In his patronage of the fine arts, Ludwig followed in the footsteps of the Medici. During his regime, he did much to raise the standard of taste among his subjects. Martin Wagner and von Hallerstein were commissioned by him to travel in Greece and Italy and secure choice sculpture and pictures for his galleries and museums. The best of them found a home in the Glyptothek and the Pinakothek, two enormous buildings in the Doric style, the cost of which he met from his privy purse. Another of his hobbies was to play the Maecenas; and any budding author or artist who came to him with a manuscript in his pocket or a canvas under his arm was certain of a welcome.
We all have our little weaknesses. That of Ludwig of Bavaria was that he was a poet. He was so sure of this that he not only produced yards of turgid verse, defying every law of construction and metre, but he even had some of it printed. A volume of selections from his Muse, entitled Walhalla's Genossen, was published for him by Baron Cotta, and, like the Indian shawls of Queen Victoria, did regular duty as a wedding-gift. One effort was dedicated "To Myself as King," and another "To my Sister, the Empress of Austria"; and a number of choice extracts were translated and appeared in an English guide-book.
Ignoring the divinity that should have hedged their author, Heine was very caustic about this royal assault upon Parnassus. Ludwig riposted by banishing him from the capital. Still, if he disapproved of this one, he added to his library the output of other bards, not necessarily German. But, while Browning was there, Tennyson had no place on his shelves. One, however, was found for Martin Tupper.
Ludwig cultivated friendly relations with England, and did all he could (within limits) to promote an entente. Thus, on the occasion of a chance visit to Munich by Lord Combermere, he "sent the distinguished traveller a message to the effect that a horse and saddlery, with aide-de-camp complete, were at his service." His companion, however, a member of the Foreign Office Staff, who had forgotten to pack his uniform—or in John Bull fashion had declined to do so—did not fare so well, since his name was struck off the list of "eligibles" to attend the palace functions. Thereupon, says Lord Combermere, he "wrote an angry letter to the chamberlain, commenting on the absurdity of the restriction."
But Ludwig's opinion of diplomatists was also somewhat unflattering, for, of a certain embassy visited by him on his travels, he wrote:
"A Theatre once—and now an Ambassador's dwelling.
Still, thou are what thou wast—the abode of deception."
A strange mixture of Henry IV and Haroun-al-Raschid, Ludwig of Bavaria was a man of contradictions. At one moment he was lavishly generous; at another, incredibly mean. He could be an autocrat to his finger tips, and insist on the observance of the most minute points of etiquette; and he could also be as democratic as anybody who ever waved a red flag. Thus, he would often walk through the streets as a private citizen, and without an escort. Yet, when he did so, he insisted on being recognised and having compliments paid him. The traffic had to be held up and hats doffed at his approach.
Nowadays, he would probably have been clapped into a museum as a curiosity.
Such, then, was the monarch whose path was to be crossed, with historic and unexpected consequences to each of them, by Lola Montez.