"Pereat, Lola!" bellowed the opposition.
Accounts of the disturbance filtered through to England. There they attracted much attention and acid criticism.
"A lady," remarked the Examiner, "has overthrown the Holy Alliance of Southern Germany. Lola Montez, whose affecting testimony during the trial of those who killed Dujarier in a duel cannot but be remembered, was driven by that catastrophe to seek her fortunes in other realms. Chance brought her to Munich, the Sovereign of which capital has divided his time between poetry and the arts, gallantry and devotion."
"What Paphian cestus," was another sour comment, "does Lola wind round the blade of her poniard? We all remember how much the respectable Juno was indebted to the bewitching girdle of a less regular fair one, but the properties of that talisman are still undescribed."
The Thunderer, in its capacity as a European watch-dog, had its eye on Ludwig and his dalliance along the primrose path. Disapproval was registered. "The King of Bavaria," solemnly announced a leading article, "has entirely forgotten the duties and dignities of his position."
Freiherr zu Canitz, however, who had succeeded von Bülow as Minister for Foreign Affairs, looked upon Ludwig's lapse with more indulgence. "It is not," he wrote from the Wilhelmstrasse, "the first time by any means that kings have chosen to live with dancers. While such conduct is not, perhaps, strictly laudable, we can disregard it if it be accompanied by a certain measure of decorum. Still, a combination of ruler-ship and dalliance with a vagrant charmer is a phenomenon that is as much out of place as is an attempt to govern a country by writing sonnets."
Availing herself of what was then, as now, looked upon as a natural safety-valve, Lola herself wrote to the Times, giving her own version of these happenings:
I left Paris in June last on a professional trip; and, among other arrangements, decided upon visiting Munich where, for the first time, I had the honour of appearing before His Majesty and receiving from him marks of appreciation, which is not a very unusual thing for a professional person to receive at a foreign Court.
I had not been here a week before I discovered that there was a plot existing in the town to get me out of it, and that the party was the Jesuit Party.... When they saw that I was not likely to leave them, they tried what bribery would do; and actually offered me 50,000 fcs. a year if I would quit Bavaria and promise never to return. This, as you may imagine, opened my eyes; and, as I indignantly refused their offer, they have since not left a stone unturned to get rid of me.... Within this last week a Jesuit professor of philosophy at the university here, named Lasaulx, was removed. Thereupon, the party paid and hired a mob to insult me and break the windows of my house.
... Knowing that your columns are always open to protect anyone unjustly accused, and more especially when that one is an unprotected female, makes me rely upon you for the insertion of this; and I have the honour to subscribe myself, your obliged servant,