. Brătianu and the other National Liberal grandees in turn saw Crown Prince Carol as a "loose cannon", who could not be manipulated like his father King Ferdinand had been, and believed that if Carol came to the throne, he would use the power of the monarchy to