But Albert, who had given no signs of attraction toward any one of the various beautiful ladies he might have married, was soon to fall in love and make a marriage that would gladden the heart of old King Leopold, and please the Belgian people.
Among other things that he had studied in his young manhood was the science of medicine, and a year after he came to America he went to Germany to see the clinic of a Bavarian duke named Charles Theodore, whose skill as an occulist had made him famous throughout Europe. Albert visited this Duke and was presented to his daughters, with one of whom, the Duchess Elizabeth, he promptly fell in love. The passion was mutual, and as the match was a good one from all points of view the young couple were married in Munich on October 2, 1900, where a celebration was held in honor of the event. When the newly wedded couple returned to Belgium no one less than King Leopold was waiting at the railroad station to receive them and offer his congratulations. Leopold was now more predisposed in favor of Albert, and when a son was born he was delighted. On the birth of a second son, the King made a speech in which he publicly confirmed Albert's claim to the throne, and public attention was now focussed on the Prince who was to be King.
Albert had no intention of meddling with political affairs until he actually should become the ruler of Belgium, and he gave scant encouragement to those who sought to sound him and find out what his future policies would be. While he surveyed all public affairs with a keen eye and attentive mind, he kept the public from knowing what he thought of them, and his mind seemed now as much of a mystery as his personality had seemed obscure before it had been known that he was to come to the throne.
Albert was greatly interested in the Belgian colony in Africa and asked permission from King Leopold to visit it and make a tour of inspection. The King was unwilling to have the heir to the throne take so long and presumably so dangerous a journey, but at last he consented and Albert departed for Africa and the Congo, where he spent three arduous months in which time, it is said, he walked more than fifteen hundred miles. The colonists took a great liking to the tall, reserved young man who studied all their interests and doings with such careful attention, and the impression that Albert made upon this part of his future kingdom was more than favorable.
He had not been at home long before King Leopold died, and on the 23rd of December, 1909, Albert came into his capital as King of the Belgians. After taking the oath to guard the constitution and preserve the territory of the Belgian nation, he made a carefully prepared and well thought out speech, in which he declared that the Belgian monarch must always obey the laws of the country and preserve the law with the utmost respect and care. And the first public appearance of Albert as King added to the good impression with which he was regarded everywhere.
His liberty and privacy were now over, and he was absorbed with the affairs of his country. He had become so interested in the Congo colony that he gave a great deal of his own money to better conditions there and to further medical research. The Queen was busy also. With her medical skill she visited the various hospitals and engaged in many charitable enterprises that endeared her to the hearts of the common people. It seemed that she could not do enough to relieve the sufferings of others, and the humblest of her subjects came to look on her as a member of their family, and almost literally worshipped the ground she walked on.
The threat of war was still far off, but Albert, who was greatly concerned over the state of the Belgian army, did all he could to increase its efficiency. He was not only concerned with the military preparedness of Belgium, but observed that the Germans seemed to be taking a firmer and firmer grip on his country. German merchants and business men swarmed in Brussels, and it was not hard to see too that German military experts were studying the topography of Belgium and sending reports back to the Fatherland.
The position of Belgium was peculiar in many ways. Not only did it lie as a little and weak nation between the great armed powers of France and Germany, exposed to the advance of an invading army in case of war, since it was the most convenient way from one country to the other, but its position on the coast made it a favorable vantage ground from which Germany might launch an attack on England. This geographical situation of Belgium has caused it throughout history to be the scene of some of the greatest battles that have ever been fought, and has gained for it the name of "the cockpit of Europe."
Even for its size, Belgium was in a woeful state of military unpreparedness for war, because it was supposed to be exempt from conflict through an agreement of the great powers. All the great nations of Europe had decided that it was safer and better to make Belgium neutral ground, and one and all they had promised to protect the neutrality of this little state with force of arms if necessary. This, as we have said, had given the Belgians a feeling of security. They believed that even if war broke out, Belgium would not be forced into the conflict, but sinister signs of danger, like the distant warnings of a hurricane, gradually obtruded themselves before King Albert's clear sighted vision. He received letters, not from one but from many sources, warning him that the Germans had decided in secret council to send their invading armies across Belgium in case of war with France, and he had seen only too clearly that German spies and military experts were mapping out the country for their own secret ends. So Albert struggled to increase the army and secured the passage of a favorable bill in October, 1913.
But the iron forces of Germany were forged and ready; the uniforms and equipment of her invading hordes were packed away in her storehouses and arsenals. Only the stroke of a pen was needed to loose the blind forces and mighty armaments of a war greater than any that history has known. King Albert's efforts in behalf of the Belgian army were too late, although he did not know it at the time.