I hear from Willisch that certain apprehensions are entertained in Berlin, which are understood to originate in the entourage of the Queen. Owing to the anxiety occasioned by the blowing-up of the citadel at Laon, objections are raised to the King entering Paris, where, it is apprehended, something might happen to him. Wrangel has telegraphed in this sense to the King, and it is stated that as a matter of fact his Majesty is now no longer inclined to go to Paris, and is disposed to await the further development of affairs at Rothschild’s place in Ferrières, which lies about half-way between Meaux and Paris.
Prince Hohenlohe dines at our table, where the Chief also joins us after returning from dinner with the King. We learn that Reims will be the administrative centre of the French provinces occupied by our troops, with the exception of Alsace and Lorraine. The Grand Duke of Mecklenburg is Governor-General, and will be at the head of the administration, and Hohenlohe will take a position under him.
The Chief remarked to his cousin, who complained of not feeling well: “At your age” (Bohlen is now thirty-eight) “I was still as sound as a bell, and could take all sorts of liberties with myself. It was at St. Petersburg that my health first sprang a leak.”
Somebody turned the conversation on Paris and the subject of the French and the Alsacians. The Chief gave his views on this matter very fully, addressing his remarks to me at the close, which I took to be a permission, or a hint, that I should either get his words or their purport into the newspapers. The Alsacians and the Germans of Lorraine, he declared, supply France with numbers of capable men, especially for the army, but they are not held of much account by the French, and seldom attain to high positions in the service of the State, while they are laughed at by the Parisians, who make caricatures and stories out of them, just as the Irish are laughed at in London. “Other French provincials are treated in the same way,” added the Minister, “if not quite so badly. To a certain extent, France is divided into two nations, the Parisians and the Provincials, and the latter are the voluntary helots of the former. The object to be aimed at now is the emancipation, the liberation of France from Parisian rule. When a provincial feels that he is capable of making a future for himself he comes to Paris, and is there adopted into, and becomes one of, the ruling caste. It is a question whether we should not oblige them to take back the Emperor as a punishment. That is still possible, as the peasants do not wish to be tyrannised from Paris. France is a nation of ciphers—a mere herd. The French are wealthy and elegant, but they have no individuality, no consciousness as individuals, but only as a mass. They are like thirty million obedient Kaffirs, each one of whom is in himself featureless and worthless, not fit to be compared with Russians and Italians, to say nothing of ourselves. It was an easy task to recruit out of this impersonal, invertebrate mass a phalanx ready to oppress the remainder of the country so long as it was not united.”
After dinner wrote several paragraphs in accordance with the Chief’s instructions and explanations. The subjects were: The German friends of the Republic—men like Jacoby, the Socialistic Democrats, and others holding similar views—will not hear of the annexation of French territory, being in the first place Republicans, and only in a secondary sense, to a certain extent, German. The security afforded to Germany by the seizure of Strassburg and Metz is detestable to them, as it is a bulwark against the Republic which they want to see established, weakening their propaganda, and injuring their prospects on our side of the Rhine. They place their party higher than their country. They welcomed the opposition to Napoleon, because he was an opponent of their doctrines, but since he has been replaced by the Republic they have become Frenchmen in sentiment and disposition. Russia has expressed a desire for a revision of the treaty entered into as the result of her defeat in the Crimean war. The alterations proposed in certain points of that instrument must be regarded as just. The Peace of Paris includes conditions respecting the Black Sea which are unfair, in view of the fact that a great part of the coast belongs to Russia. This must, however, be cautiously expressed.
The conjecture that the Crown Prince is of opinion that the Bavarians and Suabians, if they are not disposed willingly to form part of united Germany, must be compelled to do so, is correct. He is inclined to act on the maxim, Der Bien muss. I hear that at Donchery, or near that town, he had a long conversation on the subject with the Chancellor, who declared himself strongly against this idea.
Saturday, September 17th.—I did a good deal of work this morning and afternoon from instructions received yesterday. Amongst other things, I embodied in an article the following ideas, which are very characteristic of the Chancellor’s manner of thinking:
“The morning edition of the National Zeitung of September 11th contains a paragraph entitled ‘From Wilhelmshöhe,’ in which the writer, after lamenting the considerate treatment of the Prisoner of Sedan, falls into further errors. Nemesis should have shown no indulgence towards the man of December 2nd, the author of the laws of public safety, the prime mover in the Mexican tragedy, and the instigator of the present terrible war. The victor has been ‘far too chivalrous.’ That is the way in which the matter is regarded by ‘public opinion,’ as endorsed apparently by the writer. We do not in any way share those views. Public opinion is only too much disposed to treat political relations and events from the standpoint of private morals, and, amongst other things, to demand that in international conflicts the victor, guided by the moral code, should sit in judgment upon the vanquished, and impose penalties not only for the transgressions of the latter towards himself, but also, if possible, towards others. Such a demand is entirely unjustifiable. To advance it shows an utter misapprehension of the nature of political affairs, with which the conceptions of punishment, reward, and revenge have nothing in common. To accede to it would be to pervert the whole character of politics. Politics must leave to Divine Providence and to the God of Battles the punishment of princes and peoples for breaches of the moral law. The statesman has neither the authority nor the obligation to assume the office of judge. In all circumstances the sole question he has to consider is what, under the conditions given, is to the advantage of the country, and how that advantage is to be best secured. The kindlier affections have as little place in the calculations of politics as they have in those of trade. It is not the business of politics to seek vengeance for what has been done, but to take precautions that it shall not be done again. Applying these principles to our case, and to our conduct towards the vanquished and imprisoned Emperor of the French, we take the liberty to ask by what right are we to punish him for the 2nd of December, the law of public safety, and the occurrences in Mexico, however much we may disapprove of those acts? Political principles do not even permit us to think of taking revenge for the present war, of which he was the author. Were we to entertain such an idea, then it is not alone on Napoleon but almost on every single Frenchman that we should wreak the Blücher-like vengeance mentioned by the National Zeitung; for the whole of France, with her thirty-five million inhabitants, showed just as much approval of, and enthusiasm for, this war as for the Mexican expedition. Germany has simply to ask herself the further question, Which is more advantageous in the present circumstances, to treat Napoleon well or ill? And that, we believe, is not difficult to answer. Upon the same principles we also acted in 1866. If certain of the measures taken in that year and certain provisions in the Treaty of Prague could be regarded as acts of revenge for former affronts, and punishment for the offences that led to the war in question, the parties affected by those measures and conditions were not exactly those who had deserved the severest punishment or had done most to excite a desire for vengeance. Herr von Beust’s Saxony suffered no reduction of territory in consequence of that crisis, and Austria just as little.” This last sentence, which appeared literally as it now stands in the Chief’s instructions, was afterwards struck out by him. He remarked with a smile, “It is better not to mention names.”
Sunday, September 18th.—Early in the day wrote paragraphs for Berlin, Hagenau, and Reims, dealing, inter alia, with Favre’s declaration that “La République c’est la paix.” It was in the main to the following effect. During the last forty years France has always declared herself in favour of peace in every form, and has invariably acted in an entirely contrary spirit. Twenty years ago the Empire declared peace to be its ideal, and now the Republic does the same. In 1829 Legitimacy made a similar declaration, and at the same time a Franco-Russian alliance was concluded with the object of attacking Germany; and the execution of that plan was only prevented by the Revolution of 1830. It is also known that the “peaceful” administration of the “Citizen King” desired to seize the Rhine in 1840; and it will be remembered that under the Empire France has conducted more wars than under any other form of government. These facts show what we have to expect from M. Favre’s assurances respecting his Republic. Germany has one answer to all these representations, namely, “La France c’est la guerre!” and will act in accordance with that conviction in demanding the cession of Metz and Strassburg.
The Minister joined as at lunch to-day, at which two dragoon guardsmen were also present. Both wore the Iron Cross. One of them, Lieutenant Philip von Bismarck, was the Chancellor’s nephew, an official of the Supreme Court of Judicature in times of peace. The Chief asked him whether the Prince of Hohenzollern, who was attached to the lieutenant’s regiment, was “also a soldier, or merely a Prince?” The answer was favourable. The Minister replied: “I am glad of that. The fact of his having announced his election as King of Spain to his superior officer, in accordance with the regulations, impressed me in his favour.”