44 



ARNIM, COUNT VON. 



Lasker, and it is furthermore stated that the 

 recent onslaught made upon that gentleman by 

 Prince Putbus and his friends, through the me- 

 dium of the press, was at the instigation of 

 the Chancellor himself, who is reported, more- 

 over, to have in a private conversation lately 

 condemned his own church policy as an act 

 of folly (eine Thorheit}. 



The following is the account given of Count 

 Arnim's interview with the Emperor in Sep- 

 tember, 1873. He dates from July, 1872, the 

 first misunderstanding between himself and 

 the Prince Chancellor : 



The months of July, August, and September, 1873, 

 were passed by Count Arniin, now greatly enfeebled 

 in health, at Carlsbad, Kagaz, and Moritz. During 

 this time, also, the embassador received several 

 communications from the Imperial Chancellor, all 

 containing abundant evidence of the passionate hos- 

 tility which the latter had now conceived against 

 Mm. From other quarters he heard that he was not 

 the only person to whom the cause of this hatred 

 was an utter mystery. The late Herr von Balen 

 wrote to him : " The motive of Bismarck's hatred 

 against you is unknown to me. Things are going 

 on in Berlin which I fail altogether to understand." 

 Toward the end of August Count Arnim came to 

 Berlin, and on the morning of the 1st of Septem- 

 ber was received by his Majesty. The embassador 

 asked his imperial master whether he desired his 

 (Arnim's) recall from Paris and retirement from 

 public service. His Majesty replied in the nega- 

 tive, adding that he had no reason to wish for any 

 such thing. He then went on to say that the mat- 

 ter of the alleged delay in the conclusion of the 

 Convention of the 15th of March, 1873 (regarding 

 the quicker payment of the war indemnity and the 

 recall of the troops in occupation of the French 



able to understand this, as he himself was incapable 

 of bearing a grudge against anybody. But spiteful- 

 ness was, in fact, Prince Bismarck's prevailing char- 

 acteristic, and it was sad to be obliged to say so of a 

 man to whom we were all so deeply indebted. This 

 temper had already compelled the Emperor to part 

 from many faithful servants, among whom were 

 Golz, Thile, Savigny, Usedem, Werther, etc. " And 

 now it is your turn," the Emperor added (Jftzt sind 

 Sie an der Eeihe}. Count Arnim replied to his Maj- 

 esty that he, the Emperor's, and not Prince Bis- 

 marck's servant, deemed it his duty to see the Im- 

 perial Chancellor and to labor once more to convince 

 him how groundless were the assumptions upon 

 which he, probably through false information, had 

 grounded his feeling of hatred. His Majesty agreed 

 to this. 



Then come the particulars of the interview 

 between the two men, once such fast friends : 



At two o'clock in the afternoon of the same day 

 Count Arnim called on Prince Bismarck. 



The embassador was at that time in such a state 

 of suifering, and his nervous system had received 

 such a shock, that some minutes passed before he 

 could utter a word. Those who are familiar with 

 the nature of the disorder with which Count Arnim 

 was at that time afflicted in the highest degree know 

 that one of its effects is that the patient, if greatly 

 excited, is almost unable to speak. The tongue, aa 

 it were, cleaves to the palate. 



Prince Bismarck, who could not fail to observe 

 Count Arnim's painful condition, did nothing what- 

 ever to relieve it. 



" Se parnant d'aise de se trouver eu si bonne 

 santeY'the prince opened the conversation in an irri- 



tating tone of haughty condescension and wholly 

 unwarranted by the circumstances. 



On Count Arnim's request to be informed of the 

 real motive of the " cruel persecution " to which 

 he, the Imperial Chancellor, had subjected him, the 



Erince replied with a flood of reproaches which he 

 ad already prepared himself to deliver, as was evi- 

 dent from a sight of the documents which lav piled 

 upon the table before him. " 



"I atn," said the prince, "the persecuted one. 

 These eight months, this twelvemonth, you have 

 injured my health and robbed me of my rest. You 

 conspire with the Empress, and will never rest un- 

 til you can sit here at this table, and convince your- 

 self that this, too, is nothing after all (dass es auch 

 nicJits ist\. 1 have known you from your youth up- 

 ward. _ Years ago you said that every man set in 

 authority over you was vour natural enemy. That 

 enemy am I just now. You delayed the settlement 

 of the Convention of the 15th May in order to over- 

 throw Thiers, and I am now answerable for this 

 political blunder. You have accused me to the Em- 

 peror. You have connections at court which have 

 hitherto prevented me from recalling you from your 

 post." 



To all this the prince added certain peculiar ex- 

 pressions, which were, to say the least, quite un- 

 necessary. Rage, whether real or feigned, made 

 his speech incoherent. He confounded the order 

 of events, referring to matters of long date as if 

 they were quite recent, and the reverse. In conclu- 

 sion, he maintained that whatever he had said was 

 taken from the documents, without, however, offer- 

 ing any proofs of the assertion. 



He laid particular stress on the fact that in No- 

 vember, 1872, Count Arnim had expressed to Count 

 Eulenberg the desire to be admitted to a seat in the 

 House of Lords. 



This was for Prince Bismarck a sure symptom of 

 an insatiable thirst for revenge. 



"You then," he added, ''applied for a long fur- 

 lough and remained here without leave for no other 

 purpose than to intrigue against me in court circles 

 while I was in Varzin, so that I was at last com- 

 pelled to call upon you officially to return to your 

 post." 



" All this," remarks the writer, " is false." 



The above incident is graphically told, but 

 whether it be or be not an objective and thor- 

 oughly trustworthy account of what took place 

 on the occasion is a matter known to two men 

 only, and perhaps not even to them, for it is 

 presumable that they were both in such a state 

 of overwrought excitement as to pay but lit- 

 tle attention to what they said. There seems 

 to be no doubt that Count Arnim conceived 

 himself born for higher things than to be con- 

 tinually executing the orders received from 

 others, and that he really did at one time con- 

 ceive the design of leaping into the Chancllor's 

 seat ; and it is also certain that he was most 

 vigorously pushed by the Conservative party 

 for this position, The writer of " Pro Nihilo " 

 admits that certain acts of imprudence were 

 committed with reference to this matter. In 

 well-informed Berlin circles Arnim was " im- 

 prudently " spoken of as the successor of the 

 sick statesman. And Arnim himself was " im- 

 prudent" enough to lay a printed paragraph to 

 this effect before his subordinate, Herr von Hoi- 

 stein, who, as came out at the trial, was watch- 

 ing Arnim from the Foreign Office in Berlin. 



As an answer to the charge of having wit- 

 tingly thrown obstacles in the way of the con- 



