Finally it was mentioned that Count Bill was the first German to ride into Rouen. Somebody remarked that his appearance would have convinced the inhabitants of that city that our troops had not up to the present been put on short rations. This led the Chancellor to speak again of the strength of his “youngsters.” “They are unusually strong for their age,” he said, “although they have not learnt gymnastics—very much against my desire, but it is not considered the proper thing for the sons of a diplomatist.”
While enjoying his after dinner cigar the Chief asked if the members of his staff were smokers. Yes, every one of them, Abeken replied. “Well, then,” said the minister, “Engel must divide the Hamburg cigars amongst them. I have received so many that if the war were to last for twelve months I should still bring some home with me.”
Thursday, December 15th.—Count Frankenberg and Count Lehndorff joined us at dinner, Prince Pless coming in half an hour later. The Chief was in high spirits and very talkative. The conversation at first turned on the question of the day, that is to say, the commencement of the bombardment. The Minister said it might be expected within the next eight or ten days. It would possibly not be very successful during the first weeks, as the Parisians had had time to take precautions against it. Frankenberg said that in Berlin, and particularly in the Reichstag, no subject was so much discussed as the reasons why the bombardment had been postponed up to the present. Everything else gave way to that. The Chief replied; “Yes, but now that Roon has taken the matter in hand something will be done. A thousand ammunition waggons with the necessary teams are on their way here, and it is said that some of the new mortars have arrived. Now that Roon has taken it up something will at last be done.”
The manner in which the restoration of the imperial dignity in Germany had been brought before the Reichstag was then discussed, and Frankenberg as well as Prince Pless were of opinion that it might have been better managed. The Conservatives had not been informed beforehand, and the statement was actually made when they were sitting at lunch. To all appearance Windthorst was not wrong when, with his usual dexterity in seizing his opportunities, he remarked that he had expected more sympathy from the Assembly.
“Yes,” said the Chief, “there ought to have been a better stage manager for the farce. It should have had a more effective mise-en-scène,—but Delbrück does not understand that sort of thing. Some one should have got up to express his dissatisfaction with the Bavarian Treaties, which lacked this, that, and the other. Then he should have said: ‘If, however, an equivalent were found to compensate for these defects, something in which the unity of the nation would find expression, that would be different,’—and then the Emperor should have been brought forward.”... “Moreover, the Emperor is more important than many people think. I could not tell them. (that is to say, the Princes) what it all means—if I had, I certainly should not have succeeded.... I admit that the Bavarian Treaty has defects and deficiencies. That is, however, easily said when one is not responsible. How would it have been, then, if I had refused to make concessions and no treaty had been concluded? It is impossible to conceive all the difficulties that would have resulted from such a failure, and for that reason I was in mortal anxiety over the easy unconcern of centralising gentlemen in the Diet.”... “Last night, after a long interval, I had again a couple of hours of good deep sleep. At first I could not get off to sleep, worrying and pondering over all sorts of things. Then suddenly I saw Varzin before me, quite distinctly to the smallest detail like a big picture, with all the colours even—green trees, the sunshine on the stems and a blue sky above it all. I saw each single tree. I tried to get rid of it, but it came back and tormented me, and at length when it faded away it was replaced by other pictures, documents, notes, despatches, until at last towards morning I fell asleep.”
Whilst Bucher and myself were alone at tea, he told me that Delbrück, who is the “Liberal Minister,” holds with the Liberals and is “thinking of the future.” “At an early stage of his career the Chief offered him the Ministry of Commerce. Delbrück declined it, saying: ‘Yes, Excellency, but you may not remain long yourself, and I should prefer not to accept it. What should I do if you retired? I should be obliged to go too and renounce official life, and of course that would not do.’”
CHAPTER XV
CHAUDORDY AND THE TRUTH—OFFICERS OF BAD FAITH—FRENCH GARBLING—THE CROWN PRINCE DINES WITH THE CHIEF.
Friday, December 16th.—In the morning I wrote several articles on M. de Chaudordy’s circular as to the barbarity with which we are alleged to conduct the war. They were to the following effect. In addition to the calumnies that have been circulated for months past by the French press with the object of exciting public opinion against us, a document has now been issued by the Provisional Government itself for the purpose of prejudicing foreign Courts and Cabinets by means of garbled and exaggerated accounts of our conduct in the present war. An official of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at Tours, M. de Chaudordy, impeaches us in a circular to the neutral Powers. Let us consider the main points in his statement and see how the matter stands in reality, and who can be justly charged with barbarous methods of warfare, ourselves or the French.
He asserts that we make excessive requisitions, and abuse our power in the occupied towns and districts to extort impossible contributions. We are further stated to have seized private property, and to have cruelly burnt down towns and villages, whose inhabitants have offered resistance, or have in any way assisted in the defence of their country. Our accuser says: “Commanding officers have ordered a town to be plundered and burnt down as a punishment for the acts of individual citizens whose sole crime consisted in resisting the invaders, thus misusing the inexorable discipline imposed upon their troops. Every house in which a franctireur had been concealed, or received a meal, has been burnt down. How can this be reconciled with respect for private property?” The circular states that in firing upon open towns we have introduced a procedure hitherto unexampled in war. Finally, in addition to all our other cruelties, we take hostages with us on railway journeys to secure ourselves against the removal of the rails and other injuries and dangers.