خطأ غريب في قصة the prisoner of Zenda

[abubakr1g]

What is the answer to this question?

How did Rudolf Rassendyll get his red hair?

or:

?Why did Rudolf Rassendyll have red hair??
:The answer from the text book is:
.Because Countess Amalia Rassendyll was married to a member of the Elphbergs.

!!!Isn't this ridiculous.
Because this breaks Biology laws!!
:
The correct ansewr is in this quotation from the original text.

A scandal

Well then--and I must premise that I am going, perforce, to rake up the very scandal which my dear Lady Burlesdon wishes forgotten--in the year 1733, George II. sitting then on the throne, peace reigning for the moment, and the King and the Prince of Wales being not yet at loggerheads, there came on a visit to the English Court a certain prince, who was afterwards known to history as Rudolf the Third of Ruritania. The prince was a tall, handsome young fellow, marked (maybe marred, it is not for me to say) by a somewhat
unusually long, sharp and straight nose, and a mass of dark-red hair--in fact, the nose and the hair which have stamped the Elphbergs time out of mind. He stayed some months in England, where he was most courteously received; yet, in the end, he left rather under a cloud. For he fought a duel (it was considered highly well-bred of him to waive all question of his rank) with a nobleman, well known in the society of the day, not only for his own merits, but as the husband of a very beautiful wife. In that duel Prince Rudolf received a severe wound, and, recovering therefrom, was adroitly smuggled off by the Ruritanian ambassador, who had found him a pretty handful. The nobleman was not wounded in the duel; but the morning being raw and damp on the occasion of the meeting, he contracted a severe chill, and, failing to throw it off, he died some six months after the departure of Prince Rudolf, without having found leisure to adjust his relations with his wife--who, after another two months, bore an heir to the title and estates of the family of Burlesdon. This lady was the Countess Amelia, whose picture my sister-in-law wished to remove from the drawing-room in Park Lane; and her husband was James, fifth Earl of Burlesdon and twenty-second Baron Rassendyll, both in the peerage of England, and a Knight of the Garter. As for Rudolf, he went back to Ruritania, married a wife, and ascended the throne, whereon his progeny in the direct line have sat from then till this very hour--with one short interval. And, finally, if you walk through the picture galleries at Burlesdon, among the fifty portraits or so of the last century and a half, you will find five or six, including that of the sixth earl, distinguished by long,sharp, straight noses and a quantity of dark-red hair; these five or six have also blue eyes, whereas among the Rassendylls dark eyes are the commoner.
That is the explanation, and I am glad to have finished it: the blemishes on honourable lineage are a delicate subject, and certainly this heredity we hear so much about is the finest scandalmonger in the world; it laughs at discretion, and writes strange entries between the lines of the "Peerages".
It will be observed that my sister-in-law, with a want of logic that must have been peculiar to herself (since we are no longer allowed to lay it to the charge of her ***), treated my complexion almost as an offence for which I was responsible, hastening to assume from that external sign inward qualities of which I protest my entire innocence; and this unjust inference she sought to buttress by pointing to the uselessness of the life I had led.

[Essam ABDOU]

Based on our text, we can say that Rudolf Rassendyll and Rudolf the Fifth are relatives (cousins)who shared the same red hair and straight nose among other features.

Concerning the scandal, even when it was written in some editions, we used to say that Rudolf the Third married Countess Amalia without her family`s (the Rassendylls`) consent (to avoid mentioning the shameful relationship between them)

Best Regards

[abubakr1g]

.Thank you for your interest

[Mr. ABDELHADY]

The original text also referred to a drink not cakes.
.There is some adapting in the story to suit our society
However ,the question should be :
How did Rudolf Elphberg get his red hair
not :
How did Rudolf Rassendyll get his red hair

[miss ghada]

that right i've taught the prisoner of zenda to some language school students .. there were wine instead of cakes , and a shamful relationship between Amailia and Rudolf the third .