220 POLITICAL LIFE-XI 



away their muskets; that very many German soldiers, 

 during this panic, cast aside everything except the clothes 

 they wore not only their guns, but their helmets; that 

 afterward the highways and fields were strewn thickly 

 with these, and that wagons were sent out to collect them. 

 He also said that Bismarck spoke highly to him regard 

 ing the martial and civil qualities of the crown prince, 

 afterward the Emperor Frederick, but that regarding 

 the Red Prince, Frederick Charles, he expressed a very 

 different opinion. 



Speaking of a statement that some one had invented 

 armor which would ward off a rifle-ball, Sheridan said 

 that during the Civil War an officer who wore a steel vest 

 beneath his coat was driven out of decent society by gen 

 eral contempt; and at this Goldwin Smith told a story of 

 the Duke of Wellington, who, when troubled by an in 

 ventor of armor, nearly scared him to death by ordering 

 him to wear his own armor and allow a platoon of soldiers 

 to fire at him. 



During the course of the conversation Sheridan said 

 that soldiers were braver now than ever before braver, 

 indeed, than the crusaders, as was proved by the fact 

 that in these days they wear no armor. To this Goldwin 

 Smith answered that he thought war in the middle ages 

 was more destructive than even in our time. Sheridan 

 said that breech-loading rifles kill more than all the 

 cannon. 



At a breakfast given by Goldwin Smith at Wormley s, 

 Bancroft, speaking of Berlin matters, said that the Em 

 peror William did not know that Germany was the second 

 power in the world so far as a mercantile navy was con 

 cerned until he himself told him; and on the ignorance 

 of monarchs regarding their own domains, Goldwin 

 Smith said that Lord Malmesbury, when assured by Na 

 poleon III that in the plebiscite he would have the vote of 

 the army, which was five hundred thousand, answered, 

 &quot;But, your majesty, your army numbers seven hundred 

 thousand,&quot; whereupon the Emperor was silent. The in- 



