When he dismissed Stambuloff, he remarked, “Henceforth I mean to govern as well as to rule.” It was much what the Kaiser said when he got rid of Bismarck, but Ferdinand had a counsellor of greater experience than any of those who were called to the assistance of William II when Bismarck had been humiliated. He had always his wise old mother at his elbow, the shrewdest and most disinterested adviser that any princeling was ever blessed with. And, by following the advice of his mother, he contrived to convert his very temporary occupation of the Bulgarian throne into a permanency unexpected in any of the European Chancelleries.
Ferdinand was aided in his scheme of governing Bulgaria by the very mixed state of the political parties in that country. Of these parties there are no less than ten, a circumstance which in itself is most favourable to the underhand methods which are a second nature to the man who calls himself the Czar of the Bulgarians. But the foreign policy of this parvenu principality involved the exercise of an immensity of tact and discretion, and Ferdinand found the experience, the ability and the connexions of his mother more than invaluable; they were indispensable.
It must be said for him that he followed implicitly the instructions of this counsellor in petticoats, even in the matter of his marriage. She enabled him to play off the influence of Russia against the growing pretensions of Austria, and to keep Bulgaria in a position to benefit, whatever the differences between the pair might be.
But princesses cannot live for ever, not even such fine and wise old ladies as the Princess Clementine. In 1907 she died, and among the many mourners who gathered at her graveside there was no one who had such good cause to regret her loss as the son whom she had put on a throne, and kept there in the face of the most discouraging circumstances.
Just at this time there was a new and potent influence making itself felt in Austria. The Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne, had recovered all the influence he had lost by his chivalrous adherence to his morganatic bride. She too, by the exercise of the wonderful qualities that had won her the whole-souled love of this remarkable man, had gained the admiration and esteem of the aged Emperor. The influence of the heir to the throne ran through all the affairs of Austria, and it was Ferdinand’s lot to come under that powerful influence at the very time when he was deprived of his loving and long-tried adviser, the woman who had shaped his life to success.
Austria to-day remains the sole Power of Europe where the old order still reigns. But in the year 1907 the old Emperor, and the Council chamber where he presided, was swayed by the most remarkable exemplar of the new order that Europe then knew. Abler than the Kaiser, and equally as ambitious and unscrupulous politically, Franz Ferdinand had formed schemes for the aggrandisement of Austria equally as far-reaching as those which William had initiated for the expansion of Germany.
While the Kaiser was dreaming of world politics, the Archduke was maturing schemes to turn the Adriatic into an Austrian lake. They included the disappearance of such States as Serbia and Montenegro, and threatened in the same way the existence of Bulgaria. The extinction of the dual kingdoms in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the creation of a military and naval power equal in might to Germany itself, were all parts of the ambitious design of this man.
His silent power, the mysterious but pervading influence he exercised in all parts of the Austrian Empire, his rapid marshalling of all the ablest men of the country to his side, deeply impressed Ferdinand, who was in the closest touch with Austrian affairs. His visits to Vienna became more frequent, and the Count de Murany and Franz Ferdinand spent much time together.
At this time Ferdinand decided to marry once more, and as his mother was no longer there to control his choice, it fell upon a German bride, who was of the Lutheran faith. The Princess Eleonore of Reuss-Koestritz was worthy of a better man than Ferdinand of Bulgaria. At this time she was nearly fifty years of age, and her most memorable exploit had been her devoted service to the Russian wounded in the war with Japan. That service to humanity she has since amplified by Red Cross work among the wounded Bulgarians that entitles her to the respect and admiration of the whole world.
Her brother, Prince Henry of Reuss, had been one among the many princes to whom the Bulgarian throne had been offered in vain before that scene in an Austrian beer garden took place, as related in the opening chapter of this narrative. The connexion was very valuable to Ferdinand; in fact, it was a proof of his rise in life that such a house and such a Princess would condescend to him.