Johann von Bloch, who was living with his family at the Hotel Westminster, had invited us to stay at the same hotel as his guests. Now I made the acquaintance of our friend’s wife and daughters. Frau von Bloch looked like her eldest daughter’s sister, so similar and so young. This daughter is the wife of Herr von Koszielski, formerly so well liked at the Berlin court. He was known popularly as “Admiralski.” Bloch had good reason to be proud of his family. It would be difficult to imagine a bouquet of prettier, wittier, or more elegant women than the four that formed his entourage.
The Congress was opened by Minister Millerand. Frédéric Passy was honorary president; Professor Charles Richet presided.
Madame Séverine was a new apparition. I had often read, in the French papers, articles by this talented woman, and had admired the brilliancy of her style, and especially the greatness of her heart; for almost always, when she wrote her chronicles, there was some distress to reveal and to alleviate, some past wrong to right, ideas of freedom and gentleness to defend. Now I made her personal acquaintance and heard her speak. One who has never listened to Madame Séverine’s extempore speeches has no notion to what a height of passion and poetry eloquence can rise. Madame Séverine is also interesting outwardly. She was then forty-three years old, but her hair was already perfectly white—the result of the tragedies of life which she had passed through. She had dark, flashing eyes, vivacious play of expression, and a neat figure. Toward the close of her fascinating speech she greeted me as notre sœur d’Autriche, and when she finished,—both of us standing on the platform,—in my emotion I threw my arms around her, and that elicited a storm of jubilation in the hall.
We made a flying visit to the Exposition under the guidance of Charles Richet. All expositions are alike. The things that especially remained in my memory were the Eiffel Tower, the trottoir roulant, the tiny corner in the pavilion in which our Bern Bureau and its literature were displayed, and the gigantic hall in which army and navy had heaped up their latest appliances for destruction.
Richet invited us also to a small dinner given for a few friends. D’Estournelles sat next me. We talked about the general lack of information on the part of the public regarding the Hague Conference, and he told me that he had delivered explanatory lectures on this subject in various cities in France.
“Oh, if you could only come to Vienna and give such a lecture!”
“You need only to invite me,” he replied; “I will render you any service that you may require of me.”
I made him shake hands on it.
At Paris during that time I formed a new bond of friendship which has proved very valuable to me. An English lady, the daughter of a sea captain, earning her living in Paris by giving English lessons, had asked to be presented to me in the Congress hall. I exchanged a few pleasant words with her and then turned to others. The following day she wrote me a letter. This was filled with such enthusiasm, with such devotion to my cause and my person, that I was captivated and asked the writer to come to see me. Miss Alice Williams—for that was her name—came immediately and brought me a bunch of roses. But more than flowers, she brought me a soul—a soul overflowing with the ideals that are precious to me. As the daughter of an English “sea-bear,” and rather chauvinistically educated and inclined, she had been, so she told me, converted by reading Die Waffen nieder, and from that time forth had been a devoted adherent. In the course of years she has proved that such was the case. I am deeply indebted to her for her friendship, her wise suggestions, her energy, and her activity.
After our return to Harmannsdorf I devoted myself once more to literary occupations. I wrote the novel Marthas Kinder, the sequel to Die Waffen nieder. My Own also again resumed his labors and wrote on his novel Im Zeichen des Trusts. But in spite of this we did not neglect our work for the Unions and our journalistic writing. I took especial pains to make the newspaper public acquainted with the Hague business, which now threatened to be entirely forgotten in the excitement of Chinese and South African events.