During his stay in Erfurt, Dr. Stahl was presented with an album by his admirers. On its eleventh page, the album (which was afterwards printed) contains the following inscription:—
“Our watchword therefore is not ‘A United State at any price,’ but, ‘The independence of the Prussian Crown at every price.’
“Bismarck-Schönhausen,
Deputy for Brandenburg.
“Erfurt, 24th April, 1850.”
This expression, if we are not mistaken, was a quotation from a speech made by Stahl, at that time in Erfurt. Evidently it came from Bismarck’s inmost soul.
After his return from Erfurt, Bismarck dedicated some weeks to his business in Schönhausen, and then travelled into Pomerania with his family. It is this journey of which such humorous mention is made in the two following letters to his sister:
BISMARCK TO FRAU VON ARNIM.
Schönhausen, 28th June, 1850.
I write you a solemn letter of congratulation on the occasion (I think) of your twenty-fourth birthday. (I won’t tell any body of this.) You are now really a major, or, rather, would have been so, had you not had the misfortune to belong to the female sex, whose limbs, in the eyes of jurists, can never emerge from minority—not even when they are the mothers of the lustiest of Jacks. Why this apparent injustice is a very wise arrangement I will instruct you, when, I hope some fortnight hence, I have you à la portée de la voix humaine before me. Johanna—who at the present time is in the arms of Lieutenant Morpheus—will have written to you what is in prospect for me. The boy bellowing in a major key, the girl in minor, two singing nurse-girls, wet napkins and milk-bottles, myself in the character of an affectionate Paterfamilias. I resisted a long time, but as all the mothers and aunts were unanimous that poor little Molly could only be cured by sea-water and air, I should, if I resisted any longer, have my avarice and my paternal barbarity paraded before me on the occasion of every cold the child will catch till it is seventy, with the words: “Don’t you see! Ah! if the poor child could but have gone to the seaside!” The little being is suffering from the eyes, which are tearful and sticky. Perhaps this arises from the salt baths, perhaps from eye-teeth. Johanna is dreadfully excited about it, and for her satisfaction I have sent to-day for Dr. Bünger, at Stendal, who is the Fanninger of the Alt Mark. We take it for granted that you will be at home next month, and do not contemplate an excursion yourselves, in which event we would defer our visit until our return. But we write in order to settle time and place. I have very unwillingly decided to abandon my country laziness here, but now that it is settled, I see rose-colored hues in the affair, and am heartily delighted to seek you in the cavern, which I only know to be situated some ten feet above the earth, and hope to seize the herring myself in the depths of the Baltic. Johanna is still asleep, or she would certainly send many greetings. For reasons of health I now rise at six o’clock. Hoping soon to see you, I invoke God’s blessing on you and yours, for this year and all those to come.