ird,
Leopold, who had adopted a military career, was attached to the person
of the King and was in later years to have more influence upon him than
anyone except perhaps Bunsen. The real intellectual leader of the party
was Stahl, a theologian.

From about the year 1844 Bismarck seems to have become very intimate
with this religious coterie; his friend Moritz v. Blankenburg had
married Thadden's daughter and Bismarck was constantly a visitor at
Triglaff. It was at Blankenburg's wedding that he first met Hans v.
Kleist, who was in later years to be one of his most intimate friends.
He was, we are told, the most delightful and cheerful of companions; in
his tact and refinement he shewed an agreeable contrast to the ordinary
manners of Pomerania. He often rode over to take part in Shakespeare
evenings, and amused them by accounts of his visit to England[3]. He was
present occasionally at the religious meetings at Triglaff, and though
he never quite adopted all the customs of the set the influence on him
of these older men was for the next ten years to govern all his
political action. That he was not altogether at one with them we can
understand, when we are told that at Herr von Thadden's house it would
never have occurred to anyone even to think of smoking. Bismarck was
then, as in later life, a constant smoker.

The men who met in these family parties in distant Pomerania were in a
few years to change the whole of European history. Here Bismarck for the
first time saw Albrecht von Roon, a cousin of the Blankenburgs, then a
rising young officer in the artillery; they often went out shooting
together. The Belows, Blankenburgs, and Kleists were to be the founders
and leaders of the Prussian Conservative party, which was Bismarck's
only support in his great struggle with the Parliament; and here, too,
came the men who were afterwards to be editors and writers of the _Kreuz
Zeitung_.

The religious convictions which Bismarck learnt from them were to be
lasting, and they profoundly influenced his character. He had probably
received little religious training from his mother, who belonged to the
rationalistic school of thought. It was by them that his monarchical
feeling was strengthened. It is not at first apparent what necessary
connection there is between monarchical government and Christian faith.
For Bismarck they were ever inseparably bound together; nothing but
religious belief would have reconciled him to a form of go