But at first, as we have said, he came forward fresh and full of hope; nor did his first failures and undeceptions disconcert him in any way. His tone towards his opponents was that of reconciliation. For his sovereign’s sake he took many a step towards conciliation with sad reluctance, although without desistance.
His wife, who was residing in Pomerania with her parents, he could furnish with meagre reports. The lovely season of the “blue” was past, and the fullness of labor began to increase with rapidity. On the 7th of October he wrote to her at a session of the House of Deputies in the following terms:—“I am sitting at the table of the Chamber, with a speaker, who talks nonsense to me, on the tribune just before me, and between one explanation just given, and another one I shall have to give, I write to you to say I am well. Plenty of work—somewhat tired—not sleep enough—the beginning of all things is difficult. With God’s help things will go better, and it is very well so, only it is somewhat uncomfortable, this life on a tray! I dine every day with our good-natured Roon, who will be a real support for you. I see I have commenced on the wrong side; I hope it is not a bad omen.” [The letter is written on the inner side of the paper.] “If I had not R. and the mare I should feel very lonely, although I am never alone.”
Bismarck was provisionally living at the Ministry of State, in the “Auerswaldhöhle,” and only moved to the Foreign Office when the family had returned from Pomerania.
The following letter was also written during those days to his sister. The Bismarckian humor is likewise to be traced in it:—
Berlin, 18th Oct., 1862.
Such good black-pudding I never ate, and seldom such good liver; may your slaughtering be blessed: for three days I have been breakfasting upon the results of it. The cook, Rimpe, has arrived, and I dine at home alone when I am not at His Majesty’s table. I got along very well at Paris. At Letzlingen I shot one stag, one sow, one badger, five brockets, four head of deer, and blundered tolerably, if, perhaps, not as much as my neighbors. But the amount of work here is growing daily. To-day, from eight to eleven, diplomacy; from eleven to half-past two, various Ministerial squabble conferences; then, till four, report to the King; from a quarter past to three-quarters, a gallop in the rain to the Hippodrome; five o’clock, dinner; from seven till now, ten, work of all sorts. But health and sound sleep—tremendous thirst!
It ought not, and could not, remain so long. The strong self-consciousness and feeling of victory with which the Progressist party advanced—and that in a manner the most abrupt, and sometimes even personally insulting—could not fail to convince Bismarck, that he would not succeed in solving the crisis. He had now to resolve to leave—in accordance with the King’s will—time to solve matters, but, despite of this, to continue, within the constitution, to conduct the Government. With a firm step he pursued this difficult path, and he was able to inspire others with his confidence. Yes; even King William, whose gentle heart suffered severely in this arena of contention, refreshed himself at his Minister’s sure bearing—so much so, that on one occasion, when a lovely Russian princess was congratulating him on his healthy appearance, he pointed to Bismarck, and replied, “Voilà mon médecin!”
An old acquaintance, who met Bismarck at this time, and asked him how he was, received for reply, “How should I be? You know how I love to be lazy, and how I have to work!”
The chief of one of the numerous deputations of those days, at which opponents mocked so much as loyalty deputations, although they were of no little significance, was introduced to Bismarck. He summed up the personal impression which the Minister-President made upon him, in his singing Saxon dialect, in the admiring phrase:—“D’ye hear! one can’t talk nonsense when one meets that man!”
“Then I suppose you’ve never been in the Chamber?” the Berlin friends of the worthy inhabitant of Wettin, or Löbejühn, observed in reply.