MY RECOLLECTIONS OF BISMARCK- 1879-1881 583 



On this we rose and went into the garden. As we stopped 

 for an instant to enable him to take down his military cap, 

 I noticed two large photographs with autographs beneath 

 them, one of Lord Beaconsfield, and the other of King 

 Victor Emmanuel, and, as I glanced at the latter, I no- 

 ticed an inscription beneath it: 



AI mio caro cugino Bismarck. 



VITTORIO EMANUELE. 



Bismarck, seeing me look at it, said : "He calls me 'cousin' 

 because he has given me his Order of the Annunciata." 

 This remark for a moment surprised me. It was hard for 

 me to conceive that the greatest man in Europe could care 

 whether he was entitled to wear the Annunciata ribbon or 

 not, or whether any king called him i ' cousin ' ' or not. He 

 seemed, for a moment, to descend to a somewhat lower 

 plane than that upon which he had been standing ; but, as 

 we came out into the open and walked up and down the 

 avenues in the park, he resumed his discussion of greater 

 things. During this, he went at considerable length into 

 the causes which led to the partial demonetization of silver 

 in the empire; whereupon Mr. Kelly, interrupting him, 

 said: "But, prince, if you fully believed in using both the 

 precious metals, why did you allow the demonetization of 

 silver?" "Well," said Bismarck, "I had a great many 

 things to think of in those days, and as everybody said that 



Camphausen and were great financiers, and that 



they understood all about these questions, I allowed them 

 to go on ; but I soon learned, as our peasants say of those 

 who try to impose upon their neighbors, that they had 

 nothing but hot water in their dinner-pots, after all. ' ' He 

 then went on discussing the mistakes of those and other 

 gentlemen before he himself had put his hand to the work 

 and reversed their policy. There were curious allusions 

 to various individuals whose ideas had not suited him, 

 most of them humorous, but some sarcastic. At last, after 

 a walk of about twenty minutes, bearing in mind the min- 

 isters who had been so long waiting for their chief, I 



