especially reconnaissances on the part of the officers of the general
staff, had revealed the fact that the castle of Bellevue, near
Fresnois, was suited for the accommodation of the Emperor, and was not
yet occupied by the wounded. I reported this to his Majesty by
designating Fresnois as the place I should propose to your
Majesty for the meeting, and therefore referred it to the Emperor
whether his Majesty would proceed there at once, as a longer stay in
the little workman's cottage would be uncomfortable, and the Emperor
would perhaps need some rest. His Majesty readily assented, and I
accompanied the Emperor, who was preceded by an escort of honor from
your Majesty's Own Cuirassier Regiment, to the Castle of Bellevue,
where in the meantime the rest of the Emperor's suite and his
carriages, whose coming had, it appears, been considered doubtful, had
arrived from Sedan. General Wimpffen had also arrived, and with him,
in anticipation of the return of General von Moltke, the discussion of
the capitulation negotiations, which were broken off yesterday, was
resumed by General v. Podbielski in the presence of Lieut. Col. von
Verdy and the chief of General v. Wimpffen's staff, these two officers
acting as secretaries. I took part only in the commencement of the
same by setting forth the political and judicial situation in
accordance with the information furnished me by the Emperor himself,
as it was thereupon reported to me by Major Count von Nostitz, by
direction of General von Moltke, that your Majesty wished to see the
Emperor only after the capitulation of the army had been concluded--on
the receipt of which announcement the hope cherished by the opposite
party of securing other terms than those decided on was given up. I
then rode off in the direction of Chehery with the intention of
reporting the situation to your Majesty, met General v. Moltke on the
way, bringing the text of the capitulation approved by your Majesty,
and this, when we arrived with it at Fresnois, was accepted and signed
without opposition. The demeanor of General v. Wimpffen, as also that
of the other French generals, during the previous night was very
dignified, and this brave officer could not forbear expressing to me
how deeply he was pained that he should have been called upon,
forty-eight hours after his arrival from Africa, and half a day after
he had assumed command, to set his name to a capitulation so fatal to
the French arms, that, however, lack of provisions and ammunition, and
the absolute impossibility of any further defence imposed upon him, as
a general the duty of suppressing his personal feelings, as further
bloodshed could in no way alter the situation. The permission for the
officers to be released on parole was received with great
thankfulness, as an expression of your Majesty's intention not to hurt
the feelings of an army, which had fought bravely, beyond the point
demanded by the necessity of our political interests. General v.
Wimpffen also subsequently gave expression to this feeling in a letter
in which he thanks General v. Moltke for the consideration he showed
in conducting the negotiations.
v. BISMARCK.
* * * * *
EMPEROR WILLIAM I. TO BISMARCK
Berlin, March 21, '71.
With today's opening of the first German Reichstag after the
reëstablishment of a German Empire, the first public activity of the
same begins. Prussia's history and destiny have for a long time
pointed to an event which is now accomplished by its being summoned to
the head of the newly founded Empire. Prussia owes this less to her
extent of territory and her power, though both have equally increased,
than to her intellectual development and the organization of her army.
The brilliant position now occupied by my country has been attained
through an unexpectedly rapid sequence of great events during the past
six years. The work to which I called you ten years ago falls within
this time. How you have justified the confidence with which I then
summoned you lies open to the world. It is to your counsel, your
circumspection, your unwearying activity that Prussia and Germany owe
the world-historical occurrence which is embodied in my capital today.
Although the reward for such deeds is felt within you, I am
nevertheless urged and bound to express to you publicly and
permanently the thanks of the Fatherland and mine. I elevate you,
therefore, to the rank of a Prussian Prince (Fürst), which is to be
inherited always by the eldest male member of your family.
May you see in this distinction the undying gratitude of Your Emperor
and King
WILHELM.
* * * * *
EMPEROR WILLIAM I. TO BISMARCK
Coblenz, July 26, '72.
You will celebrate, on the 28th, a delightful family festival[24]
which the Almighty in His mercy has accorded you. I, therefore, may
and can not remain behind with my sympathy on this occasion, so will
you, and the Princess, your wife, accept my most cordial and warmest
congratulations on this great occasion. That both of you always gave
the first place, among the blessings showered on you by Providence, to
domestic happiness is something for which your prayers of thanksgiving
should ascend to heaven. Our and my prayers of thanksgiving, however,
go further, as they include thanks to God for having placed you at my
side at a decisive moment, and thus opened up a career for my
Government far exceeding thought and comprehension. You also will send
up your feelings of thankfulness that God graciously permitted you to
accomplish such great things. Both in and after all your labors you
always found comfort and peace in your home, and that gives you
strength in your difficult vocation. To preserve and strengthen you
for this is my constant solicitude, and I am glad to learn from your
letter through Count Lehndorff and also from the latter himself that
you will now think more of yourself than of the documents.
In remembrance of your silver wedding a vase will be handed you which
represents a grateful Borussia and which, fragile though the material
of which it is composed may be, shall one day express even in every
fragment what Prussia owes to you in its elevation to the height on
which it now stands.
Your truly devoted grateful King
WILHELM.
* * * * *
BISMARCK TO EMPEROR WILLIAM I.
Varzin, August I, '72.
Your Majesty greatly gladdened my wife and me by graciously evincing
sympathy in our family festival, and will, we trust, be graciously
pleased to accept our respectful thanks.
Your Majesty justly emphasizes happiness in the home as being among
the chief blessings for which I have to thank God, but part of the
happiness in my house, for my wife as well as for myself, comes from
the consciousness of your Majesty's satisfaction, and the exceedingly
gracious and kindly words of appreciation which your Majesty's letter
contains are more beneficial to afflicted nerves than is all medical
assistance. In looking back over my life I have such inexhaustible
cause to thank God for His unmerited mercy, that I often fear
everything will not go so well with me until the end. I recognize it
as an especially happy dispensation that God has called me on earth to
the service of a master whom I serve joyfully and with love, as the
innate fidelity of the subject never has to fear, under your Majesty's
leadership, coming into conflict with a warm feeling for the honor and
the welfare of the Fatherland. May God further give me strength to
carry out the will so to serve your Majesty that I obtain the
sovereign satisfaction, of which such a gracious testimony lies before
me today in the form of the autograph letter of the 26th. The vase,
which arrived in good time, is a truly monumental expression of Royal
favor, and at the same time so substantial that I may hope not the
"fragments" but the whole will be evidence to my descendants of the
gracious sympathy evinced by your majesty on the occasion of our
silver wedding.
The officers of the fifty-fourth regiment showed a kindly spirit of
comradeship by sending their band from Colberg. Otherwise, as is
usually the case in the country, we were confined to our family
circle; only Motley, the former American Ambassador in London, a
friend of my early youth, happened to be here on a visit. Besides her
Majesty the Queen, his Majesty the King of Bavaria, and their Royal
Highnesses Prince Carl and Friedrich Carl, and his Imperial Highness
the Crown Prince, honored me with telegraphic congratulations.
In health I am becoming slowly better; I have, it is true, done no
work whatever; but I hope to be able to report myself on duty in time
for the Imperial visits.
v. BISMARCK.
* * * * *
EMPEROR WILLIAM I. TO BISMARCK
Berlin, December 18, '81.
I must tell you of an extraordinary dream I had last night, which was
as clear as I now relate it.
The Reichstag met for the first time after the present recess. On
Count Eulenburg's entrance the discussion abruptly ceased; after a
long interval the President called on the last speaker to continue the
debate. Silence! The President thereupon declared the sitting
adjourned. This was the signal for great tumult and clamor. No order,
it was urged, should be bestowed on any member during the session of
the Reichstag; the Monarch may not be mentioned during the session.
The House adjourns till tomorrow. Eulenburg's appearance in the
Chamber is again greeted with hisses and commotion--and then I awoke
in such a state of nervous excitement that it was long before I
recovered, and I could not sleep from half-past four to half-past
six. All this happened in the House in my presence, as clearly as I
have written it down.
I will not hope that the dream will be realized, but it is certainly
peculiar. I dreamt it after six hours of quiet sleep, so it could not
have been directly produced by our conversation.
_Enfin_, I could not but tell you of this curious occurrence.
Your
WILHELM.
* * * * *
BISMARCK TO EMPEROR WILLIAM I.
Berlin, December 18, '81.
I thank your Majesty most respectfully for the gracious letter. I
quite believe that the dream owed its origin, not exactly to my
report, but to the general impression obtained during the last few
days from Puttkamer's[25] oral report, the newspaper articles, and my
report. The pictures we have in our minds when awake do not reappear
in the mirror of our dreams until our mental faculties have been well
rested by sleep. Your Majesty's communication encourages me to relate
a dream I had in the troublous days of the spring of 1863. I dreamt,
and I told my dream at once to my wife and to others the next morning,
that I was riding along a narrow Alpine path, to the right an abyss,
and to the left rocks; the path became narrower and narrower, until at
last my horse refused to take another step, and there was no room
either to turn or to dismount. I then struck the smooth rocky wall
with my riding whip in my left hand, and invoked God; the whip became
interminably long, and the wall of rock collapsed like a scene in the
theatre, opening up a wide pathway, with a view over hills and forests
such as one sees in Bohemia. I also caught sight of Prussian troops,
with their banners, and, still in my dreams, wondered how I could best
report this Quickly to your Majesty. This dream was realized, and I
awoke from it glad and strengthened.
[Illustration: FRANZ VON LENBACH EMPEROR WILLIAM I]
The bad dream from which your Majesty awoke nervous and agitated can
be realized only in so far that we shall still have many stormy and
noisy parliamentary debates, which must unfortunately undermine the
prestige of the Parliaments and seriously interfere with State
business. Your Majesty's presence at these debates is an
impossibility; and I regard such scenes as we have lately witnessed in
the Reichstag regrettable enough as a standard of our morals and our
political education, perhaps also our political qualifications, but
not as a misfortune in themselves: _l'excès du mal en devient le
remède_.
Will your Majesty pardon, with your accustomed graciousness, these
holiday reflections, which were suggested by your Majesty's letter;
for from yesterday till January 9th we have holidays and rest.
BISMARCK.
* * * * *
EMPEROR WILLIAM I. TO BISMARCK
Berlin, September 23, '87.
You celebrate on September 23, my dear Prince, the day on which,
twenty-five years ago, I called you into my Ministry of State, and
shortly afterwards gave the Premiership into your hands. The
distinguished services you had previously rendered to the Fatherland
in the most varied and important positions justified me in conferring
on you this highest post. The history of the last quarter of a century
proves that I did not err in my choice!
A shining example of true patriotism, of untiring activity often to
the utter disregard of your health, you have been indefatigable in
keeping a close watch on what were frequently overwhelming
difficulties in peace and war, and have used them to lead Prussia in
honor and glory to a Position in the world's history which had never
been dreamed of! Such achievements have been performed that the
twenty-fifth anniversary of September 23 must be celebrated with
thanks to God for placing you at my side in order to execute His will
on earth!
And I now once more impress these thanks on you, as I have so
frequently expressed and manifested them hitherto!
From a heart filled with thankfulness I congratulate you on the
celebration of such a day, and hope from my heart that your strength
may long be preserved unimpaired, to be a blessing to the Crown and to
the Fatherland! Your eternally grateful King and friend
WILHELM.
P.S.--In memory of the past twenty-five years I am sending you a view
of the building in which we have discussed and taken such weighty
resolutions which it is to be hoped will redound to the honor and
welfare of Prussia and of Germany.
* * * * *
BISMARCK. TO EMPEROR WILLIAM I.
Friedrichsruh, September 26, '87.
I thank your Majesty in deep respect for the gracious letter of the
23d inst., and for the gracious present of the picture of the palace
in which for so many years I have had the honor to make my reports to
your Majesty, and to take your Majesty's orders. The day received
especial consecration for me through the greeting in your Majesty's
name with which their royal Highnesses Prince William and Prince Henry
honored me. Even without this fresh proof of favor, the feeling with
which I greeted the twenty-fifth anniversary of my appointment as a
Minister was one of most cordial and respectful gratitude to your
Majesty. Every sovereign appoints ministers, but it is a rare
occurrence in modern times for a monarch to retain a Prime Minister
and to uphold him for twenty-five years, in troublous times when
everything does not succeed, against all animosity and intrigues.
During this period I have seen many a former friend become an
opponent, but your Majesty's favor and confidence have remained
unwaveringly with me. The thought of this is a rich reward to me for
all my work, and a consolation in illness and solitude. I love my
Fatherland, the German as well as the Prussian, but I should not have
served it with gladness if it had not been granted to me to serve to
the satisfaction of my King. The high position which I owe to your
Majesty's favor is based on, and has as its indestructible core, your
Majesty's Brandenburg liegeman and Prussian officer, and therefore I
am rendered happy by your Majesty's satisfaction, without which every
popularity would be valueless to me. * * * Besides many telegrams and
addresses from home and abroad, I received very gracious greetings and
congratulations on the twenty-third from their Majesties of Saxony and
Wurtemburg, from his Royal Highness the Regent of Bavaria, the
Grand-Dukes of Weimar, Baden, and Mecklenburg, and other rulers, and
from his Majesty the King of Italy and Minister Crispi. The two latter
touched politics, and were difficult to answer; as the text of their
letters may perhaps interest your Majesty, I have instructed the
Foreign Office to forward them.
I pray God that He may still longer grant me the pleasure of serving
your Majesty to your Majesty's satisfaction.
VOL. X-9 V. BISMARCK.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 21: Permission: Frederick A. Stokes Company, New York.]
[Footnote 22: Admiral Irminger was charged with the task of notifying
in Berlin and Vienna Christian IX.'s accession to the throne; he was
granted no audience in Berlin, and left that city on the 5th for
Vienna as, in Bismarck's opinion, the Emperor would more easily
receive him than the King of Prussia could.]
[Footnote 23: About £60,000.]
[Footnote 24: Silver wedding.]
[Footnote 25: Minister for the Interior, and Vice President of the
Ministry of State.]
* * * * *
FROM "THOUGHTS AND RECOLLECTIONS" [26]
TRANSLATED UNDER THE SUPERVISION OF A.J. BUTLER
Late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge
I
TO THE FIRST UNITED DIET
Left school at Easter, 1832, a normal product of our state system of
education; a Pantheist, and, if not a Republican, at least with the
persuasion that the Republic was the most rational form of government;
reflecting too upon the causes which could decide millions of men
permanently to obey _one man_, when all the while I was hearing from
grown up people much bitter or contemptuous criticism of their rulers.
Moreover, I had brought away with me "German-National" impressions
from Plamann's preparatory school, conducted on Jahn's drill-system,
in which I lived from my sixth to my twelfth year. These impressions
remained in the stage of theoretical reflections, and were not strong
enough to extirpate my innate Prussian monarchical sentiments. My
historical sympathies remained on the side of authority. To my
childish ideas of justice Harmodius and Aristogeiton, as well as
Brutus, were criminals, and Tell a rebel and murderer. Every German
prince who resisted the Emperor before the Thirty Years' war roused my
ire; but from the Great Elector onwards I was partisan enough to take
an anti-imperial view, and to find it natural that things should have
been in readiness for the Seven Years' war. Yet the German-National
feeling remained so strong in me that, at the beginning of my
university life, I at once entered into relations with the
_Burschenschaft_, or group of students which made the promotion of a
national sentiment its aim. But, after personal intimacy with its
members, I disliked their refusal to "give satisfaction," as well as
their want of breeding in externals and of acquaintance with the forms
and manners of good society; and a still closer acquaintance bred an
aversion to the extravagance of their political views, based upon a
lack of either culture or knowledge of the conditions of life which
historical causes had brought into existence, and which I, with my
seventeen years, had had more opportunities of observing than most of
these students, for the most part older than myself. Their ideas gave
me the impression of an association between Utopian theories and
defective breeding. Nevertheless, I retained my own private National
sentiments, and my belief that in the near future events would lead to
German unity; in fact, I made a bet with my American friend Coffin
that this aim would be attained in twenty years.
In my first half-year at Göttingen occurred the Hambach festival[27]
(May 27, 1832), the "festal ode" of which still remains in my memory; in
my third the Frankfort outbreak[28](April 3, 1833). These manifestations
revolted me. Mob interference with political authority conflicted with
my Prussian schooling, and I returned to Berlin with less liberal
opinions than when I quitted it; but this reaction was again somewhat
mitigated when I was brought into immediate connection with the workings
of the political machine. Upon foreign politics, with which the public
at that time occupied itself but little, my views, as regards the War of
Liberation, were taken from the standpoint of a Prussian officer. On
looking at the map, the Possession of Strasburg by France exasperated
me, and a visit to Heidelberg, Spires, and the Palatinate made me feel
revengeful and militant. In the period before 1848 succeed in laying a
coat of European varnish over the specifically Prussian bureaucrat. How
these observations acted in practice is clearly shown when we go through
the list of our diplomatists of those days: one is astonished to find so
few native Prussians among them. The fact of being the son of a foreign
ambassador accredited to Berlin was of itself ground for preference. The
diplomatists who had grown up in small courts and had been taken into
the Prussian service had not infrequently the advantage over natives of
greater assurance in Court circles and a greater absence of shyness. An
especial example of this tendency was Herr von Schleinitz. In the list
we find also members of noble houses in whom descent supplied the place
of talent. I scarcely remember from the period when I was appointed to
Frankfort anyone of Prussian descent being appointed chief of an
important mission, except myself, Baron Carl von Werther, Canitz, and
Count Max Hatzfeldt (who had a French wife). Foreign names were at a
premium: Brassier, Perponcher, Savigny, Oriola. It was presumed that
they had greater fluency in French, and they were more out of the
common. Another feature was the disinclination to accept personal
responsibility when not covered by unmistakable instructions, just as
was the case in the military service in 1806 in the old school of the
Frederickian period. Even in those days we were breeding stuff for
officers, even as high as the rank of regimental commander, to a pitch
of perfection attained by no other state; but beyond that rank the
native Prussian blood was no longer fertile in talents, as in the time
of Frederick the Great. Our most successful commanders, Blücher,
Gneisenau, Moltke, Goeben, were not original Prussian products, any more
than Stein, Hardenberg, Motz, and Grolmann in the Civil Service. It is
as though our statesmen, like the trees in nurseries, needed
transplanting in order that their roots might find full development.
Ancillon advised me first of all to pass my examination as
_Regierungs-Assessor,_ and then, by the circuitous route of
employment in the Zollverein to seek admittance into the _German_
diplomacy of Prussia; he did not, it would seem, anticipate in a scion
of the native squirearchy a vocation for European diplomacy. I took
his hint to heart, and resolved first of all to go up for my
examination as _Regierungs-Assessor_.
The persons and institutions of our judicial system with which I was
in the first instance concerned gave my youthful conceptions more
material for criticism than for respect. The practical education of
the _Auscultator_ began with keeping the minutes of the Criminal
Courts, and to this post I was promoted out of my proper turn by the
_Rath_, Herr von Brauchitsch, under whom I worked, because in those
days I wrote a more than usually quick and legible hand. On the
examinations, as criminal proceedings in the inquisitorial method of
that day were called, the one that has made the most lasting
impression upon me related to a widely ramifying association in Berlin
for the purpose of unnatural vice. The club arrangements of the
accomplices, the agenda books, the levelling effect through all
classes of a common pursuit of the forbidden--all this, even in 1835,
pointed to a demoralization in no whit less than that evidenced by the
proceedings against the Heinzes, husband and wife, in October, 1891.
The ramifications of this society extended even into the highest
circles. It was ascribed to the influence of Prince Wittgenstein that
the reports of the case were demanded from the Ministry of Justice,
and were never returned--at least, during the time I served on the
tribunal.
After I had been keeping the records for four months, I was
transferred to the City Court, before which civil causes are tried,
and was suddenly promoted from the mechanical occupation of writing
from dictation to an independent post, which, having regard to my
inexperience and my sentiments, made my position difficult. The
first stage in which the legal novice was called to a more independent
sphere of activity was in connection with divorce proceedings.
Obviously regarded as the least important, they were entrusted to
the most incapable _Rath_, Prätorius by name, and under him were
left to the tender mercies of unfledged _Auscultators_, who had to
make upon this _corpus vile_ their first experiments in the
part of judges--of course, under the nominal responsibility of Herr
Prätorius, who nevertheless took no part in their proceedings. By way
of indicating this gentleman's character, it was told to us young
people that when, in the course of a sitting, he was roused from a
light slumber to give his vote, he used to say, "I vote with my colleague
Tempelhof"--whereupon it was sometimes necessary to point out to him
that Herr Tempelhof was not present.