Chapter III

Reunion and summer joys—Resolved to quit the service—Rudolf’s
training—The end of the war—Conditions of peace—Fresh cares and
ruined fortunes—My husband remains in the service.

After our first expressions of joy had subsided, Frederick told us how he had been left wounded in a peasant’s hut, the regiment marching on and reporting him “missing.” This report had not reached us, and when he was sufficiently recovered he hastened home without waiting to write, for the war was practically at an end. We spent the summer again at father’s country seat, where the entire family assembled, including brother Otto, home from the Military Academy, and Cousin Conrad, whose regiment lay not far away.

I was determined to persuade my husband to quit the service, for we had grown so one in our feelings and interests that what was mine was surely his also, and why, if new wars were again to threaten, need we go through such horrors again?

Besides, Rudolf was now seven years old, and it should be our delight, in our retirement, to educate and train this little man according to our highest ideals. He had never been given over to nurses and tutors, for it was my pride to watch every phase of his development. In his growing appetite for knowledge we had never permitted ourselves to tell him a falsehood, but his questions were not always answered fully enough to suit him. He accompanied us on our daily walks, and often his questions demanded the unknowable, so we answered, “We do not know.” This did not satisfy him, and he used to put these questions to others of whom he received quite decided answers. One day he remarked triumphantly, “You do not know how old the moon is, but I do. It is six thousand years old—remember that.” Frederick and I looked at each other silently, and a whole volume of protest lay in that glance and that silence.

I seriously objected to the soldier games which his grandfather and uncle played with him. Thus the ideas of cutting down the enemy were infused in him without my knowledge. One day Frederick and I came upon him when he was mercilessly beating two puppies with a riding whip.

“You cheating little Italian,” he said, lashing the one puppy. And striking the other he called loudly, “You saucy Dane.” Frederick snatched the whip from his hand: “And you heartless little Austrian,” he said, laying on two or three blows. Rudolf began to blubber, and the Italian and Dane ran joyfully away.

“I hope you are not angry that I struck your boy, Martha; I hate the lash, but I cannot endure seeing an animal abused.”

“Quite right.”

“Only people can be hurt, then?” whimpered the boy.

“That is still worse.”

“But you went out to beat the Italians and Danes.”

“They were our enemies.”

“Then one may hate those?”

Turning away, Frederick said: “And to-morrow the priest will tell him that we must love our enemies. Such logic!” Then to Rudolf: “No, it is not because we hate them that we strike, but because they strike us.”

“Why do they want to strike us?”

“Because we—no, go and play, Rudi,” he interrupted himself, “there is no way out of the tangle. You must never do it again, and we will forgive you.”

We often had distinguished visitors from Vienna. They discussed the political situations, and thus I was enabled to follow the entire Danish engagement to the end. After all these victories it must be decided what would be done with all these Duchies. Would the famous Augustenburg receive his portion? Not at all, for an entirely new pretender claimed it. It was not enough that there was a “Glucksburg” and a “Gotrop” and whatever other lines of succession to lay claim, but Russia presented a new candidate. Against Augustenburg Russia pitted an “Oldenburg.” But finally there were no burgs at all to have the Duchies, but they were to be divided among the allies, and the expenses of the war was to be borne by the defeated. This was hard to understand. The land had been devastated, its harvests trampled under, its sons were mouldering in their graves, and now it must pay the costs. Was not rather some reparation due to them?

One day I opened the conversation: “What news in regard to Schleswig-Holstein?”

“The latest news is, that von Beust has addressed a demand to the Assembly, asking by what right the Allies can accept the surrender of these provinces from a king whose sovereignty has not been recognised by them.”

“And it is a very reasonable question,” I remarked.

“You do not understand these matters, child,” said my father. “It is not reasonable, but an impertinent trick on von Beust’s part. Do not the Duchies belong to us because we have conquered them? We should not have concluded peace, but conquered the whole of Denmark and turned it over to the German Alliance.”

“Why do that, papa, you are such a patriotic Austrian, what do you care for the German Federation?”

“Have you forgotten that our Hapsburgs were German Emperors once, and may become so again?”

“What if some of the great Germans cherished a like dream?” suggested Frederick.

My father laughed outright: “Imagine a Protestant princeling at the head of our Holy Roman Empire! You have lost your senses.”

As Bresser said, “Let us hope that the settling of this affair will not be a source of discord between the powers. For every war has within it the seed of future wars, as one act of violence has led to another since the beginning.”

Some days later a bit of news was reported: King William of Prussia visited our Emperor at Schönbrun. They met with embraces, the Prussian eagle was hoisted, and the Prussian national airs were played, with triumphant hurrahs from the people. I was very happy, for it put to shame the evil prophecies that the two powers might get into a quarrel again. My father rejoiced, for he saw in this alliance a means of reconquering our lost Lombardy.

“Will you tell me,” I cried out to the assembled guests one day, “why do not all the European States form an alliance? Would not that be the simplest way?”

The gentlemen shrugged their shoulders, smiled superior smiles and did not answer. I probably had said one of those silly things with which ladies are apt to venture into the realms of higher politics.

* * * * *

The autumn was at hand; peace had been signed, and Frederick’s retirement from the army could now be carried out. But man proposes and circumstances dispose for him. As a sequel of the war many banking houses failed, and with the rest I lost my private fortune. Shot and shell blast not only the ramparts and forts but also the entire social fabric of family and finance.

My kindest of fathers, however, came to the rescue and saw that I should want for nothing, yet the retirement of my husband from the military had become impossible, for we could not entirely depend on my father. Frederick was too proud for that, and so our beautiful castle in the air was shattered. But one comfort remained: there was nowhere a black spot on the horizon, and peace might last for many years.