to be advised by her in political matters.
It was during the so-called "reign of the baroness" that the kaiser
showed such an extraordinary degree of favor to his Polish subjects as
to excite the jealousy and ill-will of the people in many other parts
of his dominions. He reestablished the Polish language in the schools
and churches of Posen, that is of Prussian-Poland, nominated a Polish
ecclesiastic to the archbishopric of that province, and conferred so
many court dignities, government offices, and decorations upon the
compatriots of the fair Jenny, as to give rise to the remark that the
best road to imperial preferment at Berlin was to add the Polish and
feminine termination of "ska" to one's name. Old Prince Bismarck, who
was at the time at daggers-drawn with his young sovereign, at length
gave public utterance to the popular ill-will, excited by the role
of Egeria, which the baroness was accused of playing to the "Numa
Pompilius" of Emperor William. For, in the course of an address
delivered by the old ex-chancellor at Friedrichsrueh, and reproduced in
extenso in the press, he declared among other things that: "The Polish
influence in political affairs increases always in the measure that
some Polish family obtains of more or less influence at Court. I need
not allude here to the role formerly played by the princely house of
Radziwill. To-day we have exactly the same state of affairs, which
is to be deplored!" Bismarck's allusion to the Radziwills was an
ungenerous reference to the romantic attachment of old Emperor William
for that Princess Elize Radziwill, whom he was so determined to marry
that he offered his father to abandon his rights of succession to the
throne on her account. This King Frederick-William would not permit,
and William was compelled to wed Goethe's pupil, Princess Augusta
of Saxe-Weimar. A loveless match in every sense of the word, for he
remained until the day of Princess Elize's death her most devoted
friend and admirer, seeking her advice in many a difficulty, to the
great annoyance of Prince Bismarck, who detested her, and after her
death the old emperor continued to show the utmost favor and good-will
to the members of her family in honor of her memory. Of course this
speech of Prince Bismarck created no end of a sensation throughout the
empire, as well as abroad, the press being encouraged thereby to
print in cold type what had until that time been merely whispered
in official and court