The articles published between November, 1906, and April of this
year in the Zukunft, the weekly paper edited by Herr Maximilian Harden, bringing grave charges against Prince Philip Eulenburg and other officers in the Court entourage, have borne fruit in a sensational libel case now being tried at the Central Court in Berlin. It will be remembered that at the close of last year Prince Billow made a remarkable speech denouncing camarillas as a poisonous growth in terms obviously aimed at Prince Eulenburg's circle. This speech was reprinted in the North German. Gazette last spring. Shortly afterwards Prince 'Eulenburg fell from Imperial favour, and several other officers of high position at Court were dismissed or resigned their posts. One of them, Count Kuno Moltke, has now brought a libel action against Herr Harden, and the course of the trial has already thrown Germany into a ferment. Count Moltke meets the charges with a flat denial, protests his complete ignorance of the vicious character of his associates, and denies that they exerted any political influence
on the Emperor. Herr Harden, on the other hand, who has resolutely refused to compromise the case or withdraw his charges, declares that his motive is not personal but political, —his aim being to break up and expose a coterie of men of infamous character who exerted, and boasted of exerting, au undue influence on the Emperor. At this stage of the case we may be excused from saying more than this : that if Herr Harden can make good his case he will have deserved well of the State, but that no punishment can be too great for him if it can be proved that he has launched such charges against innocent men.
