BtiLOW 



996 



BULWER-LYTTON 



Von Billow was born in Holstein, at that 

 time still under Danish rule. His family had 

 been politically prominent for several genera- 

 tions, and his father, though originally in the 

 Danish service, later entered the service of 

 Prussia, and from 1873 until his death in 1879 

 was Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. 

 His son was naturally destined for a public 

 career, and after serving in the army during 

 the Franco-German War, entered the German 

 Foreign Office. He was in turn secretary of 

 legation at Rome, Petrograd and Vienna, and 

 was charge d'affaires at Athens during the 

 Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78. He was a sec- 

 retary at the Congress of Berlin, at which his 

 father was one of the three Prussian represen- 

 tatives. After further service in Petrograd and 

 Paris he became minister to Rumania in 1888 

 and ambassador to Italy in 1893. Four years 

 later he was recalled to become Secretary of 

 State for Foreign Affairs, and in 1900 suc- 

 ceeded Hohenlohe as Chancellor of the Empire. 



In the former position he was active in car- 

 rying out Germany's desire for colonial ex- 

 pansion, and as Chancellor he was particularly 

 skilful in holding together the heterogeneous 

 parties in the Reichstag and adroit in inter- 

 preting to the world the policies of the govern- 

 ment. In 1905 von Billow won a notable tri- 

 umph in the negotiations with France con- 

 cerning Morocco, and three days after the 

 resignation of Delcasse he was raised to the 

 rank of prince (Fiirst). Although the Chan- 

 cellor is not legally responsible to the German 

 Parliament, von Billow resigned in 1909 when 

 his budget, including proposals for tax reforms, 

 was defeated by the Reichstag. 



Bti'LOW, HANS GUIDO VON (1830-1894), a 

 famous German musician, one of the greatest 

 pianists and orchestra conductors of his cen- 

 tury. He was born in Dresden and began to 

 study music at the age of nine. It was many 

 years later, however, before he made up his 

 mind to follow music as a profession, for at 

 one time he expected to become a lawyer. In 

 the year 1850 he attended a magnificent pro- 

 duction of Wagner's Lohengrin, at Weimar, and 

 at that time resolved himself to become a 

 musician. Soon after this he went to Zurich 

 to study under Wagner, whose genius he wor- 

 shiped all .his life, and later he was taught by 

 Liszt at Weimar. 



Billow's public career began with a concert 

 tour of Germany and Austria, in the year 1853. 

 For many years afterward he traveled widely, 

 giving orchestra concerts in the various Euro- 



pean countries and in America. He also held 

 several important positions, being at different 

 times head professor in a leading conservatory 

 of Berlin, conductor of the royal opera in 

 Munich, and court conductor to the Duke of 

 Meiningen. The Meiningen orchestra, which 

 he took with him on numerous tours, became 

 the most famous in all Germany. His work as 

 a conductor was remarkable because of his 

 attention to details and his masterly interpre- 

 tation of the music. His memory, too, was 

 marvelous, and he used notes neither in con- 

 ducting nor in playing. 



Billow was one of the best authorities on 

 Beethoven, and published an edition of the 

 latter's works for the piano. His own com- 

 positions include the music to Shakespeare's 

 Julius Caesar; a musical ballad entitled The 

 Minstrel's Curse; a symphonic poem, Nirwana, 

 and numerous songs, choruses and pieces for 

 the piano. His fame as a composer, however, 

 is secondary to that as a pianist and con- 

 ductor. 



BUL'RUSH, a rush-like plant of the marshes, 

 common in Europe and America. The creep- 

 ing root has astringent properties and was at 

 one time used in medicine, but is now aban- 

 doned in favor of more effective remedies. 

 The round, almost leafless stems, from two to 

 ten feet high and bearing a few small, brown 

 flowers near the top, are the most useful part 

 of the plant. The little ark of bulrushes which 

 the mother of Moses made in which to hide 

 him in the marshes indicates the very old his- 

 tory of the plant. The stems are used in mak- 

 ing chair bottoms, mats, etc., and in California 

 a common variety is employed in covering 

 wine bottles for packing. See HORSETAIL RUSH. 



BULWER-LYTTON, bul'wer lit'un, EDWARD 

 GEORGE EARLE, first LORD LYTTON (1803-1873), 

 an English novelist whose most enduringly 

 popular work was The Last Days of Pompeii. 

 Others of his historical novels are Rienzi and 

 The Last of the Barons, while his "novels of 

 manners," so-called, include Pelham, his first 

 successful work, Ernest Maltravers, The Cax- 

 tons and My Novel. Theatrical as these all 

 are in places, and affected in style as well as 

 in sentiment, they were widely read at the 

 time and have continued to have a general 

 vogue because they have stories of interest to 

 tell. Bulwer wrote plays also, and two of 

 them, The Lady of Lyons and Money, have 

 not yet been dropped from the stage. From 

 another play, Richelieu, came the two best- 

 known quotations from Bulwer: 



