The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria Hungary, Volume I. (of 2) by Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy

M >> Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy >> The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria Hungary, Volume I. (of 2)

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In 1848 she intended to appeal to the Prussian National Assembly for
justice, but the police got wind of it, and she was interned in her
chateau in Silesia. On William becoming King of Prussia, she was given
the alternative of leaving the country or of becoming an inmate of
a lunatic asylum, so she transferred her abode to Paris, and after
living for awhile in London and Geneva, came to New York in 1876.

The truth of this story having been questioned, it may be mentioned
that the Prussian _Staats Anzeiger_, or official Berlin Gazette, of
June 4, 1829, contains the following royal decree:

"By order of his majesty the king, Anna Countess Dohna having claimed
to be the wife of Prince William of Prussia, I hereby decree that such
a union if it ever took place, be null and void.

"FREDERICK WILLIAM, Rex.

"ANTHONY VON ALTENSTEIN,
"Secretary of State."

I have seen it mentioned both in German and foreign publications that
the three Counts of Brandenburg, two of them distinguished generals,
and the third for many years Prussian envoy at Brussels, were the
issue of the union of Countess Anna Dohna and old Emperor William of
Germany. But this is not true; for their father, a famous premier and
soldier, of whom a fine statue exists at Berlin, was the son of
King Frederick-William II. of Prussia, and his morganatic wife, the
Countess of Dohenhoff.

With regard to Count Douglas, I may state that the kaiser's intimacy
with him dates back to many years prior to his accession to the
throne. Like his twin brother, Count Louis Douglas, the Swedish
statesman, who until a few weeks ago occupied the post of minister of
foreign affairs at Stockholm, Count Willie Douglas may be said to have
royal blood in his veins, for his father, old Count Douglas, now dead,
married the morganatic daughter of a royal princess of the reigning
house of Baden. On the old count's death, William, the elder of the
twins, inherited his mother's vast property, while Louis, the younger,
took possession of his father's estates in Sweden.

William was educated in Germany, is an officer of the Prussian army,
as well as a member of the Prussian House of Lords: Louis was brought
up in Sweden, entered the Swedish army, became chamberlain to the
Crown Prince of Sweden, married the daughter of Count Ehrensward, late
minister of foreign affairs at Stockholm, and eventually succeeded to
his father-in-law's post at the head of Sweden's foreign office. Like
his twin brother in Prussia, he is exceedingly conservative, imbued
with the necessity of retaining the old feudal prerogatives, and of
placing every obstacle in the way of the rising tide of democracy.
Indeed, whatever influence he exercises over the King and Crown Prince
of Sweden, is as reactionary as any influence which his German brother
may be said to enjoy over the kaiser.

The Douglas twins are descended from the great Scotch family of
Douglas, and are therefore allied to the Duke of Hamilton and the
Marquis of Queensberry. Their ancestors emigrated to Prussia
from Scotland at the time of the Thirty Years' War, fought under
Gustavus-Adolphus, and afterwards returned with him to Sweden, where
they became members of the Swedish nobility. Count Willie, like his
brother, displays all the hereditary traits of the Scotch house that
bears his name, having the peculiar jaw, falling underlip, and dark
complexion of the celebrated "Black Douglas." Yet neither of the twins
speaks a word of English, nor has ever visited the land of his sire,
though they bear the Douglas motto of "Do or Die." Count Willie has
few British sympathies, but some British tastes, being famous as
a four-in-hand whip, and as a magnificent shot. He is also very
hospitable, and entertains at Berlin in a right royal fashion, his
wealth, derived from the mines which he owns in the Hartz Mountains,
enabling him to do so without hesitation on the score of expense.

It is no secret that Emperor William has, on two or three occasions,
offered a cabinet office to his friend William Douglas, who has,
however, invariably declined it, much to the relief of those who are
convinced that the same peculiar moral and psychological affinity
exists between the Douglas twins as that attributed to the Corsican
brothers. It would have been, they declare, a dangerous experiment to
have had one of them directing the foreign policy of Germany, and the
other that of the kingdoms of Sweden and Norway.

It may interest my American readers to add that a few years ago Count
Willie Douglas was the defendant in an extraordinary lawsuit at Berlin
which had an American end to it. It seems that some thirty years ago a
man of the name of Brandt died in the United States, leaving a fortune
of several millions of dollars. Having no near relatives in America,
the lawyers advertised for any heirs that he might have left
behind him in Germany. The father of Count Douglas was at the time
burgomaster of the little town of Aschersleben, and one day some of
the inhabitants of the place bearing the name of Brandt placed a lot
of papers in his hands, asking him to glance over them, and to see
whether there was any truth in the statement that they were heirs
to an immense fortune in America. The old count, in his capacity of
burgomaster, declared that the affair looked to him very questionable,
that he believed it was a mere swindle, and that there was surely
nothing in it for them. Whether he returned to them the papers or
not, is unknown, but he declared to the day of his death that he had
restored them, whereas the Brandts of Aschersleben swear that he did
not. Eventually, they brought suit against his son, not merely for
the recovery of the documents, but likewise for the fortune, actually
alleging that the latter had been appropriated by old Count Douglas,
with the connivance of the late Prince Bismarck, who had received a
large share of the plunder. It is scarcely necessary to state that
they were non-suited.

Emperor William's intimacy with Count and Countess Goertz may be said
to be a sort of inherited friendship, the count's father, president
of the Hessian House of Lords, and his consort, a princess of
Sayn-Wittgenstein, having been the most intimate friends of Emperor
and Empress Frederick, whose acquaintance they made through the
late Grand Duke and Grand Duchess of Hesse. In order to show the
affectionate relations existing between the parents of the kaiser
and those of the present head of the ancient and illustrious house of
Goertz, it is merely necessary to state that Professor Hintzpeter, who
for a number of years directed the education of Emperor William and
his brother Henry, and who, as their old tutor, retains much influence
over both the imperial brothers, was selected by Emperor and Empress
Frederick for the purpose, on the personal recommendation of the late
Count and Countess Goertz, in whose family he had resided for a number
of years as tutor to their son.

In fact, the present Count Goertz, who is some eight or nine years the
senior of the emperor, can boast, like the latter, of having been
a pupil of old Hintzpeter, who in some respects is the German
counterpart of the late Czar Alexander's tutor, M. Pobietnotzoff.
That William shares the confidence placed by his parents in the Goertz
family is shown by the fact that when he found it necessary, at
one time, to obtain the services of a tutor for one of his young
relatives, in a case, it must be added, of particular delicacy, he
at once nominated to the post Professor Krenge, who at the time was
tutoring the sons of the present Count Goertz. Countess Goertz is a
woman of great beauty, which she may be said to have inherited from
her mother, the so-celebrated Countess of Villeneuve, wife to the
Brazilian envoy to the Court of Brussels, and renowned throughout
Europe on account of her loveliness.

Although the admiration which the kaiser displays for the fascinating
countess is of the most undisguised character, it fails to excite the
jealousy either of his consort or the count, and the relations between
the empress and the countess are so close that the former has been
known to lend to her friend articles of jewelry, and even of dress,
for use at fancy dress balls and elsewhere. The emperor and the count
are also as united and unrestrained with each other as two men can be
who have the same tastes, who have been intimately acquainted since
childhood, and whose parents have been close friends before them. It
is doubtful whether William ever enjoys himself so much, or feels so
thoroughly at home, as when visiting the Goertzes at Schlitz. There
his days are spent in shooting and hunting with the count, and the
evenings in composing new melodies, and setting songs to music with
the countess. The emperor's children and the young Goertzes are bound
by equal ties of affection, and are old-time playmates, so that there
seems every likelihood of this friendship between the Hohenzollerns
and the former reigning sovereign house of Goertz being continued in
the third generation.

No account of the emperor's private life can be properly written
without including a brief sketch of General Count von Hahnke, and of
Baron von Lucanus. The former is the chief of the military cabinet of
the emperor, and the other is at the head of his civil cabinet, that
is to say, he occupies the post of principal private secretary. Both
of them accompany the emperor wherever he goes, and in fact constitute
his very shadow, enjoying by reason of their proximity to the
sovereign, and by their close association with him, a far greater
degree of power and influence than any cabinet minister.

Baron Lucanus is an extremely good-looking man, whose popular nickname
at Berlin, namely, "the emperor's Blackie Man," is in nowise due to
any swarthiness of complexion, but to the fact that among the great
dignitaries in attendance on the emperor, he is the only one in
civilian attire, while moreover he is invariably selected by the
sovereign to convey to any cabinet minister, whose resignation is
required, the imperial intimation "_that he has ceased to please_."

It was Baron von Lucanus who communicated to Prince Bismarck the
emperor's request and subsequent peremptory command for the surrender
of the chancellorship of the empire, and it was he, too, who was
sent to ask Bismarck's successor, General Count Caprivi, for his
resignation; in fact, there has not been a single ministerial head
to fall during the last ten years--and they have been very numerous
during the present reign--where Herr von Lucanus has not been the
imperial emissary of these evil tidings. This is so well known
in Berlin that the moment the baron is seen to be calling at the
residence of any distinguished statesman who happens to be in office,
it is at once taken for granted that the axe has once more fallen, and
that it is another case of a ministerial downfall.

The Berliners declare that Emperor William pitches upon Lucanus
for these particular jobs in consequence of his being the son of a
Halberstadt druggist, and as such, more likely to be proficient in the
art of sugar-coating the bitter pills than any mere military officer!
He owes his patent of nobility to the late Emperor Frederick, who
entertained a very high opinion of his intelligence, and it is worthy
of note that he first came to the fore in the entourage of the emperor
when Prince Bismarck's power as chancellor commenced to wane. He is
a man of about fifty, and served for a quarter of a century in the
Department of Public Worship. It was, however, as an expert in art
matters, and as an intelligent assistant in the organization of the
Imperial Museum of Science and Art at Berlin, that he first attracted
the notice and good-will of the late emperor, and particularly of the
Empress Frederick.

His military colleague, General Count von Hahnke, although a charming
man, is, nevertheless, one of the most bitterly-hated officers of the
German army; this is due to the fact that he has virtually usurped
the prerogatives and the power of the minister of war, who has been
reduced to a mere instrument of his wishes. This is not altogether the
fault of the general, for the emperor insists on retaining absolute
control of the army in his own hands, and of exercising its command in
every particular, no appointment being made without his initiative
and sanction, while everything is done through Count Hahnke as supreme
head of the military cabinet of his majesty.

A few years ago the general lost his son under singularly tragical and
somewhat mysterious circumstances. The misfortune occurred during
one of the annual yachting trips of the kaiser, young Hahnke being a
lieutenant on board the yacht. According to the official version, the
young officer met with his death while coasting down a mountain road
at one of the Norwegian ports at which the yacht had touched, his
bicycle getting beyond his control, and precipitating itself with its
rider over a low stone parapet into a fierce torrent hundreds of feet
below. The emperor happened at the time to have a bruise on the face,
caused by a block and tackle swinging against him during a squall,
while on deck, and on the strength of this temporary disfigurement,
a story most painful to the emperor was circulated to the effect that
his black eye was due to a blow from young Hahnke, who resented some
indignity in connection with the practical jokes and rough horse-play
so frequent on board the _Hohenzollern_ during the emperor's annual
holiday. It was added that the young officer had been given by
military and naval etiquette the alternative of blowing out his
brains, or of taking his life in some other way, as the only means of
saving his name from disgrace and his honor from loss; and a certain
degree of color was given to the tale by the fact that it was
published at full length in a London society newspaper, at the very
time when its proprietor and editor was sojourning at Marienbad with
the Prince of Wales, and in daily intercourse with the British heir
apparent, who was naturally supposed to know the truth about young
Hahnke's death. Perhaps the most striking and convincing evidence of
the absurd fabrication of this story, which has given much sorrow,
both to the emperor and empress, is to be found in the fact that the
young officer's father remained at the head of the emperor's military
cabinet, and has never abandoned, even temporarily, his service near
the kaiser; this the general would certainly not have done had William
been in any sense of the word responsible for the death of his boy.
In fact it was the kindly and tactful sympathy of both the emperor
and the empress that enabled the bereaved father to bear his loss
with fortitude, and his gratitude for the kindness shown to him by his
sovereign is of a deep and undying quality.

CHAPTER VIII

Great is the contrast between the Court of Berlin to-day and the
aspect which it presented during the closing years of the reign of old
Emperor William, and were any of the latter's familiars to return to
the place where so much of their existence had been spent, they would
indeed find themselves amidst strange surroundings and strange faces.
In those days, grey and white hair were the rule rather than the
exception. To-day the contrary is the case, and not merely do
the dignitaries of the court and of the army belong to a younger
generation, but also the members of the imperial circle, that is to
say, the princes and princesses of the blood, with whom the emperor
and empress associate as kinsfolk and near relatives.

The few older members of the reigning house of Prussia who
survive--the contemporaries of the grandfather and father of William
II.--find the atmosphere of the court so different from what they have
been accustomed to in the past, so out of keeping with their ideas--in
one word, feel themselves so little at home there, that they prefer to
stay away as much as they can. Thus Prince Albert of Prussia, one of
the grandest looking soldiers of the imperial army, and certainly one
of the most gigantic in stature, divides his time between Brunswick,
where he holds a court of his own as regent, and England, where he
is accustomed to spend his holidays. The widowed Princess
Frederick-Charles lives nearly all the year round in Italy with
her chamberlain, Baron Wangenheim, whom she is understood to have
morganatically married, and in whose company she occasionally visits
the pope, a circumstance which has led to the rumor that she has
joined the Church of Rome. The widowed Empress Frederick is either
at her lovely castle of Kronberg, near Homburg, which is stocked from
garret to cellar with those art treasures of which she is one of the
finest _connaisseuses_ in Europe, or else is traveling about in Italy,
Austria or England. Indeed the only contemporary of the old Emperor
who still remains at Berlin, and who is occasionally to be seen at
court, giving one the impression of a spectre of the past, is
Prince George, who bears a startling resemblance to the old kaiser
particularly when arrayed in uniform.

While slightly eccentric, he is remarkably accomplished, and has not
only written a number of German plays over the pen-name of "George
Conrad," which have been successfully staged in Germany, but is even
the author of a drama written in the purest and most exquisitely
correct French, sparkling with Parisian wit and brilliancy, which has
had long runs in many theatres without either the actors or the public
being aware that it was from the pen of a prince of Prussia.

Until the war of 1870, Prince George was on terms of the utmost
intimacy with the de Goncourts, the Dumases, de Girardin, and all
the principal literary lights of France, with whom he was wont to
foregather on a footing of artistic equality each year at Ems, a
German watering-place much frequented by the French prior to the great
struggle of 1870; of course, since that time his intercourse with
French people has been much more restricted, and through a feeling
of delicacy and tact, with which he is not usually credited, he has
refrained from visiting Paris, or even from setting his foot on French
territory since the war. This, however, has not prevented him from
keeping himself _au courant_ of every literary and dramatic event that
takes place on the banks of the Seine, and a French academician of
my acquaintance who was presented to him last summer at Ems, and
who spent several days there in his company, could not sufficiently
express his amazement, not merely at the extraordinary purity of the
prince's French, but likewise at the amazing manner in which he seems
to have kept track of everything that has happened at Paris in the
world of letters and art, as well as of the French idioms, figures of
speech, and even witticisms of the present day.

The delicacy which Prince George manifests with regard to the
French people, and his fear lest his admiration for them should be
misinterpreted, is largely due to the treatment that he received at
the hands of Empress Eugenie at Carlsbad, in 1874 or 1875. Having
been a frequent and welcome guest at the Tuileries during the reign of
Napoleon III., the prince, when he found that the widowed empress had
arrived at Carlsbad, and had taken up her residence at the very hotel
at which he was staying, naturally considered that he could not do
otherwise than take some notice of her presence; if he affected to
ignore her, he would have exposed himself to the reproach of gross
discourtesy; at the same time he felt that any public form of
attention might prove unwelcome to her, and might possibly serve to
impair her son's prospects of recovering his father's throne; so he
contented himself with sending her every day magnificent baskets of
flowers, and with bowing to her with the utmost deference, but without
attempting to accost her when he met her in the gardens or park. He
likewise caused it to be intimated to her secretary, M. Pietri, that
if at any moment she felt disposed to accord him an audience, he would
be only too glad of the opportunity to "lay his homage at the feet of
her majesty." That was all. Yet such as it was, the empress managed to
turn it to political account, for she suddenly left Carlsbad, making
it known throughout France, by means of the press, that she had been
compelled to quit the baths, and to interrupt the cure, in consequence
of the undesirable attentions which Prince George of Prussia persisted
in forcing upon her. Naturally, the newspapers made the most of her
story, and were filled with denunciations and abuse of the prince,
some of the sheets asserting, by way of explanation of his
conduct, that he was mentally unbalanced, his mother having been an
acknowledged lunatic, and his brother. Prince Alexander, an imbecile.
Nothing can be further from the truth. It cannot be denied that he
has a few harmless and kindly eccentricities which would attract no
attention whatever in an ordinary septuagenarian, but which excite
comment merely by reason of his rank as a prince of the blood. He is
a gentle, brilliantly accomplished, chivalrous old fellow, without
an enemy in the world, and is a great favorite with the emperor's
children, who will deeply miss him when he passes over to the
majority, and is laid to rest in the family vault of the house of
Hohenzollern.

With this exception, the princes and princesses of the blood of the
Court of Berlin are all of much the same age as the emperor. They
comprise Prince Henry, his only brother, who is due home from China in
the spring of 1900, and his consort, Princess Irene of Hesse, sister
of the young czarina. Then there is Prince Frederick-Leopold, the
extremely wealthy son of Prussia's celebrated cavalry general, Prince
Frederick-Charles, to whom belonged the credit of taking the French
stronghold of Metz, in the war of 1870. He is married to a younger
sister of the empress, and is, therefore, not only the cousin, but
likewise the brother-in-law of the kaiser.

Prince Adolph, of Schaumburg-Lippe, although nominally stationed at
Bonn, is also accustomed to spend the entire season at Berlin, with
his wife, Princess Victoria of Prussia, a sister of the kaiser. The
latter is credited with the intention of investing Prince Adolph with
the regency of Brunswick, should it be vacated by Prince Albert, or
else of appointing him Viceroy of Alsace-Lorraine. Princess Aribert
of Anhalt and her husband, too, are very conspicuous figures in the
imperial circle, the princess being a special favorite of the kaiser.
She is his first cousin, being the offspring of Queen Victoria's
daughter Helena, who married Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein,
the guardian of the present empress, who spent much of her girlhood
in England with Prince and Princess Christian, so that her friendship
with Princess Aribert may be said to date from childhood. Duke
Ernest-Gunther of Schleswig-Holstein, the only brother of the empress,
has quieted down to a great extent since his marriage a year ago to
Princess Dorothy of Coburg, and inasmuch as his eighteen-year-old wife
appears to be supremely happy, there is every reason to believe that
he has demonstrated the truth of the good old adage, according to
which "reformed rakes make the best husbands!" The only daughter of
the King of Wurtemberg has made her home at Potsdam and at Berlin
since her marriage to the Prince of Wied, and as she is not only the
cousin, but likewise the most intimate friend of the young Queen
of Holland, the kaiser finds considerable political advantage in
lavishing tokens of his affection and regard upon both her and her
husband.

Another young couple belonging to the Court of Berlin are Prince and
Princess William of Hohenzollern. The princess is a daughter of the
Sicilian branch of the house of Bourbon, while her husband is the
eldest son of that Leopold of Hohenzollern, on account of whose
election to the throne of Spain in 1870, France embarked upon her
disastrous war with Germany. Young Prince William of Hohenzollern, it
may be added, figured for a time as Crown Prince of Roumania, and as
heir to the throne of his uncle, King Charles; but after living
for some time at Bucharest, he came to the conclusion that life in
Roumania as crown prince was infinitely less agreeable than that of
a scion of the house of Hohenzollern at Berlin, so he renounced his
rights to the Roumanian throne, and came back to Berlin to live.

His younger brother, Charles of Hohenzollern, divides his time between
Berlin and Potsdam; he is married to Princess Josephine of Belgium,
daughter of that Count of Flanders, who is brother and next heir to
King Leopold. Besides these, there are Prince and Princess Albert
of Saxe-Altenburg, and several other young couples belonging to the
junior sovereign houses of the German empire, who prefer to make
their home at Berlin, and at Potsdam, rather than in the smaller and
infinitely less brilliant capitals of their respective countries.
Moreover, it has now become the fashion among the various non-Prussian
rulers of the German Confederation, to send the junior members of
their families--the young men--to Berlin for a time, in order to
complete their military education under the eyes of the kaiser, and
to be in touch with that general staff which is virtually the Supreme
Council of War of the German army.

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