In 1867 the Crown Princess had drawn up a memorandum in which she laid it down that the best nurses would prove to be those who would combine the obedience of the Catholic Sisterhoods with a more scientific and comprehensive training. The Kaiserwerth Institution, where Florence Nightingale had gained valuable experience, did not give a sufficiently scientific education, and she came to the conclusion that a nursing school must be established in Berlin, where ladies, who should be given a distinguishing dress and badge, should be trained. The outbreak of the war of 1870 interrupted this scheme, but now that the pressing emergency was over, the Princess returned to her old scheme, the fundamental principle of which was that it should be carried out by educated and refined gentlewomen, preferably orphans. They were to have a three years’ theoretical and practical course, followed by a course of monthly nursing, and were to pass an examination to test their proficiency.
In the face of strong opposition, both on the part of the medical profession and of the middle classes in Germany, the Princess organised this society of trained lady nurses, who tended the sick poor in their own homes. The society began in a very quiet, humble way, but now you could not find a German, man or woman, who would not admit that this was a splendid addition to the philanthropic institutions of the country. The Princess also founded a society for sending the sick children of poor parents out of the larger towns into the country or to the seaside.
It need hardly be pointed out that in each of these cases the Crown Princess copied peculiarly British institutions, and this no doubt was partly why they aroused such indignant opposition.
All through her life one of the Princess’s mental peculiarities was that of thinking it impossible that any reasoning human being could object to anything that was obviously in itself a good and wise measure. To oppose a scheme simply because the idea of it had first originated in England or in France was something that she could not understand, so far removed was she from certain littlenesses of human nature, as well as from the dominion of national and racial prejudice.
The Crown Princess, and in this also she was warmly supported by her husband’s approval and sympathy, wished the new Empire to bestow more recognition on those Germans who had attained distinction in the arts of peace rather than of war. Encouraged by the knowledge that her work during the country’s wars had at last won a measure of national understanding and gratitude, she again did every thing in her power to break down the old Prussian Court barrier between the “born” and the “not born.” But, as might have been predicted, the Princess’s efforts were fairly successful as regards the latter, though not as regards the former.
To German women of all classes, the Princess’s interest in science seemed both eccentric and unfeminine. She had attended, when still a very young woman, some lectures given in Berlin by the great chemist, Hoffmann, who dedicated to her, in later years, his book, Remembrances of Past Friends—a compliment which pleased and touched her very much.
Her practical love of art was also regarded as uncalled for in a Royal lady and indeed unnatural in the mother of a large young family. She had a studio built in the palace, where she worked under the teaching of Professor Hagen, and she also studied under von Angeli. She was fond of visiting the studios of Berlin painters, particularly of the two Begas, of Oscar the painter, and Reinhold the sculptor, where she sometimes made studies as a student, and where she sometimes was herself the study. She and her husband were always great friends of the various artists. Among the names that recur constantly in this connection are those of Anton von Werner, to one of whose children the Crown Prince was godfather, and Georg Bleibtreu.
The New Palace in Berlin was nicknamed “The Palace of the Medicis,” because of the enthusiastic encouragement which its owners always gave to what they believed to be genius, or even talent. The Crown Princess not only entertained persons of distinction in art and literature, but, what was less easily forgiven her, any foreign scientists and artists of eminence who came to Berlin, were eagerly invited by her, generally to informal tea-parties.
But in time even the Princess realised that it was hopeless to try to blend the two elements. Unfortunately, she never took the trouble to hide her preference for people who interested and amused her to those who were merely “hoffahige.” The Prussian nobility were amazed and affronted that a Prussian princess should esteem so lightly the possession of numerous quarterings, and it was a bitter grievance that their future sovereign and his consort actually preferred the society of painters and musicians and similar persons whom they regarded as nobodies.
At the same time, she was always on cordial and pleasant terms with diplomatists, who as a rule combine the advantages of good birth with intelligence and culture and the most delightful of professions. For many years of her life her greatest personal friends were Lord Ampthill (at the time Lord Odo Russell) and his wife, a daughter of that Lord Clarendon who had expressed so high an admiration of the Princess Royal’s mental gifts.