On my rising he walked about the room for a while, continuing to speak, but sat down again soon as if he felt tired. He mentioned Herbert, who is still in London, and from this I turned the conversation on to Hatzfeldt, remarking that his appointment as Secretary of State had not yet taken place. He rejoined: “That is due solely to the fact that he himself has not yet declared in favour of remaining. He has still to complete his arrangements, and settle with his brother about a mortgage. Moreover, I cannot blame him if he prefers to draw—(I did not catch the amount) in Constantinople, where things are cheaper, than 15,000 thalers here. He has a fortune of about 100,000 thalers. I wanted more for him, 60,000 marks, but the Federal Council rejected the proposal, as they could not give the Secretary of State more than the Imperial Chancellor, who receives only 54,000, but who has become wealthy thanks to public grants. You cannot expect everybody to be prepared to make sacrifices. Every one is not disposed to lead a simple life, cutting his coat according to his cloth, and to forego great entertainments and other expensive habits; and then it is a case of five into four won’t go, so I borrow one. He must, however, decide between this and July. Otherwise we shall have to ask Dr. Busch.”
“No, thank you,” I replied. He said: “There are two doctors of that name, and I mean the other, not Büschlein. But Busch has as poor health as Hatzfeldt, who is effeminate to boot, wraps himself up like a Frenchman, and goes to bed when he has a headache or cold, so that I have already been obliged to do their work instead of their taking over mine.”
From these invalids he passed on to the Empress. “She lives on and is again in good health, but a great deal of my illness comes from her intrigues. Schleinitz is also on his legs again, although he was very ill. Doubtless he thinks: ‘Perhaps there may be some more Jewish pourboires, so I must keep alive!’”
I asked if he would speak in the debate in the Reichstag on the monopoly. “Yes,” he said, “if my health permits it. Not for the purpose of convincing them, but to bear witness before the country, and then to demand my release.” I inquired whether he intended to go to Kissingen again this summer. “No,” he replied. “Although the waters have usually been very beneficial, they did me no good the last time. For nearly four months afterwards I was tormented with hæmorrhoids that were fearfully painful, burning like hell fire.” He then added a description of the symptoms.
Before leaving I also asked: “How do you like the Chevalier Poschinger,[6] Serene Highness? There is a great deal of interesting matter in the collection, but it seems to me that he might have made a better choice. But I suppose all the documents did not come into his hands?” He replied: “That, too, had something to do with it. But there is a great deal that has not got into the archives, such as my letters to the late King, which were retained by Gerlach and which his heirs will not easily part with. But even as it is, the book is very instructive, as it contains a great deal which was not known so accurately before; and it is perhaps well that those letters and other things should remain unpublished for the present.”
He had in the meantime shaken hands several times by way of taking leave of me, but each time started some new subject which caused me to remain. He now reached me his hand for the last time, and thanking him for giving me the pleasure of seeing him after such a long interval I took my leave. As usual after such interviews, I went straight home in order to write down what I had heard without delay, before anything else should chance to blur the impression.
On the 15th of July I again visited Bucher. He complained once more of the indifferent way in which business was done at the Foreign Office and in the Imperial Chancellerie. Herbert sent his father, Holstein or Rantzau private reports of what he picked up in London society, the clubs, &c.—mostly gossip—which was then forwarded to the Emperor and occasionally made use of in the press. The correct thing for him to do would be to communicate what he had heard to his Chief, the Ambassador, who could then forward it separately, or include it in his own despatches. Herbert reported recently that after the murder of Cavendish and Burke, Gladstone, when sitting in his place in Parliament, covered his face with his hands in order to show the depth of his affliction, although the event was in every way opportune for him. That evening, however, he was.... Rantzau then came to him, Bucher, to say that the Chief would like to see that mentioned in one of the papers, but not in the Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, and to ask whether he, Bucher, would see to it. Bucher replied that his instructions were to write only for the Post and the Norddeutsche. He would, however, prepare it for the press and Rantzau could then give it to Lindau, who might get it into the Kölnische Zeitung, or into one of the Hamburg papers. After a while Rantzau returned and said that in Lindau’s opinion one of the phrases would be better if translated into the oratio obliqua. “But,” said Bucher, smiling, “it was a quotation, yet neither of them recognised it, although it was taken from Schiller. I said to him they could do what they liked with it, and since then they have not pestered me with such matters.” Bucher confirmed what the Chancellor had told me respecting Prince William’s attitude and way of thinking in political matters. He added that the Prince had told some of his acquaintances how much he disapproved of his mother reading the Volkszeitung, and identifying herself with the views of the Progressist party. Bucher then mentioned that a member of the Crown Prince’s entourage had informed him that one of the leaders of the National Liberals had recently stated that they were not so very much opposed to the tobacco monopoly, but wished to “keep their consent to it as a gift for the next emperor.” He added “I was about to write that to the Chancellor, whom I now rarely see; but I saw from his speech on the monopoly that he had already been informed of it.” In Bucher’s opinion the most important feature in the Egyptian question is “that we may expect it to lead to a breach between France and England.... Our relations with Austria are excellent. What he was not able to tell you at the time is a fact. We have a formal alliance with the Austrians, and the Chief has also done something more, so that we are quite safe from war for several years to come.”
With regard to Hatzfeldt, Bucher said: “He wants to have the Secretaryship of State offered to him so that he may make his acceptance conditional upon exorbitant terms for himself. But the Chief, in order to avoid placing himself under any obligations, means to leave it to the Emperor to settle matters with him.”
We finally spoke about Eckart, whom it was intended at first to employ in the Literary Bureau, but who has now a prospect of an appointment in the Ministry of the Interior. Bucher thinks the affair is a demonstration of the Chief’s against the Russians, who “always fancied until now that we must run to answer the bell whenever they ring.” Eckart, by the way, no longer makes the extracts from the newspapers for the Foreign Office....
On the 19th of July, Bucher sent me an article from the Deutsches Tageblatt of the 16th of July, entitled “Hirsch-Bleichröder-Rothschild and Germany in Constantinople.” It disclosed the financial intrigues of this group of bankers, “choice members of the Chosen People,” who exploit Turkey under the pretence that they are protected by the German Government in the persons of its representatives. It energetically protests against this trio, and particularly against “Bleichröder, who knows how to take advantage of the credit which Germany enjoys at the Golden Horn in association with persons who only manifest their national sentiments and their patriotism when these can be turned to account for their own transactions.” Bucher wrote: “I send you this article for your Memorabilia. It will be frequently mentioned hereafter. Justizrath Primker of Berlin, is the agent of Bleichröder here referred to.”