his head--which would possibly have come
about if they had failed in the Austrian war; how then he had
"desperately used his spurs to make the noble old horse clear the
ditch and take the risk"; and how, the victory having been won, on
their return from the war they were received by the people with the
most jubilant acclamations instead of having their heads cut off,
which had pleased the old gentleman immensely and taught him a lesson
as to his reckless prime minister.

It was not the cautious and conservative spirit of the king alone that
he had occasionally to overcome. Still more was he clogged and not
seldom exasperated by what he called the stupid old bureaucracy, which
had to be got out of its accustomed ruts whenever anything new and
bold was to be done. He fairly bubbled over with humorous anecdotes,
evidently relishing, himself, his droll descriptions of the antiquated
"Geheimrath" (privy counsellor), as he stared with his bleared eyes
wide open, whenever anything unusual was proposed, seeing nothing but
insuperable difficulties before him and then exhausting his whole
ingenuity in finding the best sort of red tape with which to strangle
the project. His patience tried to the utmost, he, the minister would
then go to the king and tell him that such and such a rusty official
could no longer be got along with and must necessarily give place to a
more efficient person; whereupon the "old gentleman," melting with
pity, would say, "Oh, he has so long been a faithful servant of the
State, would it not be cruel to cast him aside like a squeezed-out
orange?--no, I cannot do it." "And there," said Bismarck, "there we
are."

I ventured to suggest that an offer to resign on his part, if he could
not have his way, might make the king less tender of his inefficient
friends in high places. "Oh," said Bismarck with a laugh, "I have
tried that so often, too often, perhaps, to make it impressive! What
do you think happens when I offer my resignation? My old gentleman
begins to sob and cry--he actually sheds tears, and says, 'Now you
want to leave me too?' Now when I see him shed tears, what in the
world can I do then?" So he went on for a while, from one funny
anecdote to another and from one satirical description to another.

_Bismarck's Test of Von Moltke_

Bismarck then came back to the Austrian war and told me much about the
diplomatic fencing which led up to it. With evident gusto he related
story after story, sho