General Bronsart von Schellendorf similarly resigned the War Ministry. He was a descendant of one of the large colony of Huguenot families which took refuge in Berlin after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes--and it was a strange freak of Fate’s irony which, in 1871, sent him as Colonel out from the German headquarters before Sedan to convey a demand for surrender to the French Emperor. Curiously enough he was succeeded now as Minister of War by another descendant of these exiled French Protestants, General von Verdy du Vernois, the ablest military writer of his generation, a notably clever organizer and a deservedly popular man.
Neither von Verdy nor Waldersee, who succeeded to Moltke’s proud position as Chief of the General Staff, remained long in their new posts. The world had nothing but vague surmises as to the causes of their retirement, and, noting that they still retain the friendly regard of their sovereign, did not dally long with these. Here again the contrast forces itself upon public attention, for these two good soldiers and able administrators neither sought interviews with travelling correspondents in which to vent their grievances, nor inspired spiteful attacks in provincial newspapers against their young chief. They went loyally out of office, as they had entered it, and kept their silence.
Thus throughout the public service, civil and military alike, these changes went forward--the greybeards who had helped to create the Empire on the field or in the council-room, one by one stepping down and out to make room for the new generation--but Bismarck, though becoming more and more isolated, clung resolutely to his place. It was no secret to him that the Kaiser’s principal advisers and friends were keen to throw him out of the Chancellorship; it must have long been apparent to him that the Kaiser was accustoming his mind to thoughts of a Berlin without Bismarck. But the Iron Chancellor had neither the simple dignity of Moltke nor the shrewd suavity of Caprivi. He would not leave until he had been violently thrust forth, and even then he would stand on the doorstep and shout.
The opponents of Bismarck had long been gathering their forces for a grand attack. Their difficulty had been the unwillingness of the Kaiser definitely to give his assent to the overthrow of the great man. Often, in moments of impatience at the autocratic airs assumed by Bismarck and his son, William had seemed on the point of turning down his thumb as a signal for slaughter. But there always would come a realization of how mighty a figure in German history Bismarck truly was--and perhaps, too, some modified reassertion of the tremendous personal influence with which for years the Chancellor had magnetized him. Almost to the end the young man had recurring spasms of subjection to this old ideal of his youth. Even while he was sporting his British ensign in Greek waters, and showing to the whole world how completely the breach between him and English royalty had been healed, he salved his conscience, as it were, by addressing enthusiastic and affectionate despatches to Bismarck from every new stopping-place on those classic shores.