* “The Crown Prince and the German Imperial Crown,” by Gustav Freytag, p. 27.
More important still is this remark on the following page: “The idea of the German Empire grew out of princely pride in his soul; it became an ardent wish, and I think he was the originator and motive power of this innovation.”
The fact that it was Frederic who conceived the idea of the Empire first came to the world when Dr. Geffcken printed that famous portion of the Crown Prince’s diary which led to prosecutions and infinite scandal. Freytag’s subsequent publication surrounds the fact with most curious minutiae of detail.
As early as August 1st, before his Third Army had even crossed the Rhine, Frederic had broached the idea of an empire, with Prussia at its head. All through the campaign which followed his head was full of it. He busied his mind with questions of titles, precedence, &c., to grow out of the new creation. One afternoon--August 11th--he strolled on the hillside with Freytag for a talk. “He had put on his general’s cloak so that it fell around his tall figure like a king’s mantle, and had thrown around his neck the gold chain of the Hohenzollern order, which he was not wont to wear in the quiet of the camp--and paced elated along the village green. Filled with the importance which the emperor idea had for him, he evidently adapted his external appearance to the conversation.” During this talk he asked what the new title of the King of Prussia should be, and the anti-imperialist Freytag suggested Duke of Germany. Then “the Crown Prince broke out with emphasis, his eyes flashing: ‘No! he must be Emperor!’” * To create this empire Frederic was quite ready to forcibly coerce the Southern German States. Bismarck and William I., whom we think of as rough, hard, arbitrary men, shrank from even considering such a course. To the enthusiastic and slightly unreal Frederic it seemed the most natural thing in the world. The account in his diary of the long interview of Nov. 16, 1870, with Bismarck makes all this curiously clear. “What about the South Germans? Would you threaten them, then?” asks the Chancellor. “Yes, indeed!” answers our ideal constitutional Frederic, with a light heart. The interview was protracted and stormy, Bismarck ending it by resort to his accustomed trick of threatening to resign, a well-worn device which twenty years later was to be used just once too often.