e Frederick and his English consort,
had also their Court at the Marmor Palais in Potsdam, and their palace
in Berlin, but the life they led was comparatively simple. The Crown
Prince and Princess were great travellers and consequently often
absent from Germany; and when at home, while the Crown Prince, in his
serious-minded fashion, was absorbed in study, the Crown Princess
divided her time between the practice of the arts and correspondence
with her now grown-up sons and daughters.

Still, it is clear from the signs of the time that there was a good
deal of intrigue going on throughout this pre-accession period, or, if
intrigue is too strong a term for it, a good deal of friction, social
and political, in high circles. It was chiefly caused, if the old
Chancellor's statements to his sycophantic adorer, Busch, are to be
credited, by the interference of the Empress Augusta and her
daughter-in-law, the Crown Princess, in the sphere of politics, the
Empress seeking to influence her husband in favour of the Catholics,
whom she had taken under her protection, and the Crown Princess
trying, as we have seen, to influence German policy in favour of
England.

Exactly what part Prince William took in it all is not very clear. One
thing we know, that he greatly displeased Bismarck by his constant
attendance at the Waldersee _salon_, then a social centre in Berlin.
Countess Waldersee, who is still living in Hannover, was the daughter
of an American banker named Lee. She married Frederick, Prince of
Schleswig, but he died six months after the wedding. His widow
afterwards married Count Waldersee, who was subsequently to command
the international forces during the Boxer troubles in China. Bismarck
detested Waldersee, perhaps because many people spoke of him as his
probable successor, and consequently looked with anything but favour
on his imperial pupil's visit to the Waldersees.

The great figure of the time, however, was neither the Emperor nor the
Crown Prince nor Prince William, but Prince Bismarck, who, as
Chancellor for now more than a quarter of a century, had throughout
that period guided the destinies of Prussia and the German Empire.
Emperor William and Crown Prince Frederick and Prince William were
playing, doubtless, more or less prominent parts on the public stage,
but all things of moment gravitated towards Bismarck, whose days were
spent, now persuading or convincing the Emperor, now warring with a
Parliament grow