lished the supremacy of France in Europe on so firm a basis that, in spite of some appalling disasters, it lasted for more than two hundred years. The work of Bismarck is not likely to be less enduring. As he himself long ago expressed it, if Germany were only once fairly in the saddle, she would soon learn to ride. Of the four great men who established the new German Empire, he was the last to remain in laborious service. Field-Marshal Roon, the famous minister of war-a man not less remarkable for purity and nobility of character than for administrative genius was the first of them to pass from the scene. The Emperor William was the next to follow. Advancing years and the exigencies of the public service forced Field-Marshal Moltke to retire from an office in which he won a foremost place among the greatest soldiers of history. Prince Bismarck was the youngest of the group, and its most striking member. Without his indomitable courage, his strength of will, his directness of mind, his profound knowledge of men, it would have been impossible for the king to accomplish the military reforms which were absolutely necessary for the security of the country and the efficiency of the army. Moreover, it is at least doubtful whether the results of the Prussian victories in 1866 would have been so far-reaching if, after the Austrian power had been shattered at Königgrätz, the Prussian State had not been guided by a man of such diplomatic skill, sound common-sense, accurate historical knowledge, and power of gauging the forces of European life.

Otto Edward Leopold von Bismarck comes of good old Brandenburg stock. His family have been settled in the Mark since the fourteenth century. In the year 1345 the Markgraf Lewis the Elder conferred the castle of Burgstall on the Bismarck of that day, and his descendants lived there for many generations. They exchanged this property with John George, the seventh Elector of Brandenburg, in 1562 for the estate of Schönhausen, where on the 1st of April, 1815, the man was born who was destined to make their ancient name illustrious forever. The Bismarcks belonged to that sturdy race of Prussian squires who possess all the strength of the English Puritan without his peculiar narrowness, and who are remarkable for high character, firm prin

ciples, straightforward and candid minds, and, above all, uncompromising loyalty and proud submission to the House of Hohenzollern. When young Otto von Bismarck was six years old, he was sent to school at Berlin. After passing his Abiturienten-Examen he went to the university and threw himself heartily into student life. He did not, however, neglect the cultivation of his mind. From his boyhood he was devoted to the study of geography, and often tells his friends of the strange impression which the map of Germany used to inake on him; as he looked at the thirty-nine states into which his country was divided, he could not help thinking what a great work it would be to bind them together without destroying their several characteristic traditions. The study of history was pursued with eagerness. There was not a country in Europe with whose rise, development, and peculiar institutions he did not make himself thoroughly acquainted when still a very young man. He insists continually on his great obligations to Ranke for his intellectual development, loses no opportunity of praising the political sagacity of that historian, and gives as an instance of it the famous memorandum on the Eastern Question which Ranke wrote for Frederick William the Fourth. His knowledge of English literature is very great, and although he speaks it with a slight accent and a somewhat old-fashioned pronunciation, his mastery of our language is complete. Not only is he perfectly acquainted with the chief works of our great poets, he is almost equally at home in obscure and forgotten works of second-rate writers. He has been known to quote in English on the spur of the moment some twenty lines of Lalla Rookh, aud an English statesman is fond of telling that when he was in Berlin some few years ago the great Chancellor expressed his regret that the pressure of official business had made it impossible for him to make himself as well acquainted as he should like to be with the works of living English poets.

When the golden days of university life came to an end, he entered the Civil Service, and worked for a couple of years at Berlin, at Aix-la-Chapelle, and Potsdam. In 1838 he performed his obligatory military service, and when that was over undertook the management of the estate of

He became known to the country as an excellent landlord, who took great and intelligent interest in all agricultural pursuits. He was a passionate sportsman and a splendid horseman. He could use the pistol with such skill as to be able to decapitate ducks as they swam in the pond at Kniephof. He has remained all his life a firstrate shot. A story is told that when he was Ambassador at St. Petersburg he went out bear-hunting one day with six other gentlemen. Bismarck killed the first bear that appeared. Soon another came from the bushes and trotted toward the party, one of whom fired and missed; the bear made for Bismarck, who waited till the animal came quite close, then took steady aim and stretched him at his fect. Another bear then broke cover; one of the gentlemen fired twice without effect, then Bismarck fired and killed the animal when it was just about to attack the gentleınan who had discharged his gun. On another occasion, besides stags and roedeer, he shot five elks, one of which measured 6 ft. 8 in. to his withers. His feats of horsemanship were not less remarkable, although he got several severe falls, one of them of a very serious character. His powers of endurance in the saddle were exceptionally great. At the battle of Königgrätz he was on his horse for more than twelve hours, and the day after Sedan he was riding from six o'clock in the morning till midnight.

The year 1847 marks a turning-point in the life of Bismarck. His political career began. On the 3rd of February Frederick William the Fourth called together a United Diet, composed of the representatives of the Provincial Councils established by King Frederick William the Third. Bismarck became a member of this Assembly, and delivered his maiden speech on the 17th of May. It is worthy of notice that his first appearance as an orator was for the purpose of attacking one of those popular superstitions every where common. It used to be industriously circulated in Germany, and thoughtlessly accepted as true by many, that the motive power of the patriotic movement of 1813 was a desire for parliamentary institutions. Bismarck, who had lived in the country and was well acquainted with people of all classes, had often heard mel

the French were in the country. Among his own friends and acquaintances there were many who had to struggle with actual poverty in those years. I have myself known two gentlemen, bearers of great Prussian names, one of them still alive, who can remember when every head of cattle was driven from their fathers' park, when there was no horse of any description left in the stable to do the most necessary work on the home farm, and when their families were able to afford no better light than that of tallow candles. Four-fifths of the estates of the country were unable to meet their rates and taxes. When the French army passed through on its way to Moscow, it had not only to be supplied with food during its march, but each soldier had to be provided with twenty-one days' rations as it crossed the Russian frontier. In the province of East Prussia almost every vehicle was sequestrated, and in that province and Lithuania 71,161 horses were seized for the army. The story of the French occupation in Prussia may be read in the pages of Duncker and Droysen, and Bismarck was perfectly justified in contending that hatred of the foreigner, and not any desire to establish a Parliament at Berlin, was the mainspring of that famous movement, which was the first step toward the unity of Germany.

Bismarck made the first of his real weighty speeches on the 22nd of March, 1849, against the proposal to grant an amnesty to those who had taken part in the rebellion of the previous year. He protested against any parley with treason, insisted that to amnesty law-breakers was sure to weaken respect for law in the minds of the people, and sneered at the weak sentimentality which wept over the punishment of fanatical rebels, as if they were suffering in a sacred cause. His next important public utterance was on the 10th of April following, when he conclusively showed the unpractical character of the constitution elaborated at Frankfort by persons who he truly said had learned nothing since the publication of Rousseau's Contrat Social. In this speech, which is full of prophetic wisdom, he showed how ruinous it would be for the Prussian Monarchy to have anything to do with the Frankfort Constitution, with its suspensive veto, its widely extended suf

frage, and the ludicrously inadequate representation it accorded to Prussia. His next speech of weight was a defence of the Manteuffel Government for the Convention of Olmütz. The Elector of Hesse had appointed Hassenpflug as minister, and overthrew the constitution. The Government of the King of Prussia committed itself to maintain the rights of the people. The restored Diet at Frankfort, under the influence of Austria, took the side of the Elector. A large Austrian army was concentrated in Bohemia, and placed under the command of Radetzky. Prussian troops stood in the presence of Austrians and Bavarians in Hesse. Shots had been exchanged, and war seemed inevitable. The relations between the Government of Berlin and the Court of St. Petersburg were at that moment strained to the utmost, owing to differences of opinion on the Schleswig-Holstein question. No one could trust Louis Napoleon, who would probably have profited by the war to seize Prussian territory on the left bank of the Rhine, where the population at that time were still in sympathy with France, as we know on the undoubted authority of recently published letters of Field-Marshal Roon. All of a sudden Count Brandenburg, the Prime Minister of Prussia, was sent to Warsaw to see the Emperor Nicholas. The Czar convinced him of the necessity of yielding to the demands of Austria as regards the Hessian question, and of leaving the Elbe Duchies to Denmark. He came back to Berlin and urged this policy on the King. His advice was followed, and on the 29th of November, 1850, a convention was signed at Olmütz, in which Prussia gave way to Austria and Russia on every point of importance.

There was the greatest possible indignation in Prussia, and it required no small amount of courage to defend this policy. Bismarck, however, stepped into the breach and delivered a most powerful oration, in which he insisted on the great responsibility men incurred who drove a country lightly into war. He asked those who criticised the Government whether, after the sacrifices the nation would have to make if a warlike policy had been adopted, they really expected the people would be content when, in return for these sacrifices, they were told that Bayrhofer was minister in Hesse, and that Hassen

pflug had been sent about his business. Alluding to the cry which had been got up that the honor of Prussia was tarnished, he remarked, Prussian honor, according to my conviction, does not consist in Prussia playing the part of Don Quixote in Germany to please the offended vanity of parliamentary celebritics. Prussian honor consists in keeping clear of all connection with revolution and the forces of anarchy." Shortly after this speech Frederick William the Fourth appointed him Prussian representative to the Diet of Frankfort. The action of Bismarck in his new capacity is told most fully'in the publication of Poschinger, which contains the confidential reports and State papers which he wrote for his Government. He devoted himself entirely to counteract the policy of Austria, but what is of more interest to this country is the attitude he took up regarding the Crimean war. In the year 1854 the Emperor Nicholas was at the height of his power. He had put down the revolution in Austria, and order reigned in Poland. The Ottoman Porte had, however, incurred his displeasure for having given Polish and Hungarian refugees positions in the Turkish army. He made up his mind that the time had come to put an end to the government of the Sultan in Europe, and the Crimean war broke out.

From the very beginning the Eastern question had excited the keenest interest in Berlin. Those who desired German unity, who mourned over Olmütz and the loss of Schleswig-Holstein, saw with delight any symptom of Russian humiliation. They imagined a golden opportunity was offered to Prussia to put herself at the head of Germany. A group of distinguished men, like Count Goltz and Count Pourtales and the Privy Councillors Bethmann-Hollweg and Mathis, urged strongly an alliance with the Western Powers, and their organ in the press, the Preussische Wochenblatt, published very able articles in this sense. On the other hand, the Prime Minister, Manteuffel, held different views, and so did Gencral Count Dohna, Count AlvenslebenErxleben, and others who were special favorites with the King. The latter were Russian sympathizers pure and simple, full of enthusiasm for the sovereign who had done so much to crush the revolution of 1848.

In this state of affairs Bismarck thought

himself justified in offering his opinion. He wrote several letters on the general position of Prussia, which will be found. in Poschinger's work, and which explain much of his subsequent policy. In the first place he expressed entire concurrence with those who desired to avoid a war with Russia. He pointed out that the Western Powers ran no real danger. The contrary would be the case with Prussia. If she joined France and England she would have to bear the whole brunt of the war, and had nothing to gain in the not improbable event of military success. Пe insisted that his country had little to fear from the progress of Russia in the East. Her real enemy was Austria. If they decided in Berlin to join in the war, the interests of the nation dictated that they should take the side against Austria so as to force that Power to given the Hohenzollern monarchy elbow-room in German affairs. Bismarck himself was strongly in favor of neutrality, and this advice prevailed with the King.

These letters from Frankfort show that Rismarck was always a firm advocate of the policy of a good understanding with Russia. Although he has many English friends, and in one of these letters frankly says that after his own land there is no country to which he is so attached as Eng. land, yet he has always had a profound mistrust of the policy of an English alliance. He has never forgotten, and constantly alludes to, the conduct of England in deserting Frederick the Great. His confidence has not been strengthened by his observations of English policy in his own time. This idea of holding to the Russian alliance found expression some years later, after he became Prime Minister. When the Crimean war broke out the Poles in London and Paris began to show great signs of activity. Some of them, followers of General Mieroslawski, hoped for a democratic republic and the destruction of Western culture. More moderate men gathered round Prince Adam Czartoryski, the patriarch of the Polish exiles, who was a candidate for the throne should Poland become an independent kingdom. Nothing of importance, however, took place during the war. When it was over the French Emperor turned his attention to the expulsion of the Austrians from Italy, which task occupied him from the campaign of Solferino

in 1859 till the cession of Venice to him by Austria in 1866. For this purpose it was clear that Russia must not be offended, and the notion of restoring Poland by force of arms was out of the question. He maintained, however, his interest in the country, and when he met the Emperor Alexander in Southern Germany in 1857, he urged that Russia should make Poland every possible concession consistent with her own interests. Alexander was prepared to do anything that was for the benefit of his subjects; and his chancellor was ready to make great sacrifices for the French alliance, through which he hoped to get back for his country the foremost position in Europe, and ultimately to tear up the treaty which prevented Russian ships of war from cruising in the waters of the Black Sea. The Government of St. Petersburg set to work to introduce some reforms, but it made the capital mistake of supposing that improvement in administration was what the Poles wanted. There were at that time two parties formed in Poland, known by the name of the White and the Red. The first party was mainly composed of the great aristocracy, who desired a separate administrative system, the restoration of the constitution of 1815, and a national army. By this means they hoped to obtain gradually complete independence. The Red party were impatient at delay, and were anxious for an immediate appeal to arms. In January 1863 numbers of young men began to assemble in a wood a few miles from Warsaw, and similar bands were formed near Lublin, Plock, and other towns. On the night of the 23rd some small Russian garrisons were surprised, and about a hundred soldiers murdered in their beds or burned in the barracks. The country rose in revolution. Prince Gortschakoff was unmoved, for he believed, like all the world in St. Petersburg, that the rebellion would soon be crushed. In that case the Marquis Wielopolski, who was governing Poland, would become all powerful. This nobleman, undoubtedly the greatest intellect Poland could boast of, desired a good understanding between his own country and Russia, with a view to counteract German influence, which he positively hated. He and his friends, who possessed great influence over the Grand Duke Constantine, desired that Poland should become an indepen