¶ When the Kaiser, on that eventful day in March, 1890, turned and told the old man to go, Bismarck received the heart-breaking sentence without a sign of protest.
¶ To a friend who called he told the news in a calm voice, a smile on his lips, congratulating himself on being able to resume his country life, of which he was so fond, of visiting again the forests on his estates, and “belonging to himself” in the few years that were yet left.
¶ “I’ll soon be gone,” he said, “and it is time I should take a rest.”
¶ The story is long and complex, but we will give you the large details, only. The day comes when Bismarck’s old friend, Emperor William I, passes from this earthly scene; his son, Frederick III, reigns three months and is carried off by cancer of the throat. The doom of Bismarck is now sealed! Emperor William I was the firm foundation of Bismarck’s strength, but the son did not like the Iron Chancellor, and within the three brief months of power before death called, Frederick III let it be known that Bismarck was marked for retirement. Frederick’s one act leveled against the Bismarck family-dynasty was to dismiss von Puttkammer, Minister of the Interior.
¶ Now enters William II, aged 29, a mighty man in the making, a sleepless man, one who in his time was to become the standard by which henceforth all German institutions are to be measured. His first address to the army; his second, to the navy; his third, three days later, to the citizens.
¶ Did he not ask old von Moltke to resign? Yes, and others. It was not, as many historians set up, that Emperor William II was jealous of Bismarck, nor was it a case of “crabbed age and youth cannot live together.”
¶ The Emperor, with firm feeling in his will to Imperial power, wishes to develop Germany along lines of world-wide importance. Bismarck was of the past; William of the future. The blow fell March 28th, 1890.
¶ The world gave a gasp of astonishment; it seemed impossible that Bismarck, the master-mind of United Germany, should be unceremoniously shuffled out of sight.
Political writers the world around become involved in spirited controversies, on the whole supporting the old man and denouncing what seemed like ingratitude on the part of the new Emperor. It was pointed out that Bismarck himself, speaking to the Czar, had only a short time before declared, “I hope to die in office, always a good friend of Russia.” Also that William II had on New Year’s telegraphed to Bismarck, “That I may long be permitted to work with you, for the welfare and greatness of the Fatherland!”