The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1898-08-11

vas AAiuiSCcI dt LOuuOu JUST aIteI DIS |
marck humiliated Austria. His mother
refused to send him to Heidelberg be-
cause she thought he would get the de- |
testable habit of drinking beer there |
Before he left Berlin he had fought
duel with a Jew Lad named Wolf and
cut off VOLTS spectacles and received |
wipe in the leg. |
He was jolly student and Travelled
through the Harz mountains on foot,
and for throwing a bottle out through
window after breakfast was summoned
before the faculty and came in with his
enormous dog, which caused him to be
fined thalers. He fought about 20
duels at Goettingen and was wounded
only once, showing the scar on his cheek.
He is said never to have attended lee
ture, rather displeased his fastidious
mother, yet he passed his examination
by natural gifts He was full of hard
pranks.
At 20 he was made notary or exam
iner in Berlin and had much to do with
getting divorces. At court ball he met
his future master and king, who was
struck with his tall form and grim coun-
tsnance. "Justice," said Prince Will
liam, ''must seek her advocates accord
ing to their height in the guards" A
favorite cousin once gave him letter to
deliver, which he forgot, and when he
| returned it to her in three weeks he said,
81 did not deliver this in order to entire
| ly cure my cousin of the habit of intrust-
| ing me with letters" Sometimes he
would let a parcel Of young foxes into
| the drawing room.
A man of exalted spirits, to whom the
dry, common life of Prussia was insult
ficient, Bismarck was sure to attain dis
tinction only in some irregular, perhaps
| overbearing, way. He was all the time
| getting ready to be diplomatist, as his
mother desired, and for that reason went
to AK -Chapelle, in the western section
| of Prussia, where there was a special
court but this was a bathing resort, and
| Bismarck fell in with French, Belgians
and Engishmen and went with them
on excursions everywhere. His first rate
English made him favorite with the
young men of that nation. but he got
into many scrapes and consequently had
himself transferred to Potsdam, the old
royal residence. an hours ride from Ber
lin. where after 1888 he went into the
messroom among his fellow guards
His fathers estates were falling to
ruin. and he undertook to hear agricul-
tural lectures The sons took charge of
their parents estates in order to save
them from destruction. He went into
the provincial diet of Pomerania at Stet-
tin. but got tired of its monotony. AS
an agriculturist. however, he showed
some vigor and was rather severe en-
ployer. yet after hard days supervi-
sion he would get on his horse and ride
10 miles to some evening assembly in a
town. He was moody at times from the
want of real domestic life, and some
called him mad Bismarck"
Sometimes, tortured by dark thoughts,
he would dash through the fields in soil
tude and again bring III loud CON-
pany and make night of it, go that tales
were told Of him as if he were some
haunted spirit Sometimes he appeared
to be a Liberal in politics. In this coun-
try solitude at Kniephof, near the Baltic,
however, he read much in every direc-
tion-theology and philosophy as we'll as
history. He studied Spinoza deeply, Wis
tied France and England and had re-
markable impudence with his official su-
periors. The old father died in 1916, and
the sons divided the property, and Bis
marck kept Kniephof and Schoenhausen.
We must understand that Prussia had
undergone complete transformation in
the early part of the present century,
when she recklessly attacked Napoleon
and was overrun by him in one brie1
campaign. He imposed upon her con:
ditions of the hardest character. Hel
western provinces were absorbed in one
of his experimental kingdoms, and hel
army was compelled to be kept at low
standard. Two remarkable men, SteiI
and ScharnLorst, undertook to keep these
conditions and yet raise Prussia to he1
former military rank. They therefore
compelled the whole population to be {
certain period under arms, and this W.!
the commencement of the great militia
system of Prussia, and Bismarcks frs
: prominence in politics was in contendine
against the taxpayers who would no
allow the army to be kept up to an ex
travagant standard at their expense
+ while he meditated recreating Germany
= by driving Austria out Of it and consoli
dating the smaller states, which after tn
, close of the French revolution governed
: the diet at Frankfort, which was some
a what like a weak congress in the United
:, ! States.
In short, throughout Germany, unit
. Bismarck reformed it, there was some
thing like states rights, with diet O
congress at Frankfort, in which Austri'
and Prussia were the two great rivals
to be compared to Virginia and New
York in the story of the United States.
! 1t may also be explained that Ger
many was peculiar among the nations o
= Europe after the conquest of the Romal
Z empire by the Germans whose dlHeren
= tribes and leaders formed nearly ever.
. kingdom in Europe. France pulled ava
from the empire of Charlemagne and LET
. Germany to become the representative Q
the old Roman empire. The German EN-
) perors were also called kings of Rom
and after being elected in a peculiar wa
% generally went to Rome at their convent
:. :. ence to be crowned by the pope.
~ Thus ! mixed military and spiritus
70 empire existed north of the Alps unit
. the time of Luther, when the mino
- princes, feeling the popular inspiratio
- against so much Italian interference i
Germany, went into revolt. Prussl
was the especial country of Luther an
y = remained Protestant and was not muc
= affected, like other parts of Germany an
y all France. by the Calvinistic second re-
g. ormatiOn.
lg A rather compact church was forme
It IN Germany, something like the Estal
h lished church of England, and this a.
go counts for the Lutheran priests ever.
Of where having such close control ovt
s. their congregations and schools. Luths
It is regarded in Germany as the found.
as of the literature, the common languae