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as a 'raving madman' by those who had never taken the trouble to master the truth concerning his motives and actions. Perhaps it may be a far-fetched fancy; but I own to a belief that the personal friendship between these two men, one of whom has already risen so high, and the other of whom seems to have before him a career so full of a brilliant promise, may hereafter become a fact of international importance. At all events, we may be glad that a young man who is steadily though unostentatiously pressing his way to the front should have had his ideas widened, and to a certain extent moulded, by direct personal intercourse with one of the masterminds of Europe.

PRINCE BISMARCK.

VOL. I.

I

[OTTO, PRINCE BISMARCK, was born at Schoenhausen, April 1st, 1815; and married, 1847, Jeanne-Fréderique, daughter of Henri de Puttkamer. Educated at Göttingen and Griefswald. Became a Member of the Diet of the Province of Saxony (Prussia), 1846, and of the General Diet in 1847. In 1851, was appointed Prussian Diplomatic Representative at Frankfort. In March 1859, was sent as Ambassador to St. Petersburg, and, in May 1862, was transferred to Paris. In September of the same year was made Minister of Foreign Affairs for Prussia. Was created a Count in September 1865, and a Prince and Chancellor of the German Empire in 1871.]

PRINCE BISMARCK.

OR at least ten years past Prince Bis

FOR

marck has been the central figure in Europe. Surrounded by subservient flatterers, who have treated him as though he were something better than mortal man, he has also been the mark at which the shafts of a thousand, nay, of a million, venomous antagonists have been shot. No man living probably has so many enemies as the German Chancellor. There is no corner of Europe where his influence has not been felt, and there is hardly a single spot where it has not been felt in an unpleasant way. This

fact must be borne in mind in estimating his character. Whatever may be his faults, it is quite certain that he is not so black as he is painted by some people. Whilst it is the fashion among his admirers to laud him as the greatest statesman of modern times, he is decried as no statesman at all by a not inconsiderable party in the political world. It must be said at once that this party is altogether without reason for its belief.

With

Prince Bismarck is no charlatan. out saying that he has the very highest intellectual endowments, or that he is a master of political economy or of the craft of Machiavelli, I need only point to what he has done within the last fifteen years in order to prove that he is a real statesman of a very high, if not of the highest, order. He found Prussia weak and distracted, verging daily nearer and nearer to Liberalism, and possessing little or no influence in Europe, or even in

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