ted Staats-minister, and a
week later thunders out his famous blood-and-iron speech. On October
the 8th, 1862, he is definitely named Minister President and Minister
for Foreign Affairs.

William I had succeeded his brother as king. He was a soldier and a
believer in the army, and wished to spend more on it, and to lengthen
the time of service with the colors to three years. The legislature
opposed these measures. A minister was needed who could bully the
legislature, and Bismarck was chosen for the task. He spent the
necessary money despite the legislative opposition, pleading that a
legislature that refused to vote necessary supplies had ipso facto
laid down its proper functions, and the king must take over the
responsibilities of government that they declined to exercise. The
cavalry boots were beginning to trample their way to Paris, and to the
crowning of an emperor.

In February, 1864, Prussia and Austria together declare war upon
Denmark over the Schleswig-Holstein succession. They agree to govern
the spoils between them, but fall out over the question of their
respective jurisdiction, and the Prussian army being ready, and the
Moltke plan of campaign worked out, war is declared, and in seven
weeks the Treaty of Prague is signed, in 1866, by which Austria gives
up all her rights in Schleswig-Holstein, and abandons her claim to
take part in the reorganization of Germany. The North German
Confederation is formed to include all lands north of the Main;
Schleswig-Holstein, Hanover, the Hesse states, Nassau, and Frankfurt-am-
Main become part of Prussia; and the south German states agree to remain
neutral, but allies of Prussia in war.

On the 11th of March, 1867, a month after the formation of the
Confederation of the North German States, Bismarck proclaims with
pride in the new Reichstag: "Setzen win Deutschland, so zu sagen, in
den Sattel! Reiten wird es schon koennen!"

October 13th, 1868, Leopold von Sigmaringen, a German prince of the
House of Hohenzollern, is named for the first time as a candidate for
the Spanish throne. Nobody in Germany, or anywhere else, was much more
interested in this candidature, than we are now interested in the
woman's suffrage or the prohibition candidate at home. But France had
looked on with jealous eyes at the vigorous growth and martial
successes of Prussia. It was thought well to attack her and humiliate
her before she became stronger. All France was convinced, too, that
th