"Very well," replied the old minister, with a twinkle in his eye, but in his most suave and courtly manner, and with a most unruffled demeanor: "And shall I allow the patent signed by your majesty in that case to go out in the usual form, 'To my trusted and well-beloved cousin and counsellor?'"
The kaiser saw the joke at once, burst into a loud peal of laughter, his ill-temper having vanished in a moment.
Another amusing incident in which the devil was called upon to play a part occurred on the occasion of the emperor's inspection of a number of newly-joined recruits for the first regiment of Foot Guards. In accordance with his invariable custom, he was examining-them as to what they would do in this or that emergency. Addressing one burly Pomeranian grenadier, he inquired what he would say to a man who annoyed him while on sentry duty.
"Go to the devil! Get out! your majesty," responded the man.
"All right, my friend," exclaimed the emperor, laughing, "I'll get out; but I'll be hanged if I'll go to the devil," and with that he turned to the next man.
Military inspections very often furnish the occasion for amusing and sometimes rather disconcerting episodes. I can recall as an illustration an inspection of recruits for the navy at Kiel. On that day the emperor had been holding forth, as he so often does, about the duty of sailors as well as soldiers to defend the crown against the foes beyond the frontiers of the empire, as well as against the enemies within the boundaries of the latter. He then singled out a stolid-looking recruit, and having ascertained that he was the son of a Bavarian farmer, with a strongly developed taste for the sea, he proceeded to question him with regard to the address which he had just delivered.
"And who are our foreign foes, my good fellow?" he inquired.
"The Russians and the French, your majesty," replied the recruit.
"And who are the enemies within the empire?" proceeded the emperor, expecting of course that the sailor would say that they were the socialists.
"The Prussians, your majesty," answered the Jack-tar that was to be, without apparently realizing that he had said anything wrong or impolite, and merely giving a frank utterance to the sentiment in which he, like all his countrymen in Bavaria, had been brought up.