was free from the feminine influence, the sense of honor of
the heir of Frederick the Great and of a Prussian officer always
remained paramount. Against the opposition of his consort, due to her
natural feminine timidity and lack of national feeling, the King's
power of resistance was weakened by his knightly regard for the lady
and his kingly consideration for a Queen, and especially for his own
Queen. I have been told that Queen Augusta implored her husband with
tears, before his departure from Ems to Berlin, to bear in mind Jena
and Tilsit and avert war. I consider the statement authentic, even to
the tears.

Having decided to resign, in spite of the remonstrances which Roon
made against it, I invited him and Moltke to dine with me alone on the
13th, and communicated to them at table my views and projects for
doing so. Both were greatly depressed, and reproached me indirectly
with selfishly availing myself of my greater facility for withdrawing
from service. I maintained the position that I could not offer up my
sense of honor to politics, that both of them, being professional
soldiers and consequently without freedom of choice, need not take the
same point of view as a responsible Foreign Minister. During our
conversation I was informed that a telegram from Ems, in cipher, if I
recollect rightly, of about 200 "groups," was being deciphered. When
the copy was handed to me it showed that Abeken had drawn up and
signed the telegram at his Majesty's command, and I read it out to my
guests,[36] whose dejection was so great that they turned away from
food and drink. On a repeated examination of the document I lingered
upon the authorization of his Majesty, which included a command,
immediately to communicate Benedetti's fresh demand and its rejection
both to our ambassadors and to the press. I put a few questions to
Moltke as to the extent of his confidence in the state of our
preparations, especially as to the time they would still require in
order to meet this sudden risk of war. He answered that if there was
to be war he expected no advantage to us by deferring its outbreak;
and even if we should not be strong enough at first to protect all the
territories on the left bank of the Rhine against French invasion, our
preparations would nevertheless soon overtake those of the French,
while at a later period this advantage would be diminished; he
regarded a rapid outbreak as, on the whole, more favorable to us than
delay.