That Germany had consulted Russia about a question to make war with England a pretext for seizing Denmark, we suspected. The end of the Japanese War had curbed Russia's eastern ambition for a time. How were we to be sure that the Baltic and the North Sea might not, under German tutelage, attract her?
If von Freytag-Loringhoven's utterances were to be taken seriously, it was evident that war was in the air; and why was von Tirpitz building up the German Navy? The distributors of rumours in Denmark said that all hopes of a Scandinavian confederacy were to be ended by a quarrel with England, a move on France, and the division of Scandinavia into two parts, one nominally Russian, the other, Denmark, to be actually German, while Norway should gradually be terrorised into submission. This shows how excited public opinion was. The German propaganda spread pleasant reports of the peaceful intentions of the Kaiser, the Crown Prince, and the personages in power in Germany. Above all, we were told how charming the Crown Princess Cecilia was, and how potent her influence would be in warding off any attempts of the Pan-Germans on Denmark, even if Germany and England should fly at each other's throats.
People in the court circle, who knew how little royal family alliances count to-day in actual politics, admitted that the Crown Princess was most charming and sympathetic; she is the sister of the Queen of Denmark, and she had become as German as it was possible for the daughter of a Russian mother to be. Her sister, Queen Alexandrina, had become thoroughly Danish, but then her tendencies had always been towards democracy and the simplicities of life.
The German news vendors alternately praised the Crown Prince and depreciated him. If he were violent, it was against the wishes of his father—he was a second Prince Hal trying on the imperial crown. As a rule, however, he was brought out of the background to show his virtues. On several occasions he had evinced more knowledge of what was going on than his father. This was notable in the Eulenberg scandal, when he fearlessly laid bare a horrible ulcer which was beginning to eat into the heart of the army. On this subject he and Max Harden, of the Zukunft, were in amazing alliance. Whatever may be said of the Crown Prince's political ambitions—and we believed and do believe that they meant world conquest—he is very much of a man. In 1911, it was understood that he would not condescend to wear the peace-mask that seemed to conceal his father's face. Dr. von Bethmann-Hollweg, the Chancellor, was temporising as usual. The Moroccan affair led to nothing because Germany's financial backers were not ready for war. The Chancellor was attacked by von Heydebrand; the Danish press gave graphic accounts of the scene when the Crown Prince, from the royal box, applauded every insult that the powerful Junker heaped on the Chancellor, who was merely the tool of the Kaiser. It was the time of the Emperor to temporise; the time had not come to strike; Germany was not rich enough. Russia was still doubtful. France, in the imperial opinion, was not sufficiently corrupted, and the dissensions between Ulster and the rest of Ireland had not yet reached that poisonous growth which, in that opinion, would force mutiny and sedition to poison the English. The Crown Prince probably, in his frankness, voiced more than his own inner sentiments. At any rate, to us near the frontier, it seemed so. However, the incident was used to the credit of the Crown Prince. Fair and open dealing for him! England might interfere in Morocco and other places to prevent his country from taking a place 'in the sun'; but let us have it out!
In the secret councils of the Social Democrats was the hope that, if a Hohenzollern must succeed the Kaiser, it would not be the Crown Prince. In spite of his amiabilities and his apparently youthful point of view of life—though there were fewer indiscretions to his credit than are generally attributed to Crown Princes—it was known that he was military to the core, and that in his time the soldier of the world would never lack employment. While the Kaiser was constantly insisting that more soldiers and more sailors and Krupp von Bohlen's newest instruments of destruction were pawns in the game of peace, his son made no pretence of agreeing with him. Clever or not, he had held that a straight line was the shortest way from one given point to another. And the Zabern incident and several others showed that the Crown Prince meant, when his chance came, to make war after the Napoleonic method and to exalt the sword above the pen and the ploughshare.
The Social Democrats in Denmark were not flattered when he said that 'one day the Social Democrats would go to court!' But he was right; they went to court as their old Emperor went to Carrossa, when they accepted the war! The German writers said, too, that in France his admiration for Napoleon endeared him to the French. If he appeared in Paris, he would be as popular as King Edward of England was when he was Prince of Wales! 'Who knows,' one of their writers said, 'he may make the hopes of the Duke de Reichstadt his own, and live to see them fulfilled'? I called the attention of an Austrian friend to this. This gentleman, high in favour in 1909, but somewhat gloomed in 1914, owing to a bon mot, said: 'But the French remember that the heir of Napoleon, who might have completed his father's conquests, was the son of an Austrian mother.' He was gemütlich, like his grandfather, they said, and how sweetly amiable to the American ladies who had married into the superior race! More than one titled American hoped to be saved from the position of morganaticism in the future through the kindness of His Imperial Highness. But the fixity of will has been underrated. Napoleon tried to conquer Europe; his eyes were on the kingdoms of Solomon and of the jewelled monarchs of the East. Why he failed, the Crown Prince believed he had discovered. There was no reason, therefore, why a Prussian Napoleon might not succeed, and no necessity to repeat the defeats of Moscow and Waterloo. The Prince would begin by fighting Waterloo first and then putting Russia out of commission!
In 1913 Mr. Frederick Wile, then correspondent of the London Daily Mail, wrote: 'He is the idol of the German Army almost to a greater degree than his father. His Hunting Diary is amusing. He writes of his sympathy with his 'sainted' ancestor Frederick the Great, in the dictum that everybody should be allowed to pursue happiness and salvation in his own sweet way.' Holy Moses!
It was not difficult to get near to the characters of the important men in power in Germany. A night's run took one to Berlin, and at Flensberg, a few hours from our Legation, one could see the German war vessels. There were constant visits of Germans of distinction; Prince Eitel Friedrich often came in his yacht, and the Waldhausens—Madame Waldhausen was a Belgian—were constantly entertaining guests of all countries. Princess Harald, the wife of Prince Harold, brother of the King of Denmark, attracted many Germans, with whom she was in sympathy.
At court very few Germans appeared, unless they were of high official rank. Both King Christian X. and the Queen seemed to prefer to speak English, and nothing irritated the King, who speaks English and French and German well, more than any attempt on the part of a diplomatist to speak to him in Danish. It is best, I think, for diplomatists at court to use French. One is always more guarded in speaking a foreign language, but every member of the Danish Court spoke English and seemed to like it. Prince Valdemar and the Princess Marie always spoke English in their family. Prince Valdemar's French was not so good as his English, and, in the beginning, the Princess Marie found the learning of Danish slow work, and she had, during the exile of her family in England, become entirely at home in the English language. Prince Axel, their son, who recently visited America as the guest of the American Navy, spoke English admirably. Like all his family, he is in love with freedom.