SIR: Your letter confirms me in the opinion I had formed. The intrusting of the great statue of Washington to a man like Siemering is a job and an outrage. It is clear that he is a mere pretender, since he has erected no statue as yet in Berlin. That statue of the Father of our Country ought to have been intrusted to native talent. I have a son fourteen years old who has already greatly distinguished himself. He has modeled a number of figures in butter and putty which all my friends think are most remarkable. I am satisfied that he could have produced a work which, by its originality and power, would have done honor to our country and to art. Yours very truly, —— ——.
Curious, too, was the following: One morning the mail brought me a large packet filled with little squares of cheap cotton cloth. I was greatly puzzled to know their purpose until, a few days later, there came a letter which, with changes of proper names, ran as follows:
PODUNK, ——, 1880.
SIR: We are going to have a fancy fair for the benefit of the —— Church in this town, and we are getting ready some autograph bed-quilts. I have sent you a package of small squares of cotton cloth, which please take to the Emperor William and his wife, also to Prince Bismarck and the other princes and leading persons of Germany, asking them to write their names on them and send them to me as soon as possible. Yours truly, —— ——.
P.S. Tell them to be sure to write their names in the middle of the pieces, for fear that their autographs may get sewed in.
My associations with the diplomatic corps I found especially pleasing. The dean, as regarded seniority, was the Italian ambassador, Count Delaunay, a man of large experience and kindly manners. He gave me various interesting reminiscences of his relations with Cavour, and said that when he was associated with the great Italian statesman, the latter was never able to get time for him, except at five o'clock in the morning, and that this was their usual hour of work.
Another very interesting person was the representative of Great Britain—Lord Odo Russell. He was full of interesting reminiscences of his life at Washington, at Rome, and at Versailles with Bismarck. As to Rome, he gave me interesting stories of Pope Pius IX, who, he said, was inclined to be jocose, and even to speak in a sportive way regarding exceedingly serious subjects.[14] As to Cavour, he thought him a greater man even than Bismarck; and this from a man so intimate with the German chancellor was a testimony of no small value.
[14] One of these reminiscences I have given elsewhere.
As to his recollections of Versailles, he was present at the proclamation of the Empire in the Galerie des Glaces, and described the scene to me very vividly.
His relations with Bismarck were very close, and the latter once paid him a compliment which sped far; saying that, as a rule, he distrusted an Englishman who spoke French very correctly, but that there was one exception— Lord Odo Russell.