COUNT CAPRIVI. T HE title bestowed on General von Caprivi, and
the short speech of high laudation pronounced on the [8th inst. by the Emperor, indicate two facts of some political importance. The German Emperor is more willing than the world expected to share with others both responsibility and fame. It was fancied that he wished to be the one living figure in his Empire, to be surrounded with agents only, and, if he took advice, to keep his advisers steadily out of sight. His Majesty, however, clearly considers the formation of the Central Zollverein an achievement of the greatest moment, he is so profoundly satisfied with it that he thinks it may be "a turning- point in history," and yet in the very first moments of elation, when the treaties have just been accepted by Parliament, he assigns the credit to his Chan- cellor, Von Caprivi. That is generous, and shows more of the most essential capacity of Kings, the ability to elicit the devoted service of competent agents, than anything the young Emperor has yet done. It looks as if he were not omnivorous of repute, but were willing to share it, and power too, at all events with the Ministers of his own personal selection. It shows, too, in the second place, that the Emperor is not only content with his principal servant, but is a good deal impressed by him, has a clear perception that he can cope with difficulties, and will therefore in future attend willingly to his advice. That is a good omen both for Germany and for Europe, for, if we mistake not, Count von Caprivi—who had much better be called in England Count Caprivi— possesses just those qualities which make him an in- valuable supplement to his master. The Emperor's momentum is, if anything, a little too strong, and it is necessary for him, specially among all rulers, to talk over a matter before he acts, with some one whom he likes, and who is willing to act as his agent, but who takes cooler views than his master on most subjects does at first. That function, we conceive, specially suits Count Caprivi. It is far too soon as yet to judge decisively, for he has not been tried by a great crisis ; but every act and speech of the German Chancellor tends to justify the general European impression that his special quality is what Americans describe as "level-headedness," a mixture of sagacity, realism, and good temper. Certainly that is what his speeches suggest. They are very direct, even care- lessly frank, but they are free from arrogance and the spirit of domineering, and full to repletion of con- densed argument. He forgets nothing, though lie some- times brushes good argument aside, as he did in his plea against the abolition of taxes on food, with what is really only a non possumus. The speeches give the impres- sion of strong sense in the speaker, and of clear resolve, and at the same time of a genuine good temper, rather wanting in North Germans and the German-Jews who contribute so much intellectual strength to the Reichsrath, but very frequently found in strong Italians. Count Caprivi springs from the Montecuculi, and he is a good deal more like Cavour than Bismarck, with this important difference, that he has been trained in the rigorous Prussian discipline to tolerate superiors, and Count Cavour had not. The latter hated rebuke, and the relations between him and his King, who was an abler man than the world knew, were occasionally strained by very lively altercations. Count Caprivi evi- dently is liked by his Sovereign—a most important point where sovereignty is real—and may influence him much more than a man of more dominant ways. The absence of elation.in the Chancellor so suddenly lifted to the highest political altitude, his freedom from militarismus, which yet is consistent with great military knowledge, the " sim- plicity " of his manner, which so strikes Germans used to reserve in the great, all point to the same type of character, which is quite consistent with any amount of strength, and, it may be, a little craft. At least we should imagine it took some craft of the better sort to bring four Kings and four Cabinets and four Parliaments, all more or less Protec- tionist, into a mood of willingness to accept a commercial arrangement of great complexity, which wounds though it does not outrage Protectionist feeling, and which on one or two points might have roused national suscepti- bilities about independence. Financial independence is very much limited by its terms, for the long period of twelve years. It took a capable man to manage that, yet suc- ceed in pacifying the jealous and exacting peasant interest, and we know from the Emperor's laudatory words that it was not all plain sailing. And lastly, the negative evidence all testifies to the same quality in the Chancellor. He has affronted nobody and bullied nobody. The allied Powers are quite pleased at his elevation in rank, and the States of the Federation, always apt to be raspy in their criticism, have only kind words for the Chancellor, who must have carried the Federal Council as he carried the Reichsra,th. He is not afraid of war, and has in his speeches boldly faced the horrible contingency of a war with two fronts ; but he evidently takes a sane view of the prospect, and con- sequently greatly prefers peace. "We must be fully armed," he says, in almost every speech ; "but we will make no war if we can help it," precisely the attitude which, in the present condition of Europe, indicates the well- balanced mind. It is a great deal better and wiser than that of some German soldiers of eminence, and, we think, of the late Premier of Italy, who had rather the war arrived than that the heavy burden of preparation should any longer continue. Count Caprivi prefers to wait ; and just now every great man in the world should take for his motto one which he will not find in heraldic books, Patientia est Sapiodia.
The Emperor is wise in publicly honouring Count Caprivi, and will be wiser still if he honours other agents, until a group of strong men are visible standing around his throne. The old group has passed away, and it takes time to secure a new one ; but the position he has hitherto seemed to take for himself, that of an Emperor who is Premier in all departments, must sooner or later become untenable. He may remain at the head as final Referee in all important matters, but no human being can be Emperor of Germany, King of Prussia—a great country governed from above—and Commander-in-Chief of all German armies, do all the work of those great functions, and yet find time for thinking. The modern world is too complex, the demands on authority are too unceasing. There must either be excessive hurry, such as is visible when the Emperor drives abroad ; or endless accumulation of papers, every one an impediment to action till it is signed ; or a devolution of real power on men who are all the while treated as mere clerks. A man who, like the Emperor William, is at once conscientious and energetic, must either wear himself out in his task, or give hasty decisions, for he will not be able to leave work undone and yet remain content. There must be Vice-Kings in a true Monarchy, or there can be no progress, and the reluctance to raise men to that position, to make them real and visible "Ministers," must always end in suspension of progress, injurious not only to the State generally, but to the bureaucracy, which tends to be become a service expectant of long delays, and therefore unenergetic. No man so raised is in a true Monarchy a rival of the Sovereign, and the more of them there are, the greater is the repute of the King, who, if he does everything himself, at last accumulates on his head the effect of every failure. These are the old maxims of statecraft, and in neglecting them the German Emperor is preparing for himself at once that kind of mental solitude which so often threatens the reason of autocrats, and in future, in some hour of adversity, a burst of ill- feeling as unreasoning as much of the popularity which now surrounds him. Those who watch his career with interest and sympathy—and that is half Europe—will bail with pleasure the honour he pays to Count Caprivi, if only as evidence that he is prepared to allow somebody besides himself to be great in Germany. At present, for the full safety of the State, the Emperor is too lonely, too com- pletely the centre of all eyes, too much the one hope and dread of a multitudinous people. Frederick the Great, it is said, did all things for himself, and played Providence successfully ; but Frederick the Great ruled a Canton, and his successor rules an Empire.
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