and
everything. Who knows but that these gentlemen wouldn't
begin the old game and say to the Emperor, 'You are simply
nothing but a doll. Bismarck is the real ruler.' On the old
Emperor this would have made no impression, but the young
one would be more sensitive. Bismarck, therefore, wanted
Waldersee's banishment, and would, if he could, send him to
Strasburg (where Hohenlohe was Statthalter) as commanding
general. Perhaps he was only aiming at making me (Hohenlohe)
sick of my post and so get rid of Waldersee, his enemy, when
I cleared out. Bleichroeder said Bismarck only introduced
the compulsory pass system to show the Emperor that he too
could act sharply against the French, and so as to take the
wind out of the sails of the military party. Bismarck was
thinking above all about seating his son Herbert firmly in
the saddle (Herbert was Secretary of State for Foreign
Affairs). That is the sole motive of his action and thought.
There was therefore no prospect of matters in the Rhineland
improving. As to Russia, Bleichroeder expected some
occurrence, something out of the way (_exotisches_) by which
Russia might be won, either the withdrawal of troops from
the frontier or a meeting of Emperors. The Emperor, Bismarck
said, would not begin a war. If it came, however, it would
not be unwelcome to him."

Prince Hohenlohe also tells of a visit he paid in the month of the
accession to the widowed Empress Frederick. "She is much bowed down,"
he said,

"very harassed-looking, and I feel sure that all this recent
time, all the last year in fact, she has been displaying an
artificial good-humour, for now I find her in deep distress.
At first she could not speak for weeping. We spoke of the
Emperor Frederick's last days, then she recovered herself a
little and complained of the wickedness and meanness of men,
by which she meant to allude to certain people.... Herbert
Bismarck had had the impudence to tell the Prince of Wales
(later Edward VII) that an Emperor who could not talk and
discuss things should not be allowed to reign, and so on.
The Prince of Wales, the Empress said, told Herbert that if
it were not that he valued good relations between England
and Germany, he would have thrown him out of the door....
Waldersee was a false, unprincipl