I return to my Budapest diary.
September 23. Yesterday, as on the eve of the Congress, a great soirée in the Parkklub, cards of invitation for which were sent out by Koloman von Szell. This clubhouse is really beautiful—massive, splendid, with English comfort. All the members of the Conference are present; we have a joyous meeting with old acquaintances,—Stanhope, Beernaert, Cremer, Descamps, and others. Many ladies of Hungarian society and the wives of the members of the Conference are there. Almost all the Hungarian ministers, Baron Banffy at their head; Counts Eugen Zichy, Albert Apponyi, Szapary, Esterhazy, and many journalists and artists. Our old Passy is closely surrounded. Maria Louise looks wondrously pretty and, it seems to me, is turning the heads of several of the Magyars! Also that northern maiden, Ranghild Lund, the beauty of the conference days at Rome, is here and arousing much admiration. John Lund comes up to me and brings me a message from Björnson. I make the acquaintance of a young Countess Kalnoky (unmarried and very independent), and her free and broad-minded views greatly appeal to me. Then we are joined by a Countess Forgac; she has much to tell us of Empress Elisabeth, among other things the following: Some spirit communications had been made (presumably at a spiritualistic séance) to the effect that the place where the Crown Prince Rudolf is staying is worse than hell and no prayers are of any avail; the Empress is full of despair about it. Melinda Karolyi and I exchange glances equivalent to many exclamation marks.
Servants bring round delicious edibles and drinkables. A journalist remarks, “One need not be a member of a peace league to find this sort of international meeting decidedly pleasanter than those where bombs and grenades are served.”
To-day the opening session takes place in the House of Magnates. Before the building, on the edge of the street, fastened together with garlands of flowers, stand masts, from which float the flags of all the nations that participate in the Conference,—an object lesson for the passers-by. That conception of a “European Confederation,” still so strange, is here expressed in the language of emblems.
We reach our places in the gallery before the members of the Conference make their appearance in the hall, so we watch them as they come in deliberately and take their places. In the ministerial chairs, where of late the King’s Hungarian councilors sat, now the foreign parliamentarians are taking their seats. Frédéric Passy is between Cardinal Schlauch and Minister Darany. Gobat mounts the platform and proposes that the president of the Hungarian House of Deputies, Desider Szilagyi, be chairman of the Conference. He accepts and delivers the welcoming address. Now follow the speeches of old acquaintances,—Pirquet, Descamps, Beernaert, Von Bar, Bajer, and others. Apponyi is new and surprising to me. What a speaker! He has a tall, elegant figure, a powerful barytone voice, and an easy mastery of foreign tongues.
At the second session at four o’clock begin the actual transactions. Point I: “Permanent International Arbitration Tribunal.” Descamps reports that he has sent to all the sovereigns and governments the memorandum in regard to this question, drawn up in accordance with the motion of the previous year. Most of the governments had replied favorably to the principles, but the most decisive answer came from St. Petersburg, from the recently departed Prince Lobanof.
In the evening a great soirée at the Prime Minister’s.
I see that my diary has not kept a very strict account of the various phases of the transactions of the Conference. But the official protocol lies before me and I will here dwell upon something that seems to me important in the historical development of the peace cause. In that session of September 22, 1896, the following resolution was offered by Pierantoni:
The Seventh Interparliamentary Conference requests all civilized states to call a diplomatic conference in order that the question of an international court of arbitration may be laid before it; at this conference the labors of the Interparliamentary Union shall serve as a basis for further resolves.
A Conference of Diplomatists. In this term does there not already ring—how shall I express it?—a note suggestive of the conferences at The Hague, in which, indeed, the labors of Descamps and La Fontaine served as the foundation of the establishment of the Hague Tribunal.