Part 5 (1/2)

'And, as to guests?'

'Only the Americans of your staff, I think, who have been already presented to the king.'

The announcement that the King of England would take tea with us did not cause a ripple in the household; the servants were used to kings.

King Frederick had a pleasant way of dropping in to tea without ceremony, and the princesses liked our cakes. Besides, Hans, the indispensable Hans, had waited on King Edward frequently, so he knew his tastes. But the king did not come; Prince Hans said that he was tired. He sent an equerry, with a most gracious message for Grover Cleveland, and another inquiry as to his health. The royal cigars lasted a long time as few guests were brave enough to smoke them. The king at the _Cercle_ at court was most gracious. 'I hope to see you in London,' he said. My colleagues seemed to think that his word was law, and that I would be the next amba.s.sador at the Court of St.

James's. I knew very well that his politeness was only to show that he was in a special mood to manifest his regard for the country I represented.

The King of England was failing at the time as far as his bodily health was concerned, but he had what a German observer called 'a good head' in more senses than one. He still took his favourite champagne; his cigars were too big and strong for most men, but not too big and strong for him. He showed symptoms of asthma, but he was alert, and firmly resolved to keep the peace in Europe, and, it was evident--he made it very evident--he was determined to keep on the best terms with the United States. During the pause between the parts of the performance at the Royal Opera House, where we witnessed Queen Alexandra's favourite ballet, _Napoli_, and heard excerpts from _I Poliacci_ and _Cavalleria_, the king renewed the questions about Grover Cleveland's health. Prince Hans suddenly announced that he was dead. As every minister is quite accustomed to having all kinds of news announced before he receives it, I could only conclude that it was true. Several ladies of American birth came and asked me; I could only say, 'Prince Hans says so.' Countess Raben-Levitzau, whose husband was then Minister of Foreign Affairs, seemed to be much amused that I should receive a bit of information of that kind through Prince Hans. Late that night, after the gala was over, a cable came telling me that the ex-President was well. I was glad that I was not obliged to put out the flag at half-mast for the loss of a President whom the whole country honoured, and who had shown great confidence in me at one time.

Prince Hans was full of the sayings and doings of the King of England after his departure. He called him 'Bertie' when absent-minded, recovering to the 'King of England' when he remembered that he was speaking to a stranger. Once, quoting the German Emperor, he said 'Uncle Albert.'

'Denmark will not become part of Germany in the Kaiser's time--”Uncle Albert” will see to that. England will not fight Germany in his time on any question; therefore Russia will not go against us.'

'But the Crown Prince. What of him?'

'”Uncle Albert” will see to that if the Kaiser should die--but life is long. The King of England will cease to smoke so much, and, after that, his health will be good; he has saved us, I will tell you, by defeating at Berlin the designs of the Pan-Germans against Denmark.'

The late King of England had new issues to face, and he knew it. The cause of sane democracy would have been better served had he lived longer. Perhaps he had been, like his brother-in-law, King Frederick of Denmark, crown prince too long. Nevertheless, he had observed, and he was wise. He may have been too tolerant, but he was not weak. In Denmark, one might easily get a fair view of the characters of the royal people. The Danes are keen judges of persons--perhaps too keen, and the members of their aristocracy had been constantly on intimate terms with European kings and princes. 'As for Queen Alexandra,' Miss Knollys once said, 'she will go down in history as the most beautiful of England's queens, but also as the most devoted of wives and mothers. The king makes us all work, but she works most cheerfully and is never bored.'

The visit of the King of England caused more conjectures. What did it mean? A pledge on the part of England that Denmark would be protected both against Germany and Russia? Notwithstanding the opinion that the Foreign Office in England did all the work, the diplomatists held that kings, especially King Edward and the Kaiser, had much to do with it.

CHAPTER IV

SOME DETAILS THE GERMANS KNEW

I gathered that Germany, in 1908, 1909, 1910, was growing more and more furiously jealous of England. To make a financial wilderness of London and reconstruct the money centre of the world in Berlin was the ambition of some of her great financiers.

Our time had not come yet; we might grow in peace. It depended on our att.i.tude whether we should be plucked when ripe or not. If we could be led, I gathered, into an att.i.tude inimical to England, all would be well; but that might safely be left 'to the Irish and the great German population of the Middle West.' It was 'known that English money prevented the development of our merchant marine'; but this, after all, was not to the disadvantage of Germany since, if we developed our marine, it might mean state subsidies to American ocean steamer lines. This would not have pleased Herr Ballin.

Count Henckel-Donnersmarck held no such opinions, but the members of the Berlin _haute bourgeoisie_, who occasionally came to Copenhagen, were firmly convinced that English money was largely distributed in the United States to prejudice our people against the beneficent German Kultur, which, as yet, we were too crude to receive. I gathered, too, that many of the important, the rich business representatives of Germany in our country reported that we were 'only fit to be bled.' We were unmusical, unliterary, unintellectual. We knew not what a gentleman should eat or drink. Our cooking was vile, our taste in amus.e.m.e.nt only a reflection of the English music halls.

We bluffed. We were not virile. The aristocrat did not express these opinions; but the middle cla.s.s, or higher middle cla.s.s, sojourners in our land did. 'Good Heavens!' exclaimed one American at one of our receptions to a German-American guest; 'you eat that grouse from your fists like an animal.'

'I am a male,' answered Fritz proudly; 'we must devour our food--we of the virile race!'

The pretensions of this kind of German were intolerable. He was the most brutal of sn.o.bs. He arrogated to himself a rank, when one met him, that he was not allowed to a.s.sume in his own country. It was often amusing to receive a call from a spurious 'von,' representing German interests in Milwaukee, Chicago, or Cincinnati, who patronised us until he discovered that we knew that he would be in the seventh heaven if he could, by any chance, marry his half-American daughter to the most shop-worn little lieutenant in the German army! To see him shrivel when a veritable Junker came in, was humiliating. I often wondered whether the well-to-do German burghers of St. Louis or Cincinnati were really imposed upon by men of this kind.

The n.o.bles' Club in Copenhagen is not a club as we know clubs. There are chairs, newspapers from all parts of the world, and bridge tables, if you wish to use them. You may even play the honoured game of _l'ombre_--after the manner of Christian IV., or, perhaps, His Lords.h.i.+p, the High Chamberlain Polonius, of the court of his late Majesty, King Claudius. People seldom go there. It is the one place in Denmark where the members of the club are never found.

The country gentlemen have rooms there when they come to town. It is in an annex of the Hotel Phoenix. A few of the best bridge players in Copenhagen meet there occasionally; the rest is silence; therefore it is a safe place for diplomatic conversations.

A very distinguished German came to me with a letter of introduction from Munich, in 1909--late in the year. His position was settled. He was not in the cla.s.s of the spurious 'vons.' He was, however, high in the confidence of the Kings of Saxony and Bavaria, both of whom, he confessed, were displeased because the United States had no diplomatic representatives at their courts. He had been _persona non grata_ with Bismarck because of his father's liberalism; he had been friendly with Windthorst, the Centre leader, and he had been in some remote way connected with the German Legation at the Vatican. We talked of Was.h.i.+ngton in the older days, of Speck von Sternberg[4] and of his charming wife, then a widow in Berlin; of the cleverness of Secretary Radowitz, who had been at the German Emba.s.sy at Was.h.i.+ngton; of the point of view of von Schoen, who had been Minister to Copenhagen. He spoke of the Kaiser's having dined in our apartment, which von Schoen had then occupied; and then he came to the point.

[4] Baron Speck von Sternberg died on May 23rd, 1908.

'Is the United States serious about the Monroe Doctrine--really?' he asked.

'It is an integral part of our policy of defence.'