"I was contemplating these reminiscences (the pictures of La
Barberini) in silent reverie when the door opened and the
Kaiser came in with little Menzel.
"'I have a mind to engage Angeli to paint her Majesty's
picture in the costume of Princess Amalia,' said the Emperor
'What do you think of it?'
"'Angeli is painter to many emperors and kings,' replied the Professor, and I saw him smile diplomatically as he moved his spectacles to get a better view of the allegorical canvas on the left wall that exhibits the nude figure of the famous mistress in its entirety.
"'I am glad you agree with me on that point,' said the Emperor, impatient to execute the idea that had crossed his mind. 'I will telegraph to him to-night.'
"And when, five minutes later, Menzel bent over my hand to take formal leave, I heard him murmur in his dry, absent-minded manner—'Pesne … Angeli … Frederick the Great … William II!"
We have spoken of the Court atmosphere of this time. The following extracts from the Memoirs of ex-Chancellor Prince Hohenlohe will assist the reader, perhaps even better than a connected account, to enter, in imagination at all events, into it. The conversations cited between the Emperor and the Prince turn on all sorts of topics—the pass question in Alsace (where Hohenlohe was then Statthalter), the possibility of war with Russia, pheasant shooting, projected monuments, the breach with Bismarck, the Triple Alliance, and a hundred more of the most different kinds. Once talking domestic politics, the Emperor said:
"It will end by the Social Democrats getting the upper hand.
Then they will plunder the people. Not that I care. I will
have the palace loop-holed and look on at the plundering.
The burghers will soon call on me for help;"
and on another occasion, in 1889, Hohenlohe tells of a dinner at the palace, and how after dinner, when the Empress and her ladies had gone into another salon, the Emperor, Hohenlohe, and Dr. Hinzpeter (the Emperor's old tutor) conversed together for an hour, all standing. "The first subject touched on," relates the Prince, was the gymnasia (high schools), the Emperor holding that they made too exacting claims on the scholars, while Hohenlohe and Hinzpeter pointed out that otherwise the run on the schools would be too great and cause danger of a "learned proletariat." Prince Hohenlohe concludes:
"In the whole conversation, which never once came to a
standstill, I was pleased by the fresh, lively manner of the
Emperor, and was in all ways reminded of his grandfather,
Prince Albert."
Next year the Prince was present at an official dinner in the Berlin palace. He writes:—