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Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, Science, and Art, March 1885
Irish humor is not dead yet, but it is decaying or dormant; and if ever, in spite of the malign influence of the Gulf Stream, and the Nationalist Party, and a sense of their past wrongs, and race-hatred, and half-a-dozen other drawbacks, Ireland should recover her sanity and grow prosperous and contented, then, and not till then, may we expect to see her sons grow merry as well as wise, – unless, indeed, their sense of humor is entirely improved out of them in the process. Judging from the character of the men of Antrim, this is not impossible. But valuable as is the gift of humor, the harmony of Great Britain would not be too dearly bought by its sacrifice. —The Spectator.
PRINCE BISMARCK'S CHARACTER
The late general election in Germany showed results which have signally verified Prince Bismarck's calculations on the tendencies of modern democracy.
The Liberalists, who represent the opinions of the Manchester school, lost a great number of seats – no less than forty-four; while signal victories were won by the Conservatives, the Catholics, and the Socialists. The doctrines of the Liberals were treated with unequivocal contempt in the large cities, and several members of the party retained their seats only through the support grudgingly given to them by Socialist electors at the second ballot. At the first ballot the Socialists testified to their absolute hatred of the Liberals by voting for Conservative or Catholic candidates in constituencies where they were not strong enough to carry candidates of their own; but at the second ballot they dictated terms to the sorely mortified party whose overthrow they had caused, and agreed to assist Liberals who promised to vote for a repeal of the law against Socialists. The Liberals swallowed the leek and made the promise, though throughout the electoral campaign they had denounced the Socialists as the worst enemies of human progress. The Socialists, on their side, went to the polls as if obeying the injunction which Ferdinand Lassalle laid upon working-men eighteen months before his death27: “I have always been a Republican, but, promise me, my friends, that if ever a struggle should take place between the Divine Right Monarchy and the miserable Liberal middle-class, you will fight on the King's side against the bourgeois.”
German Conservatives have regretted that Lassalle died at least six years too soon, for it is supposed that if he had witnessed the triumphs of Bismarck's policy and the unification of Germany after the war of 1870, he would have used his influence over the working classes to make them trust the great and successful champion of their nation. This, however, is doubtful, for the post-mortem examination of Lassalle's body revealed that he had in him the germs of disease by which his intellect would have gradually deteriorated. He had become a voluptuary before he died, and had he lived a little longer he might simply have been dazzled by the conqueror s glory, and have lost his influence by accepting honors and favors too readily as the reward of his homage. On the other hand, if Lassalle had remained head-whole and heart-whole, Bismarck and he could not have lived together. Both giants, one must have succumbed to the other after some formidable encounter. The two spent an afternoon in company at the height of the Conflikt-Zeit, when Bismarck was wrestling with the Liberal opposition in the Prussian Parliament. They smoked and drank beer, laughed like old friends over the events of the day, talked long and with deepening earnestness over the world's future, and separated well pleased with each other. But Lassalle is believed to have shown his hand a little too openly to his host. There were points where the policy of the two blended, and one point of ultimate convergence might have been found if Lassalle's only object had been to seek it; but his personal ambition was at least equal to his zeal as a reformer. “He is a composer,” said Edward Lasker, “who will never think his music well executed unless he conducts the orchestra.”
It is well to remember what were the views of Lassalle about Germany, and how much they differed from those of his inferior successor in the leadership of the Socialists, Karl Marx. In a historical tragedy, “Franz von Sickingen,” which Lassalle published in 1859, he declared that “the sword is the god of this world, the word made flesh, the instrument of all great deliverances, the necessary tool of all useful undertakings.” In the 3d scene of Act III. Franz von Sickingen, the hero in whom Lassalle portrays himself, exclaims against the sordid ambition of petty princes, adding: “How are you to make the soul of a giant enter into the bodies of pigmies? … what we want is a strong and united Germany free from the yoke of Rome – an empire under an evangelical emperor.”28
This has been also the wish of Bismarck's life – and this wish he has realised; the obstacles he had to surmount before achieving success offer a most curious subject for study. The political difficulties have furnished matter for many books, but something remains to be said of the social difficulties.
“A conqueror's enemies are not all in front of him,” said Wallenstein, and we know Voltaire's apologue about that “grain of sand in the eye which checked Alexander's march.” Bismarck, like other great fighters, has had to shake off friends – real friends – tugging at his arm. He has had to foil boudoir cabals more powerful than Parliamentary majorities. He has got into those little scrapes which Lord Beaconsfield compared to sudden fogs in a park: “You may have the luck to walk straight home through them, or they may cause you to go miles out of your way and to miss anything, from a dinner to an appointment on which all your prospects depend.” Bismarck again has known the worry and agony of being unable to convince persons of thick head or of timorous conscience, whose co-operation was absolutely indispensable to him. Lord Chesterfield well said that the manner of a man's discourse is of more weight than the matter, for there are more people with ears to be charmed than with minds to understand. Bismarck is no charmer; he has had to contend with the disadvantage of cumbersome speech moved by slow thoughts, and of a temper inflammable as touchwood. For many years he was considered by those who knew him best to be more of a trooper than a politician.
Lord Ampthill once found him reading Andersen's story on the Ugly Duckling, which relates how a duck hatched a swan's egg, and how the cygnet was jeered at by his putative brethren, the ducklings, until one day a troop of lordly swans, floating down the river, saluted him as one of their race. “Ah,” observed Bismarck, “it was a long time before my poor mother could be persuaded that in hatching me she had not produced a goose.”
Bismarck was born in 1814, and at the age of seventeen went to the University of Göttingen. Here he joined a Verbindung– one of those student associations whose members wear flat caps of many colors, hold interminable Kneipen or beer-carousals, and fight rapier duels with the members of other clubs. Bismarck's Verbindung was select, containing none but the sons of noblemen, and it called itself by Kotzebue's name, out of antagonism to a Liberal club which was named after Karl Sand, Kotzebue's murderer.29 There hangs in one of the rooms at Varzin, a pencil sketch of young Otto Bismarck fighting with a “Sandist” who was the great swashbuckler of his party. Both combatants are dressed, as is still the custom for such meetings, in padded leather jackets, tall hats, iron spectacles with wire netting over the glasses, and they wear thick stocks covering all the neck and throat. Only parts of the face are exposed, the object of the fighters being not to inflict deadly injuries, but to slit each other's cheeks, or to snip off the tip of a nose. Bismarck's adversary, named Konrad Koch, was a towering fellow with such a long arm that he had all the advantage; and after a few passes he snicked Bismarck along the left cheek down to the chin, making a wound of which the scar can be seen to this day. But before the duel he had bragged that he would make the “Kotzebuan” wear the “Sandist” color, red – and, laughing triumphantly at the fulfilment of his threat, as he saw Bismarck drenched in blood, he so infuriated the latter that the Kotzebuan insisted on having another bout. This was contrary to the regulations of student duels, which always end with first blood, so Bismarck had to take patience until his cut was healed, and until he could prove his fitness to meet Koch again, by worsting a number of Sandists. The rapier duels were, and are now, regular Saturday afternoon pastimes, taking place in a gymnastic room, and the combatants on either side being drawn by lot; but it is a rule that, when a student has beaten an opponent, he may decline duelling with him again until this antagonist works his way up to him, so to say, by prevailing over all other swordsmen who may care to challenge him. Bismarck had to fight nearly half-a-dozen duels before he could cross swords with Koch again, but on this second occasion he dealt the Sandist a master-slash on the face and remained victorious.
This series of duels had some important consequences. A satirical paper called Der Floh (The Flea), which was published at Hanover, inserted an article against student fights, and pretty clearly designated young Bismarck as a truculent fellow. Bismarck went to Hanover, called on the editor of the paper, and holding up to his nose the cutting of the offensive article, requested him to swallow it. One version of the story says that the editor's mouth was forced open and that the article was thrust into it in a pellet; another version states that a scrimmage ensued and that the student, after giving and receiving blows and kicks, was hustled out of the office. But it is certain that the affair reached the ears of the Rector of Göttingen University, who sent for Bismarck and rebuked him in a paternal way for his pugnacity. Bismarck did not accept the reproof. To the Rector's astonishment he made an indignant speech, expressing his detestation of Frenchmen, French principles and revolutionary Germans, whom he called Frenchmen in disguise. He prayed that the sword of Joshua might be given him to exterminate all these. “Well, my young friend, you are preparing great trouble for yourself,” remarked the Rector, with a shake of the head; “your opinions are those of another age.” “Good opinions re-flower like the trees after winter,” was Bismarck's answer.
At this time, however, Bismarck's principles were not yet well set. The son of a Pomeranian squire, he had the Junker's abhorrence of Radicals, and from the study of J. J. Rousseau's “Emile,” he had derived the idea that all cities are nests of corruption. Though he execrated Rousseau's name, he was so far his disciple as to look upon country life as the perfect life; in fact, he was an idealist, and he was often sadly at a loss for arguments with which to refute the reasoning of political opponents. This tormented him, for he did not wish to be a man like that Colonel in Hacklander's “Tale of the Regiment,” who said of a philosopher: “I felt the fellow was going to convince me, so I kicked him down stairs.” From Göttingen he went to the University of Berlin, and there vexed his soul in many disputations, without acquiring the consciousness that he was growing really strong in logic. At last he heard in a Lutheran church a sermon which left a lasting impression on his mind. He has often spoken of it since as “my Pentecost.”
The preacher was treating of infidelity in connection with Socialist aspirations, and he observed that men could not live without faith in some ideal. Those men who reject the doctrine of immortality and of a world after this, delude themselves with visions of an earthly paradise. The Socialist's dream is nothing else; and his shibboleths of equality, fraternity and co-operation, are but a paraphrase of the Christian's “love one another.” Love is not necessary to the fulfilment of the Socialist's schemes than it is to the realisation of one's image of Heaven. A world in which there shall be no poor – in which each man shall receive according to his needs and work to the full measure of his capacities, having no individual advancement to expect from his industry, but content to see other men, less capable, fed out of the surplus of his earnings – what would this be but a paradise purged of all human passions – envy, jealousy, covetousness and sloth? Unless there were universal love, how could all the members of a Socialist community be expected to work to their utmost? And if every man did not work his best, so that the weak and the clumsy might live at the expense of the strong and the clever, how could the community exist?
This was the substance of the sermon which Bismarck heard, and those words “the Socialist's Earthly Paradise” have remained fixed in his memory ever since as a terse demonstration as to the inanity of Socialism. State Socialism is of course another matter, and very early in life Bismarck came to the conclusion that the wise ruler must try to make himself popular by humoring the fancies of the people, whatever they may be, and however they may vary. If he can divert the people's fancies towards the objects of his own preference, so much the better, and it must be part of his business to endeavor to do this. But if he cannot lead, he must seem to lead while letting himself be pushed onward. “The people must be led without knowing it,” said Napoleon in a letter which he wrote to Fouché to decline Barrère's offer of pamphlets extolling the Emperor's policy. Bismarck has described universal suffrage as “the government of a house by its nursery;” but he added: “You can do anything with children if you play with them.”
It has been one of the secrets of Bismarck's strength that he has never let himself be imposed upon by inflated talk about the “majesty of the People.” The Democracy has been in his eyes a mere multitude of mediocrities. “Cent imbéciles ne font pas un sage,” said Voltaire, and though La Rochefoucauld inclines to the contrary opinion in some of his well-known aphorisms,30 it is a provable fact that the only successful rulers are those who have had eyes enabling them to analyse the component elements of a crowd. As sportsmen delight in tales of the chase, and soldiers in anecdotes of war, so Bismarck has always taken a peculiar pleasure in stories showing how one man by presence of mind has mastered an angry mob, or outwitted it, or coaxed it into good humor. A sure way to make him laugh is to tell him such stories, and it must be added that he likes them all the better when they exhibit the bon enfant side of the popular character.
During the siege of Paris, whilst he was at Versailles, a pass was applied for by a relation of M. Cuvillier Fleury, the eminent critic and member of the French Academy. The Chancellor at once gave the pass, saying: “M. Fleury is an admirable man. I know a capital story about him.” The story was this: M. Fleury, who had been tutor to the Duc d'Aumale, was in 1848 Private Secretary to the Duchess of Orleans. When the revolution of February broke out, a rabble invaded the Palais Royal, where the Princess resided, and began smashing works of art, pictures, statuettes, and nicknacks. All the household was seized with panic except M. Fleury, who, throwing off his coat, smeared his face and hands with coal, caught up a poker, and rushed among the mob, shouting: “Here, I'll show you where the best pictures are.” So saying, he plied his poker upon furniture of no value, and, thus winning the confidence of the roughs, was able to lead them out of the royal apartments into the kitchen regions, where they spent their patriotic fury upon the contents of the larder and cellar. The sequel of this story is very droll, and Bismarck relates it with great relish. A few days after he had saved the Palais Royal, M. Fleury was recognised in the streets as the Duchess of Orleans's Secretary, and mobbed. He was being somewhat roughly hustled when a hulking water-carrier elbowed his way through the throng and roared: “Let that man be! He is one of the right sort. He led us to the pillage of the Palais Royal the other day!”
Bismarck once told Lord Bloomfield that he had the highest opinion of Charles Mathews, the actor. It turned out that this opinion was not based on any particular admiration for Mathews's professional talent, but on his coolness during a theatrical riot which Bismarck witnessed during a visit to London. Mathews was manager of a theatre, and for want of pay, part of his company had struck work. It was impossible to perform the piece advertised, so pit and gallery grew clamorous. In the midst of the hubbub, Mathews came before the curtain and jovially announced that, although he must disappoint the audience of the comedy which they had expected, he was ready to perform anything they pleased, provided only that he could satisfy the majority. A voice from the gallery sang out: “'Box and Cox.'” “Well, that is an excellent play,” said Mathews gravely, “but before my honorable friend puts a motion for its performance, I think he should explain to the audience why he prefers it to all others.” This turned a general laugh against the “mover,” who of course became bashful and could explain nothing. Mathews then made a chaffing little speech on the comparative merits of various plays, and at length withdrew, saying that as he could discern nothing like unanimity among the audience, he thought it best that they should all agree to meet him another day, but that meanwhile those who liked to apply for their money at the doors should have it. It seems that a number of men had come to the theatre on purpose to create a disturbance, but Mathews's banter put the whole audience into good humor, and the house was emptied without any riot.31
Bismarck has another favorite story about mobs. When the Grand Duke Constantine of Russia went as Viceroy to Poland in 1862, he was received in the streets of Warsaw with cries of “Long live the Constitution!” A Prussian, Count Perponcher, who was present, asked a vociferating Pole who “Constitutiona” was? “I suppose it's his wife,” answered the Pole. “Well, but he has children,” said Perponcher, “so you should cry: “Hurrah for Constitutiona and the little Constitutions,”” which the Pole at once did. Hearing Bismarck tell this anecdote – not for the first time probably – his son-in-law Count Rantzau, once said: “You can make a mob cry anything by paying a few men among them a mark apiece to start the shouting.” “Nein, but you need not waste your marks,“ demurred the Chancellor, ”es gibt immer Esel genug, die schreien unbezahlt.” (There are always asses to bray gratis).
The knowledge of how men can be swayed involves an accurate estimate of the influence which oratory exercises over them. Bismarck, as we have said, is not eloquent, and it is one of his maxims that a man of many words cannot be a man of action. “The best Parliamentary speeches” – he said, in conversation with M. Pouyer Quertier about M. Thiers – “are those which men have delivered to criticise other men's work, or to set forth what they themselves were going to do, or to apologize for what they have left undone.”
Action speaks for itself. “When I hear of ministers in parliamentary countries making long speeches to defend their policy, it always strikes me that there has been very little policy; and I am reminded of those big dishes of stew which our frugal German housewives serve up on Mondays with the remnants of Sunday's dinner – lots of cabbage and carrots, making a great show, with small scraps of meat.”
Action fascinates the masses as much as speech,32 for it demands courage, which is of all virtues the rarest.33 Pastor Stocker, of anti-Semitic renown, relates that Bismarck once asked him whether there were any text in the Bible saying, “All men are cowards?” “No, you are thinking of the text: 'The Cretans are all liars,'” said Stocker. “Liars – cowards, it comes to much the same thing,” answered Bismarck; “but it's not true only of the Cretans;” and he then asked Stocker whether the latter had met many thoroughly brave men. The Court pastor replied that there might be several definitions of courage; but Bismarck interrupted him with a boisterous laugh: “Oh, yes, the moral courage of letting one's face be smacked rather than fight a duel; I have met plenty of men who had that.”
Bismarck's own courage is that of a mastiff, and in early life it often got him into scrapes. We have remarked how some of these might have been detrimental to his whole career. Whilst he was doing his One Year Voluntariate in the Prussian Light Infantry, he paid a visit to Schleswig, which was then under Danish rule. One day, wearing his uniform, he was seated in a Brauerei when he overheard two gentlemen holding a political conversation and expressing extreme Liberal sentiments. With amazing impudence he walked up to their table and requested that: “If they must talk nonsense, they would use an undertone.” The two Schleswigers told the Junker to mind his own business, whereupon Bismarck caught up a beer-jug and dashed its contents in their faces. This affair caused very serious trouble. Bismarck was taken into custody and ordered out of the country. On joining his regiment he was placed under arrest again, and there was an interchange of diplomatic notes about him. He only escaped severe punishment through powerful intercession being employed at Court on his behalf.
Some years later when Bismarck had been appointed to the Legation at Frankfort (a post which he owed to the delight with which Frederick William IV. had read his bluff speeches in the Prussian Lower House), he was present at a public ball, where a member of the French Corps Législatif, M. Jouvois de Clancy, was pointed out to him as a noted fire-eater. This gentleman had been a Republican, but had turned his coat after the coup d'état. He was a big man with dandified airs, but evidently not much accustomed to society, for he had brought his hat – not a compressible one – into the ball-room; and in waltzing he held it in his left hand. The sight of the big Frenchman careering round the room with his hat extended at arm's length was too much for Bismarck's sense of fun; so, as M. Jouvois revolved past him, he dropped a copper coin into the hat. One may imagine the scene. The Frenchman, turning purple, stopped short in his dancing, led back his partner to her place, and then came with flashing eyes to demand satisfaction. There would have been assault and battery on the spot if friends had not interposed; but on the following day the Frenchman and the Prussian met with pistols and the former was wounded. Unfortunately for Bismarck, M. Jouvois knew Louis Schneider, the ex-comedian, who had become Court Councillor to Frederick William IV., and was that eccentric monarch's favorite companion. Schneider had but a moderate fondness for Bismarck, and he represented his act of gaminerie in so unfavorable a light to the King that his Majesty instructed the Foreign Office to read the newly appointed diplomatist a severe lecture.
Bismarck has never liked Frenchmen. His feelings towards them savor of contempt in their expression, but there is more of hatred than of genuine disdain in them, and much of this hatred has its source in religious fervor. Bismarck is a believer. The sceptical levity of most Frenchmen, the profanity and licentiousness of their literature, their want of reverence for all things, whether of Divine or of human ordinance – all this shocks the statesman, who still reads his Bible with a simple faith, and who has attentively noted the doom which is threatened to nations who are disobedient, During the Franco-German War, Countess Bismarck, hearing that her husband had lost the travelling-bag in which he carried his Bible, sent him another with this naïve letter: “As I am afraid you may not be able to buy a Bible in France, I send you two copies of the Scriptures, and have marked the passages in Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel which relate to France– also the verse in the Psalms which says that 'The unbeliever shall be rooted out.'”
