e had begun to prepare for war and that would not be
allowed.

"It is clear," writes the English Ambassador, "that Count
Bismarck and the Prussian Ministry regret the attitude which the
King has shewn to Count Benedetti, and feel, in regard to public
opinion, the necessity of guarding the honour of the nation."

To the Crown Prince, who had come to Berlin, Bismarck was more open; he
declared that war was necessary.

This very day there were taking place at Ems events which were to give
him the opportunity for which he longed. On Benedetti had fallen the
task of presenting the new demands to the King; it was one of the most
ungrateful of the many unpleasant duties which had been entrusted to him
during the last few years. In the early morning, he went out in the hope
that he might see someone of the Court; he met the King, himself who was
taking the waters. The King at once beckoned to him, entered into
conversation, and shewed him a copy of the _Cologne Gazette_ containing
the statement of the Prince's withdrawal. Benedetti then, as in duty
bound, asked permission to inform his Government that the King would
undertake that the candidature should not be resumed at any time. The
King, of course, refused, and, when Benedetti pressed the request,
repeated the refusal with some emphasis, and then, beckoning to his
adjutant, who had withdrawn a few paces, broke off the conversation.
When a few hours later the King received a letter from the Prince of
Hohenzollern confirming the public statement, he sent a message to
Benedetti by his aide-decamp, Count Radziwill, and added to it that
there would now be nothing further to say, as the incident was closed.
Benedetti twice asked for another interview, but it was refused.

He had done his duty, he had made his request, as he expected, in vain,
but between him and the King there had been no departure by word or
gesture from the ordinary courtesy which we should expect from these
two accomplished gentlemen. All the proceedings indeed had been unusual,
for it was not the habit of the King, as it was of Napoleon, to receive
foreign envoys except on the advice of his Ministers, and the last
conversation had taken place on the public promenade of the fashionable
watering-place; but the exception had been explained and justified by
the theory that the King's interest in the affair was domestic and not
political. Both were anxious to avoid war, and the King to the last
treated