In the autumn of 1867 my family went to Wiesbaden, where my wife was
to spend some time on account of her health, and I joined them there
about Christmas time for a few weeks. Great changes had taken place in
Germany since that dark December night in 1861 when I rushed through
the country from the Belgian frontier to Hamburg on my way from Spain
to America. The period of stupid reaction after the collapse of the
revolutionary movements of 1848 was over. King Frederick William IV.
of Prussia, who had been so deeply convinced and arduous an upholder
of the divine right of kings, had died a helpless lunatic. King
William I., afterwards Emperor William I., his brother and successor,
also a believer in that divine right, but not to the extent of
believing as well in the divine inspiration of kings--in other words,
a man of good sense and capable of recognizing the superior ability of
others--had found in Bismarck a minister of commanding genius. The
sweeping victory of Prussia over Austria in 1866 had resulted in the
establishment of the North German Confederacy under Prussian hegemony,
which was considered a stepping-stone to the unification of all
Germany as a constitutional empire. Several of the revolutionists of
1848 now sat in the Reichstag of the North German Confederacy, and one
of the ablest of them, Lothar Bucher, was Bismarck's confidential
counsellor. The nation was elated with hope, and there was a liberal
wind blowing even in the sphere of the government.
I did not doubt that under these circumstances I might venture into
Germany without danger of being seriously molested; yet, as my
personal case was technically not covered by any of the several
amnesties which had been proclaimed in Prussia from time to time, I
thought that some subordinate officer, either construing his duty with
the strictness of a thorough Prussian, or wishing to distinguish
himself by a conspicuous display of official watchfulness, might give
me annoyance. I did not, indeed, entertain the slightest apprehension
as to my safety, but I might have become involved in sensational
proceedings, which would have been extremely distasteful to me, as
well as unwelcome to the government. I therefore wrote to Mr. George
Bancroft, the American Minister at Berlin, requesting him if possible
to inform himself privately whether the Prussian government had any
objection to my visiting Germany for a few weeks, and to let me have
his answer at Bremerhaven upon the arrival there of the steamer on
which I had taken passage. My intention was, in case the answer were
unfavorable, to sail at once from Bremen to England and to meet my
family there. Mr. Bancroft very kindly complied with my request, and
assured me in his letter which I found at Bremerhaven that the
Prussian government not only had no objection to my visiting Germany,
but that I should be welcome.
After having spent Christmas with my family in Wiesbaden, I went to
Berlin. I wrote a note to Lothar Bucher, whom I had last seen sixteen
years before as a fellow refugee in London, and whom I wished very
much to meet again. Bucher answered promptly that he would be glad
indeed to see me again, and asked if I would not like to make the
acquaintance of "the Minister" (Bismarck), who had expressed a wish to
have a talk with me. I replied, of course, that I should be happy,
etc., whereupon I received within an hour an invitation from Count
Bismarck himself (he was then only a count) to visit him at eight
o'clock that same evening at the Chancellor's palace on the
Wilhelmstrasse. Promptly at the appointed hour I was announced to him,
and he received me at the door of a room of moderate size, the table
and some of the furniture of which were covered with books and
papers,--evidently his working cabinet. There I beheld the great man
whose name was filling the world--tall, erect, and broad-shouldered,
and on those Atlas shoulders that massive head which everybody knows
from pictures--the whole figure making the impression of something
colossal--then at the age of fifty-three, in the fulness of physical
and mental vigor.
He was dressed in a General's undress uniform, unbuttoned. His
features, which evidently could look very stern when he wished, were
lighted up with a friendly smile. He stretched out his hand and gave
me a vigorous grasp. "Glad you have come," he said, in a voice which
appeared rather high-keyed, issuing from so huge a form, but of
pleasing timbre.
"I think I must have seen you before," was his first remark, while we
were still standing up facing one another. "It was some time in the
early fifties on a railway train from Frankfort to Berlin. There was a
young man sitting opposite me who, from some picture of you which I
had seen in a pictorial paper, I thought might be you."
I replied that this could not be, since at that period I was not in
Germany. "Besides," I added--a little impudently perhaps--"would you
not have had me arrested as a malefactor?"
"Oh," he exclaimed, with a good, natural laugh, "you mistake me. I
would not have done such a thing. You mean on account of that Kinkel
affair? Oh, no! I rather liked that. And if it were not that it would
be highly improper for His Majesty's minister and the Chancellor of
the North German Confederacy, I should like to go with you to Spandau
and have you tell me the whole story on the spot. Now let us sit
down."
He pointed out to me an easy-chair close to his own and then uncorked
a bottle which stood, with two glasses, on a tray at his elbow. "You
are a Rhinelander," he said, "and I know you will relish this." We
touched glasses, and I found the wine indeed very excellent.
"You smoke, of course," he continued, "and here are some good Havanas.
I used to be very fond of them, but I have a sort of superstitious
belief that every person is permitted to smoke only a certain number
of cigars in his life, and no more. I am afraid I have exhausted my
allowance, and now I take to the pipe." With a lighted strip of paper,
called in German "Fidibus," he put the tobacco in the porcelain bowl
of his long German student pipe in full blast, and presently he blew
forth huge clouds of smoke.
This done, he comfortably leaned back in his chair and said: "Now tell
me, as an American Republican and a Forty-eighter of the revolutionary
kind, how the present condition of Germany strikes you. I would not
ask you that question," he added, "if you were a privy counsellor (a
Geheimrath), for I know what he would answer. But you will tell me
what you really think."
_Bismarck's Sarcastic Humor_
I replied that I had been in the country only a few weeks and had
received only superficial impressions, but that I had become sensible
of a general atmosphere of newly inspired national ambition and a
confident hope for the development of more liberal political
institutions. I had found only a few old fogies in Nassau and a banker
in Frankfort who seemed to be in a disappointed and depressed state of
mind. Bismarck laughed heartily. The disgruntled Nassauers, he said,
had probably been some sort of purveyors to the late ducal court, and
he would wager that the Frankfort banker was either a member of one of
the old patrician families, who thought they were the highest nobility
in all the land, or a money-maker complaining that Frankfort was no
longer, as it had been, the financial center of southern Germany. Here
Bismarck gave full reign to his sarcastic humor. He had spent years in
Frankfort as the representative of the defunct "Bundestag," and had no
end of funny anecdotes about the aristocratic pretensions of the
patrician burghers of that ancient free city, and about their lofty
wrath at the incorporation of that commonwealth in the Prussian
monarchy.
_Forcing the War with Austria_
Then he began to tell me about the great difficulties he had been
obliged to overcome in bringing about the decisive struggle with
Austria. One of the most serious of these difficulties, as he said,
consisted in the scrupulous hesitancy of old King William to consent
to anything that seemed to be in any sense unconstitutional or not in
harmony with the strictest notion of good faith. In our conversation
Bismarck constantly called the king "der alte Herr"--"the old
gentleman," or, as it might also have been translated, "the old
master." One moment he would speak of the old gentleman with something
like sentimental tenderness, and then again in a tone of familiar
freedom which smacked of anything but reverential respect. He told me
anecdotes about him which made me stare, for at the moment I could not
help remembering that I was listening to the prime minister of the
crown, to whom I was an entire stranger and who knew nothing of my
discretion or sense of responsibility.
[Illustration: KAISER WILHELM I
FROM THE PAINTING BY GUSTAV RICHTER
_Photographed by the Berlin Photographic Co._]
As if we had been confidential chums all our lives, he gave me, with
apparently the completest abandon and exuberant vivacity, inside views
of the famous "conflict" period between the crown and the Prussian
parliament, when, seeing the war with Austria inevitably coming, he
had, without legislative authorization, spent millions upon millions
of the public funds upon the army in preparation for the great
crisis; how the liberal majority of the chambers, and an indignant
public opinion which did not recognize the great object of national
unification in view, had fiercely risen up against that arbitrary
stretch of power; how the king himself had recoiled from such a breach
of the constitution; how the king had apprehended a new revolution
which might cost each of them his head--which would possibly have come
about if they had failed in the Austrian war; how then he had
"desperately used his spurs to make the noble old horse clear the
ditch and take the risk"; and how, the victory having been won, on
their return from the war they were received by the people with the
most jubilant acclamations instead of having their heads cut off,
which had pleased the old gentleman immensely and taught him a lesson
as to his reckless prime minister.
It was not the cautious and conservative spirit of the king alone that
he had occasionally to overcome. Still more was he clogged and not
seldom exasperated by what he called the stupid old bureaucracy, which
had to be got out of its accustomed ruts whenever anything new and
bold was to be done. He fairly bubbled over with humorous anecdotes,
evidently relishing, himself, his droll descriptions of the antiquated
"Geheimrath" (privy counsellor), as he stared with his bleared eyes
wide open, whenever anything unusual was proposed, seeing nothing but
insuperable difficulties before him and then exhausting his whole
ingenuity in finding the best sort of red tape with which to strangle
the project. His patience tried to the utmost, he, the minister would
then go to the king and tell him that such and such a rusty official
could no longer be got along with and must necessarily give place to a
more efficient person; whereupon the "old gentleman," melting with
pity, would say, "Oh, he has so long been a faithful servant of the
State, would it not be cruel to cast him aside like a squeezed-out
orange?--no, I cannot do it." "And there," said Bismarck, "there we
are."
I ventured to suggest that an offer to resign on his part, if he could
not have his way, might make the king less tender of his inefficient
friends in high places. "Oh," said Bismarck with a laugh, "I have
tried that so often, too often, perhaps, to make it impressive! What
do you think happens when I offer my resignation? My old gentleman
begins to sob and cry--he actually sheds tears, and says, 'Now you
want to leave me too?' Now when I see him shed tears, what in the
world can I do then?" So he went on for a while, from one funny
anecdote to another and from one satirical description to another.
_Bismarck's Test of Von Moltke_
Bismarck then came back to the Austrian war and told me much about the
diplomatic fencing which led up to it. With evident gusto he related
story after story, showing how his diplomatic adversaries at that
critical period had been like puppets in his hands, and how he had
managed the German princes as they grouped themselves on one side or
the other. Then he came to speak of the battle of Koeniggraetz, and
especially of that "anxious moment" in it before the arrival of the
Crown Prince in the rear of the Austrians, when some Prussian attacks
had failed and there were signs of disorder among the repulsed
troops.
"It was an anxious moment," said Bismarck, "a moment on the decision
of which the fate of empire depended. What would have become of us if
we had lost that battle? Squadrons of cavalry, all mixed up, hussars,
dragoons, uhlans, were streaming by the spot where the king, Moltke,
and myself stood, and although we had calculated that the Crown Prince
might long have appeared behind the Austrian rear, no sign of the
Crown Prince! Things began to look ominous. I confess I felt not a
little nervous. I looked at Moltke, who sat quietly on his horse and
did not seem to be disturbed by what was going on around us. I thought
I would test whether he was really as calm as he appeared. I rode up
to him and asked him whether I might offer him a cigar, since I
noticed he was not smoking. He replied that he would be glad if I had
one to spare. I presented to him my open case in which there were only
two cigars, one a very good Havana, and the other of rather poor
quality. Moltke looked at them and even handled them with great
attention, in order to ascertain their relative value, and then with
slow deliberation chose the Havana. 'Very good,' he said composedly.
This reassured me very much. I thought, If Moltke can bestow so much
time and attention upon the choice between two cigars, things cannot
be very bad. Indeed, a few minutes later we heard the Crown Prince's
guns, we observed unsteady and confused movements on the Austrian
positions, and the battle was won."
I said that we in America who had followed the course of events with
intense interest were rather surprised, at the time, that the
conclusion of peace followed the battle of Koeniggraetz so quickly and
that Prussia did not take greater advantage of her victory. Bismarck
replied that the speedy conclusion of peace had been a great surprise
to many people, but that he thought it was the best thing he had ever
done, and that he had accomplished it against the desire of the king
and of the military party, who were greatly elated by that splendid
triumph of the Prussian arms and thought that so great and so
successful an effort should have a greater reward. Sound statesmanship
required that the Austrian Empire, the existence of which was
necessary for Europe, should not be reduced to a mere wreck; that it
should be made a friend and, as a friend, not too powerless; that what
Prussia had gone to war for was the leadership of Germany, and that
this leadership in Germany would not have been fortified, but rather
weakened, by the acquisition from Austria of populations which would
not have fitted into the Prussian scheme.
Besides, the Chancellor thought that, the success of the Prussians
having been so decisive, it was wise to avoid further sacrifices and
risks. The cholera had made its appearance among the troops, and so
long as the war lasted there would have been danger of French
intervention. He had successfully fought off that French intervention,
he said, by all sorts of diplomatic manoeuvres, some of which he
narrated to me in detail. But Louis Napoleon had become very restless
at the growth of Prussian power and prestige, and he would, probably,
not have hesitated to put in his hand, had not the French army been so
weakened by his foolish Mexican adventure. But now, when the main
Prussian army was marching farther and farther away from the Rhine and
had suffered serious losses, and was threatened by malignant disease,
he might have felt encouraged by these circumstances to do what he
would have liked to do all the time.
"That would have created a new situation," said Bismarck. "But to meet
that situation, I should have had a shot in my locker which, perhaps,
will surprise you when I mention it."
I was indeed curious. "What would have been the effect," said
Bismarck, "if under those circumstances I had appealed to the national
feeling of the whole people by proclaiming the constitution of the
German Empire made at Frankfort in 1848 and 1849?"
"I think it would have electrified the whole country and created a
German nation," I replied. "But would you really have adopted that
great orphan left by the revolution of 1848?"
"Why not?" said the Chancellor. "True, that constitution contained
some features very objectionable to me. But, after all, it was not so
very far from what I am aiming at now. But whether the old gentleman
would have adopted it is doubtful. Still, with Napoleon at the gates,
he might have taken that jump too. But," he added, "we shall have
that war with France anyhow."
"_War with France in Two Years_"
I expressed my surprise at this prediction,--a prediction all the more
surprising to me when I again recalled that the great statesman,
carrying on his shoulders such tremendous responsibilities, was
talking to an entire stranger,--and his tone grew quite serious,
grave, almost solemn, as he said: "Do not believe that I love war. I
have seen enough of war to abhor it profoundly. The terrible scenes I
have witnessed will never cease to haunt my mind. I shall never
consent to a war that is avoidable, much less seek it. But this war
with France will surely come. It will be forced upon us by the French
Emperor. I see that clearly."
Then he went on to explain how the situation of an "adventurer on a
throne," such as Louis Napoleon, was different from that of a
legitimate sovereign, like the King of Prussia. "I know," said he with
a smile, "you do not believe in such a thing as the divine right of
kings. But many people do, especially in Prussia--perhaps not as many
as did before 1848, but even now more than you think. People are
attracted to the dynasty by traditional loyalty. A King of Prussia may
make mistakes or suffer misfortunes, or even humiliations, but that
traditional loyalty will not give way. But the adventurer on the
throne has no such traditional sentiment behind him. His security
depends upon personal prestige, and that prestige upon sensational
effects which must follow one another in rather rapid succession to
remain fresh and satisfactory to the ambition, or the pride, or, if
you will, the vanity of the people--especially to such a people as the
French.
"Now, Louis Napoleon has lost much of his prestige by two things--the
Mexican adventure, which was an astounding blunder, a fantastic folly
on his part; and then by permitting Prussia to become so great without
obtaining some sort of 'compensation' in the way of an acquisition of
territory that might have been made to appear to the French people as
a brilliant achievement of his diplomacy. It was well known that he
wanted such a compensation, and tried for it, and was manoeuvered out
of it by me without his knowledge of what was happening to him. He is
well aware that thus he has lost much of his prestige, more than he
can afford, and that such a loss, unless soon repaired, may become
dangerous to his tenure as emperor. He will, therefore, as soon as he
thinks that his army is in good fighting condition, again make an
effort to recover that prestige which is so vital to him, by using
some pretext for picking a quarrel with us. I do not think he is
personally eager for that war, I think he would rather avoid it, but
the precariousness of his situation will drive him to it. My
calculation is that the crisis will come in about two years. We have
to be ready, of course, and we are. We shall win, and the result will
be just the contrary of what Napoleon aims at--the total unification
of Germany outside of Austria, and probably Napoleon's downfall."
[Illustration: PRINCE OTTO VON BISMARCK
FROM THE PAINTING BY FRANZ VON LENBACH
_Photographed by the Berlin Photographic Co._]
This was said in January, 1868. The war between France and Prussia and
her allies broke out in July, 1870, and the foundation of the German
Empire and the downfall of Napoleon were the results. No prediction
was ever more shrewdly made and more accurately and amply fulfilled.
[Illustration: COUNT HELLMUTH VON MOLTKE
FROM THE PAINTING BY FRANZ VON LENBACH
_Photographed by the Berlin Photographic Co._]
I have introduced here Bismarck as speaking in the first person. I did
this to present the substance of what he said to me in a succinct
form. But this does not pretend to portray the manner in which he said
it--the bubbling vivacity of his talk, now and then interspersed with
French or English phrases; the lightning flashes of his wit
scintillating around the subjects of his remarks and sometimes
illuminating, as with a search-light, a public character, or an event,
or a situation; his laugh, now contageously genial, and then grimly
sarcastic; the rapid transitions from jovial, sportive humor to
touching pathos; the evident pleasure taken by the narrator in his
tale; the dashing, rattling rapidity with which that tale would at
times rush on; and behind all this that tremendous personality--the
picturesque embodiment of a power greater than any king's--a veritable
Atlas carrying upon his shoulders the destinies of a great nation.
There was a strange fascination in the presence of the giant who
appeared so peculiarly grand and yet so human.
[Illustration: THE CHANCELLOR'S PALACE ON THE WILHELMSTRASSE WHERE CARL
SCHURZ VISITED BISMARCK IN 1878.
_Photographed by the Berlin Photographic Co._]
While he was still speaking with unabated animation I looked at the
clock opposite me and was astounded when I found that midnight was
long behind us. I rose in alarm and begged the Chancellor's pardon for
having intruded so long upon his time. "Oh," said the Chancellor, "I
am used to late hours, and we have not talked yet about America.
However, you have a right to be tired. But you must come again. You
must dine with me. Can you do so to-morrow? I have invited a
commission on the Penal Code--mostly dull old jurists, I suppose--but
I may find some one among them fit to be your neighbor at the table
and to entertain you."
I gladly accepted the invitation and found myself the next evening in
a large company of serious and learned-looking gentlemen, each one of
whom was adorned with one or more decorations. I was the only person
in the room who had none, and several of the guests seemed to eye me
with some curiosity, when Bismarck in a loud voice presented me to the
Countess as "General Carl Schurz from the United States of America."
Some of the gentlemen looked somewhat surprised, but I at once became
a person of interest, and many introductions followed. At the table I
had a judge from Cologne for my neighbor, who had enough of the
Rhenish temperament to be cheerful company. The dinner was a very
rapid affair--lasting hardly three quarters of an hour, certainly not
more.
[Illustration: THE BATTLE OF KOeNIGGRAeTZ--FROM THE PAINTING BY GEORG
BLEISTREW
THE DECISIVE BATTLE OF THE SEVEN WEEKS' WAR, BY WHICH PRUSSIA BECAME THE
LEADING POLITICAL AND MILITARY POWER IN GERMANY. IN THE CENTER OF THE
PICTURE IS SHOWN KING WILLIAM, SURROUNDED BY BISMARCK, VON MOLTKE, AND
THE MEMBERS OF HIS STAFF.
_Photographed by the Berlin Photographic Co._]
Before the smokers could have got half through with their cigars, the
Minister of Justice, who seemed to act as mentor and guide to the
gentlemen of the Penal Code Commission, took leave of the host, which
was accepted by the whole company as a signal to depart. I followed
their example, but the Chancellor said: "Wait a moment. Why should you
stand in that crowd struggling for your overcoat? Let us sit down and
have a glass of Apollinaris." We sat down by a small round table, a
bottle of Apollinaris water was brought, and he began at once to ply
me with questions about America.
[Illustration: EMPEROR NAPOLEON III WHOM BISMARCK CALLED "THE ADVENTURER
ON THE THRONE," AND WHOSE DOWNFALL HE PREDICTED IN A CONVERSATION WITH
CARL SCHURZ TWO YEARS BEFORE SEDAN]
He was greatly interested in the struggle going on between President
Johnson and the Republican majority in Congress, which was then
approaching its final crisis. He said that he looked upon that
struggle as a test of the strength of the conservative element in our
political fabric. Would the impeachment of the President, and, if he
were found guilty, his deposition from office, lead to any further
conflicts dangerous to the public peace and order? I replied that I
was convinced it would not; the executive power would simply pass from
the hands of one man to the hands of another, according to the
constitution and laws of the country, without any resistance on the
part of anybody; and on the other hand, if President Johnson were
acquitted, there would be general submission to the verdict as a
matter of course, although popular excitement stirred up by the matter
would run very high throughout the country.
The Chancellor was too polite to tell me point-blank that he had grave
doubts as to all this, but he would at least not let me believe that
he thought as I did. He smilingly asked me whether I was still as
firmly convinced a republican as I had been before I went to America
and studied republicanism from the inside; and when I assured him that
I was, and that, although I had in personal experience found the
republic not as lovely as my youthful enthusiasm had pictured it to my
imagination, but much more practical in its general beneficence to the
great masses of the people, and much more conservative in its
tendencies than I had imagined, he said that he supposed our
impressions or views with regard to such things were largely owing to
temperament, or education, or traditional ways of thinking.
"I am not a democrat," he went on, "and cannot be. I was born an
aristocrat and brought up an aristocrat. To tell you the truth, there
was something in me that made me instinctively sympathize with the
slaveholders, as the aristocratic party, in your Civil War. But," he
added with earnest emphasis, "this vague sympathy did not in the least
affect my views as to the policy to be followed by our government with
regard to the United States. Prussia, notwithstanding her monarchical
and aristocratic sympathies, is, and will steadily be by tradition, as
well as by thoroughly understood interest, the firm friend of your
republic. You may always count upon that."
He asked me a great many questions concerning the political and social
conditions in the United States. Again and again he wondered how
society could be kept in tolerable order where the powers of the
government were so narrowly restricted and where there was so little
reverence for the constituted or "ordained" authorities. With a hearty
laugh, in which there seemed to be a suggestion of assent, he received
my remark that the American people would hardly have become the
self-reliant, energetic, progressive people they were, had there been
a privy-counsellor or a police captain standing at every mud-puddle in
America to keep people from stepping into it. And he seemed to be much
struck when I brought out the apparent paradox that in a democracy
with little government things might go badly in detail but well on the
whole, while in a monarchy with much and omni-present government
things might go very pleasingly in detail but poorly on the whole. He
saw that with such views I was an incurable democrat; but would not,
he asked, the real test of our democratic institutions come when,
after the disappearance of the exceptional opportunities springing
from our wonderful natural resources which were in a certain sense
common property, our political struggles became, as they surely would
become, struggles between the poor and the rich, between the few who
have, and the many who want? Here we entered upon a wide field of
conjecture.
The conversation then turned to international relations, and
especially public opinion in America concerning Germany. Did the
Americans sympathize with German endeavors towards national unity?--I
thought that so far as any feeling with regard to German unity existed
in America, it was sympathetic; among the German-Americans it was
warmly so.--Did Louis Napoleon, the emperor of the French, enjoy any
popularity in America?--He did not enjoy the respect of the people at
large and was rather unpopular except with a comparatively small
number of snobs who would feel themselves exalted by an introduction
at his court.--There would, then, in case of a war between Germany and
France, be no likelihood of American sympathy running in favor of
Louis Napoleon?--There would not, unless Germany forced war on France
for decidedly unjust cause.
Throughout our conversation Bismarck repeatedly expressed his pleasure
at the friendly relations existing between him and the German
Liberals, some of whom had been prominent in the revolutionary
troubles of 1848. He mentioned several of my old friends, Bucher,
Kapp, and others, who, having returned to Germany, felt themselves
quite at home under the new conditions and had found their way open to
public positions and activities of distinction and influence, in
harmony with their principles. As he repeated this, or something like
it, in a manner apt to command my attention, I might have taken it as
a suggestion inviting me to do likewise. But I thought it best not to
say anything in response.
Our conversation had throughout been so animated that time had slipped
by us unaware, and it was again long past midnight when I left. My old
friends of 1848 whom I met in Berlin were of course very curious to
know what the great man of the time might have had to say to me, and I
thought I could without being indiscreet communicate to them how
highly pleased he had expressed himself with the harmonious
cooperation between him and them for common ends. Some of them thought
that Bismarck's conversion to liberal principles was really sincere.
Others were less sanguine, believing as they did that he was indeed
sincere and earnest in his endeavor to create a united German empire
under Prussian leadership; that he would carry on a gay flirtation
with the Liberals so long as he thought that he could thus best
further his object, but that his true autocratic nature would assert
itself again and he would throw his temporarily assumed Liberalism
overboard as soon as he felt that he did not need its support any
longer, and especially when he found it to stand in the way of his
will.