In the July of that year, while the gilding was yet untarnished upon
France's brand-new Constitution--ratified by a _plebiscitum_ obtained
after the usual methods, and recording seven millions of pinchbeck
votes--while the Imperial Court of the Third Napoleon played at
Arcadian pastorals under the mistletoe-draped oaks and spreading
beeches of St. Cloud, the question of the Candidacy of Prince Leopold
of Hohenzollern for the vacant Throne of Spain appeared in the
firmament of European politics (even as the voice of Lord Granville
prophesied a lengthy period of unbroken fine weather)--and broke
about the ears of the Power most concerned like a stinging shower of
hail.
The Spanish crown upon the head of a Hohenzollern. Rather a
Montpensier, intolerable as that would have been. True, the Almanach
de Gotha had offered (to General Prim, President Zorilla, and the
Cortes, assembled in solemn session) only the unwelcome alternative
of the legal heir to the throne going begging; true, the Spanish
people were very well satisfied with the idea of being ruled by a
Catholic gentleman of Royal blood, suitable age, handsome person, and
military experience, married to a Portuguese princess, and possessing
two healthy sons.
But that a Prussian Prince, holding a commission in Prussia's Army,
should be set up like a signpost of warning on France's southern
frontier, as though to keep her in mind of what would happen in the
event of another war on the Rhine--was, from the Gallic point of
view, intolerable. "The security and the dignity of the French
nation are endangered by this candidacy!" cried Jules Favre.
According to M. Thiers, "the nominacy was not only an affront to the
nation, but an enterprise adverse to its interests." Gambetta cried
aloud that all Frenchmen must unite for a national war. Marshal
Vaillant made a memorandum in his notebook. "_This signifies war, or
something very like it!_" And at the Council of Ministers hastily
summoned to St. Cloud on the morning of the sixth of July, the
Emperor passed to the Duke de Gramont, his Foreign Minister, a
penciled communication. "_Notify Prince Gortchakoff at Petersburg
that if Prussia insists upon the accession of the Prince of
Hohenzollern to the throne of Spain, it will mean war!_"
What haste to clutch at the _casus belli_. When the Ministers
quitted the Imperial Council, and the Corps Législatif opened its
session, long-continued applause greeted the declaration of Gramont
from the tribune that a certain unnamed Third Power, by placing one
of its Princes on the throne of Charles V., threatened to disturb the
equilibrium of Europe, to imperil the material interests and endanger
the honor of France. "If it be impossible to prevent this," ran the
peroration, "strong in your support, Messieurs, we shall perform our
duty without hesitation or faltering!" Here was an ultimatum that
sounded the very note of war.
Do you hear the echo of the thunderous acclamations that attended the
Foreign Minister to his seat, the clapping of hands, stamping of
feet, roaring of lungs that have been dust for more than forty years,
or are now on the point of dissolving into their native element?
Naturally because the Right were defiant, the Left called their
utterances bellicose. Had the Right manifested a disposition to turn
the other cheek in Scriptural fashion, the Left would have
passionately taunted this band of politicians with cowardice, lack of
patriotism, indifference to the sacred cause of national
freedom,--would have accused them of being traitors to their country,
and Heaven knows what else.
The Press threw oil upon the roaring conflagration. Were this
affront submitted to, cried the _Gaulois_, "there would not exist a
woman in the world who would accept a Frenchman's arm!" The
_Correspondant_ was "relieved to find that Frenchmen once more have
become Frenchmen." The _Moniteur Universel_ was charmed to discover
that the blame for this momentous conflict could never be attributed
to the French Government. The _Figaro_ left off making a cockshy of
the Imperial dignity, to admit that for once the Emperor's official
mouthpiece had spoken the right word. And the _Débats_ praised the
attitude taken by the Government. "Silence at this juncture would,"
it cried, "have been pusillanimous. Shall the nation be accused of
bowing its head for the second time, before the cannon of Sadowa?"
Lord Granville, replacing the recently deceased Clarendon at Great
Britain's Foreign Ministry, mentioned to the Spanish Ambassador to
England that the choice of Prince Leopold would create a sore. He
wrote to Layard at Berlin that he considered France had been given
good cause of resentment. Lyons, in the shoes of Lord Cowley, at the
English Embassy in Paris, wrote to his chief that the unhappy affair
had revived all the old animosity, though it seemed to him that
"neither the Emperor nor his Ministers really wish or expect war!"
The _Times_ of July 8th was severe on the policy of Prussia; the
_Standard_ for once expressed the same opinion as the _Times_. The
_Daily Telegraph_ prophesied that the succession of the Prussian
Prince would mean France's present humiliation and future peril. The
_Pall Mall Gazette_ poked mordant fun at the attitude of
unconsciousness assumed by King William, who, between sips of Ems
water, declared his ignorance of the whole affair. The _Early Wire_,
backing and filling, kept an even keel for a day or two. Then said
Mr. Knewbit confidentially to P. C. Breagh, one midsummer evening,
after the early supper:
"My opinion is we are a-going to give a leg-up to this 'ere
'O'enzollern business, our Chief being--when England, Home, and Duty
permit him to indulge the weakness--a red-'ot admirer of a Certain
Person at Berlin. Who"--Mr. Knewbit's wink was infinitely
sagacious--"is said on the strict Q.T. to have put up Field-Marshal
Prim and the Government at Madrid to making the proposal to the young
gentleman. For the sake of giving a jolt-up to the elderly swell at
the Tuileries. We all have our ideal 'eroes," Mr. Knewbit added,
"and our Chief's partiality dates from his acting in an emergency as
Special War Correspondent for his own paper, durin' the
Prusso-Austrian War of 1866. It was at the Battle of----that name
always beats me----"
"Königgratz, perhaps?" suggested Carolan.
"Königgratz--when this 'ere Bismarck spurs his big brown mare up to
Colonel von Somebody to ask him why, seeing the 'eavy losses
occurring in his neighborhood from Austrian Artillery--he didn't ride
forward with his Cuirassiers to find out where the shells came from?
Took our Chief's fancy uncommon, that did, as the iron sugar-plums
was dropping freely in the neighborhood, and when he had rode on,
swearing at the Colonel like anything you can imagine--the old man
picked up a cigar-stump he'd pitched away, and keeps it to this hour
in the pen-tray of the silver inkstand the Proprietors presented him
with when he came home."
Said P. C. Breagh reflectively:
"It's the rule, invariably. Men love Bismarck or lampoon him--swear
by him--or swear at him. He's the devil or a demigod--there's no
alternative!"
"Good!" said Mr. Knewbit, leaning back in his Windsor chair, and
rubbing the ear of the ginger Tom with the toe of one of his carpet
slippers. "Tell us a bit more. Anything you can lay hold of. I
want to see him stand out a bit clearer in my mind."
"He gets his name from the Wendish--I've read in the _Kleine
Anekdotenbuch_," said P. C. Breagh, "that 'Bismarck' really means
'beware of the thorns.' And there's a golden sprig of
blackberry-bramble among the family quarterings, so perhaps there's
something in it, after all. An ancestor of his who lived in the
sixteenth century was a tailor--and a natural son of Duke Philip of
Hesse, by the way! Duke Philip was a lineal descendant of St.
Elizabeth of Hungary--who in her turn was descended from the Emperor
Charlemagne----"
"Lor' bless my soul!" said Mr. Knewbit, rubbing his knees.
"And he--this man you want to know about!--was born the younger son
of a Pomeranian country squire, and entered the University of
Göttingen in 1831. They say that he permitted study to interfere so
little with the more serious business of amusement that the name of
Mad Bismarck was given him then, and had stuck to him even when he
passed his examination as Referendar, and began to practice law in
the Municipal Court of Aix-la-Chapelle."
Mr. Knewbit, drinking in the information at every pore, nodded
"_More_"--and P. C. Breagh obliged him:
"He served his year as Volunteer at Potsdam in the _Jägers_ of the
Guard, and then went home to the paternal estate of Kneiphof, and
began sowing wild oats--acres and acres of them. The officers of the
garrison were a hard-drinking set of fellows, and the county Junkers
scorned to be outdone by them--so they hunted and shot and danced and
made love to the local beauties--they dined and supped and gambled
and fought duels. In fact, they did all the things men usually do
when they mean to have a high old time and don't care a damn for the
consequences," said P. C. Breagh, "and when you regularly hail
smiling morn with cold punch, beer, and corn-brandy, and wind up the
night with quart-beakers of champagne and porter, the consequences
must be----"
"A taut skin and a fiery eye next morning," interpolated Mr. Knewbit,
"and a tongue like a foul oven-plate or a burned kettle-bottom.
But--my stars!--what a constitution that man must have to be as hale
and as hearty, and as upright as they say he is, at fifty-five, and
with a family of grown-up sons! One wonders how his sweetheart ever
had the courage to marry such a--such a Ring-tailed Roarer.... But
Love's a thing you can't account for nohow."
"I have heard that the Fräulein Puttkammer's family objected to the
engagement," said P. C. Breagh, "but he seems to have got over their
prejudices in a way peculiarly his own. By betrothing himself
privately to the Fräulein first, and then calling openly to inquire
how the family felt about it," he added, in response to the
interrogative hoist of Mr. Knewbit's eyebrows, "and taking the
precaution, upon entering the room--to hug the young lady before all
her friends."
"The hugging would settle the thing--in Germany?" asked Mr. Knewbit.
"To a dead certainty."
"Without any male cousin or anything of that kind getting up and
calling the hugger out?" asked Mr. Knewbit dubiously.
"When a man is six feet two inches in height, is as strong as a bull,
and possesses a well-earned reputation as a fencer and pistol-shot,
even male cousins," returned P. C. Breagh, "are content to sit still
and let him hug."
"And then he married her and went into politics--and to-day, when the
Press says 'Prussia,' it means him!" cried Mr. Knewbit. "What our
Chief likes, and what fetches me!--is his cool owdaciousness. If
ever I chance to find myself in Berlin," he added, "before visiting
any State Collection of Art Objects ever brought together--I'd choose
to 'ave a look at that man!"
Said P. C. Breagh:
"I've seen the Iron Chancellor just once--in '67--passing through
Schwärz-Brettingen on his way to Berlin. It was in my first semester
at the University, and just after the Constitution of the North
German Bund was put into force by Royal Patent. The Social Democrats
had protested against the withdrawal of the Prussian garrison from
the independent State of Luxembourg--wanted to rush Germany into war
over the business, and they, as well as the _Ultramontaine_, having
plenty of followers among the students--both parties formed up on the
platform of the railway-station, and gave the Count three groans."
"How did he take 'em--the groans, I mean?'
"Rather as if he liked them, now I come to think of it. I can see
him now, in civil dress, black frock-coat, vest and trousers, with a
white choker something like a Lutheran clergyman's. And he jammed
his great black felt hat down on his head and thrust his huge body
half out of the carriage window. His eyes--fierce blue eyes heavily
pouched underneath, and blazing from under shaggy eyebrows--swept
over us as though we were a lot of squeaking mice--though he was
laughing in a good-tempered sort of way. And he shouted something in
dialect--they said it was a common Pomeranian proverb, '_Let not live
men fight over a dead dog!_'"
"Meaning----?"
"Meaning, one would suppose, that the Luxembourg garrison was a right
which had been given up as unimportant, and therefore was of no more
value than a dead dog, set against the cost of a new war."
"I'm obliged for your information," said Mr. Knewbit, pushing back
his chair and getting up to reach his brass tobacco-box from the high
kitchen mantelshelf. "In return I'll give you a bit o' news--which
may be of walley to you. You have been talking A.1 journalism, young
man, as different from the stuff you commonly put on paper as gold is
from this metal"--he tapped the brass tobacco-box--"and--my advice
is--For the future, write only of what you know; have felt, and heard
and seen!"
He sucked despairingly at the wooden pipe he was filling and, finding
it foul, stuck the stem in the spout of the boiling kettle--a
practice abhorred of Miss Ling--and left it to be cleaned as he
continued:
"Big things are going on in the world at this moment--things worth
watching and waiting for. Damme!--though I'm not a swearer as a
rule," said the little man, "if I don't wish I could change places
with something that has wings. The great man we have been a-talking
of is at this minute at his country-seat in Pomerania--that's the
estate he bought with the grant--sixty thousand pounds English, it
came to--the German Parliament voted him after the Prussian-Austrian
War. And the King of Prussia is at Ems, a-drinking the waters, and
the French Ambassador has been sent there by the Emperor Napoleon
III. to obtain a special audience, I'm told. And if you or me could
swop jobs with a fly on the wall at one place or the other--being a
German insect it would be likely to understand their crack jaw
language--me or you would be able to supply a leaded half-column for
Special Issue that would fairly set the world afire. See this!"
He took the short poker from the top of Miss Ling's kitchen-range,
and, pushing back his chair, rose and approached the wall, which was
destitute of pictures, and distempered in an economical brown color.
"Look here, I say!..." began P. C. Breagh.
"The breath of genius inflates me," said Mr. Knewbit, who had had
more than his allowance of beer at supper. "The impulse to prophesy
stimulates me. Look at this!"
He wielded the poker deftly as he spoke. And on the brown distemper
appeared in huge white letters:
WILL THERE BE WAR?
YES!
HOHENZOLLERN QUESTION NO DEAD DOG TO FRANCE!
GAUL, AND TEUTON RIPE FOR CONFLICT.
BISMARCK'S VIEWS!
"But, there, my inspiration gives out," said Mr. Knewbit, replacing
the poker on the range and shaking his head mournfully, "unless it
was possible to change with that fly on the wall--and take him at one
of his expansive, confidential moments--if he ever has any--neither
me nor any other man living will ever be able to give Bismarck's real
views upon this or any other subject dealing with Politics. Who's
this?"
The hall-door had slammed a moment previously. There had been a step
upon the oilcloth-covered basement staircase, and now it bore Miss
Ling's first-floor lodger, Herr von Rosius, the "quiet gentleman,"
who taught German to English students and English to Germans at the
Institute of Languages in Berners Street, W.--across the threshold of
her tidy kitchen, pipe in mouth and hat in hand.
"Meine Herren, I haf to beg your pardons! I seek the Fräulein
Ling----" he was beginning, when suddenly the tall, broad-shouldered
figure in the ill-fitting checked tweed clothes was petrified into
rigidity. The felt hat he had civilly removed dropped from his hand,
his jaws clenched on his inseparable meerschaum. Bolt upright,
crimson to the hair, and staring through his steel-rimmed spectacles,
he stood confronting the huge white letters that disfigured Miss
Ling's brown distemper.
"_Kreuzdonnerwetter! was ist dies?_" Carolan heard him mutter in his
own tongue. "_Es ist in jedermanns Mund!_" Then he recovered
himself almost instantly, picked up his hat, and gave good-evening in
his stiff, yet civil, way.