CHAPTER XX.

Napoleon III. Plans the Overthrow of Prussian Dominion. Vacant Throne in Spain. A Hohenzollern Candidate. Benedetti and King William. War Declared by France. Metz. Sedan. King William at Versailles. Crowned Hereditary Emperor of the German Empire. Death of Emperor William I. Emperor Frederick. His Unfulfilled Dreams and his Death. William II. Emperor.

CHAPTER XX.

There was a man in France to whom these overturnings were especially distasteful. Napoleon III., sitting in brand-new splendor upon his newly created throne, was industriously engaged in building up an empire and a reputation upon Napoleonic lines. These lines of course were despotic. So the triumph of liberalism in Germany, the creation of a new political power with Austria and despotism cast out, was a severe blow to his policy and to his prestige. It weakened him in Europe, where he aspired to headship, and at home, where he should be considered invincible, not alone in arms, but in statecraft.

The Crimea, Magenta, and Solferino had been splendid decorations to his reign; but they looked tame and insignificant since this transforming Seven Weeks' War. Then, too, his magnificent scheme of an empire in Mexico, with a Hapsburg ruling under a French protectorate--that had miserably failed. And now there had suddenly arisen, as if out of the ground, a new political Germany, which rivaled France in strength. Frenchmen began to ask whether this man was, after all, such a great leader, and destined to wear the mantle of his uncle!

Obviously the thing to do was to recover his waning prestige by a splendid victory over this new power of which Prussia was the head.

If the Emperor had any misgivings they were swept away by the beautiful Empress Eugenie, who, intensely Catholic, saw in the ascendency of Protestant Prussia, and the humiliation of Catholic Austria, an impious blow at the Catholic faith in Europe.

So the war was determined upon. Only one obstacle existed. There was nothing to fight about! But that could be overcome, and in 1870 a pretext was found.

Queen Isabella had been expelled from Spain, and there existed that perennial source of disturbance in Europe, a vacant Spanish throne. From among the several candidates, Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern, a relative of William I. of Prussia, was chosen.

The French ambassador Benedetti received instant orders to demand of King William that he should prohibit Prince Leopold from accepting the offer.

The King made answer that "not having advised it, he could not forbid it." However, to the disappointment of the Emperor, the Hohenzollern prince voluntarily declined, and the way to a war seemed closed again.

But the Empress Eugenie was intent upon her object, and the war-fever had taken deep hold upon the people of France. So the fateful dispatch was sent to Benedetti--"Be rough to the King."

The kindly old King William was peacefully sunning himself at Ems, when the ambassador discourteously approached him and made an abrupt demand for a guarantee that no Hohenzollern should ever occupy the throne of Spain. The words and the manner were offensive--as they were intended to be.

The King, recognizing an intended impertinence, without replying turned away and left Benedetti standing. Here was the opportunity. The telegraph swiftly bore the news that the French ambassador had been publicly insulted by the King of Prussia. France was in a blaze of indignation. These Prussians should be taught that the great French Empire was not to be insulted with impunity.

Not a shadow of doubt existed as to the result. The French army was invincible, and the southern German states would be glad at the deliverance. They would welcome an invading army, and perhaps Hesse and Hanover also would revolt and the new Prussian confederation would fall to pieces in their hands. The birthday of Napoleon I., the 15th of August, must be celebrated in Berlin!

Such were the wild expectations when the French army moved, bearing away with it the boy Prince Imperial, that he might witness for himself his father's triumphs, and receive an object lesson, as it were, in avenging insult to the imperial dignity, which would one day be in his keeping!

This was the way it looked in France. How was it in Germany? There was no north and no south German. Men and states sprang together as a unit, showing how vital was the bond which had existed only for four years. It was no longer a German race combining with a common purpose, but a German nation instinct with one life, and solemnly resolved to defend it or to perish. In only eleven days an army of four hundred and fifty thousand soldiers was under the command of Moltke, with the Crown Prince Frederick William leading one of the three great divisions.

In less than three weeks, instead of waging an aggressive war in Germany, the French were fighting for their existence on their own soil.

In less than a month the French Emperor was a prisoner, and in seven months his empire was swept out of existence; the Germans were in Paris--and King William, Unser Fritz, Bismarck, and Von Moltke were quartered at Versailles.

France had given up Alsace and Lorraine, had agreed to pay an indemnity of five thousand millions of francs, and was glad to have peace even at that price!

The surrenders of Metz (August 4), and of Sedan (September 2), were monumental disasters, and history would be searched in vain for such a crushing defeat of a proud and strong nation as was consummated by the Treaty of Peace signed at Paris on the 10th of May, 1871.

Even the three southern states, Bavaria, Wurtemberg, and Baden, had participated in this Franco-Prussian war. So the last barrier to a completed union was removed, and a dramatic climax occurred in the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles on the 18th of January, 1871.

In that very hall where Richelieu, and Louis XIV., and Louis XV. had schemed to entangle and cripple and rob Germany, and where Napoleon I. had plotted the destruction of the German Empire, Ludwig II., King of Bavaria, in the name of the rest of the German states, laid their united allegiance at the feet of King William of Prussia, begging him to assume the crown and with it the title of "Hereditary Emperor of the German Empire."

It is a curious fact that Bavaria, which had always been a thorn in the side of the Empire, which from the time of the first Duke Welf had stood for all that was conservative and despotic and reactionary, should have taken the initiative in the final act which set a seal upon the triumph of liberalism in Germany. It was recompense full and ample for the trouble she had given in the past!

The return to Germany was a march of triumph. The popular enthusiasm knew no bounds. It was less than ten years since those days of gloom and depression. What a change had been wrought! Was it all done by blood and iron? They had been mighty factors certainly, but they had been used by a masterful intelligence, which had also recognized the power of patriotism. The empire which was immediately organized was simply a renewal of the North German Union.

The dream of Hermann had at last been realized. There was a United Germany.

When in 1888 Emperor William I. sank under the weight of years and the crown rested upon the head of his son Frederick, that adored prince was no longer in the full tide of victorious youth, but being borne by a swiftly ebbing tide beyond the reach of earthly honors. He was a stricken and indeed a dying man when the opportunity came to carry out the policy he had intended for Germany.

What that policy was we shall never know, nor whether it would have been a safe and a wise one. We are sure it would have been beneficent, for no gentler, kindlier prince ever had power and opportunity.

The distrust of him manifested by the conservative party, and notably by Bismarck, and one still nearer to him, leads us to believe that he leaned too strongly toward the ideal of the patriots of 1860. But we shall never know. We can only conjecture whether in Frederick's death Germany escaped a danger or missed an opportunity.

The unseemly dissensions, the heartbreaking complications, which tormented this dying man make one of the saddest chapters in history; and his reign of five months can scarcely be matched in suffering. At last it was ended. The untarnished soul and tortured body parted company, and William II. reigned in his stead.

It is not the province of history to pass judgment upon the living. When the young Emperor William II. dismissed his great chancellor, he assumed the full responsibility of his empire. Whether he has the intelligence and the wisdom required to control, unaided, the forces at home, or to guide his bark amid the whirl of European currents, later histories will tell.

But one thing is very certain. Time spent to-day in riveting antiquated chains upon Germany is time thrown away; and the ruler who desires his work to be permanent must turn his back upon medievalism and must realize that the true source of abiding power in his country is that sentiment which emancipated her from Napoleon in 1814, and which in 1871 made of her a UNITED GERMANY.

THE END.