The quarrel between Prince Bismarck and his master still continues,
General Caprivi having published the orders issued to German diplomatists in Vienna on the occasion of the Prince's visit there. They are couched in honorific terms, but direct Prince Reuss and his staff to avoid the wedding cere- monials, and inform him that the reported rapprochement between the Emperor and Prince has not occurred. "Those reports lack the indispensable condition that the former Chancellor take the first steps." In a circular to all the diplo- matists of the Empire, General Caprivi says :—" His Majesty discriminates between the Prince Bismarck of former times and of to-day, and is anxious that his Government should avoid everything which might tend to diminish in the eyes of the German nation the familiar figure of its greatest states- man." That is gracefully said ; but it is evident that the Emperor is not cordial at heart, and that the Prince bitterly resents his Majesty's action in forbidding the otherwise inevitable recognition of his subject's great position. It is rather a miserable controversy on both sides, more like the disputes of social pretenders than those of the really great.
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