The weekly paper, _Im Neuen Reich_, publishes a reply to an article in the _Kreuzzeitung_ pleading in favour of the Palais Radziwill. “No doubt it is a splendid and hospitable house worthy of a Polish _grand seigneur_ who holds his Court in Berlin, and those who have had access to it--amongst them evidently the contributor to the _Kreuzzeitung_--appreciate it. But we should advise the latter to make his inquiries about the characteristic feature of the Palais Radziwill not in the house itself, but on Prussian soil, and he may learn that the vast capital represented by its luxury and refinement, although acquired by bourgeois investments, yields its dividends only for the benefit of a certain form of Catholicism, which is Polish rather than German.” Bucher called my attention to this article, and added the following commentary: “The article in the _Kreuzzeitung_ is written by no other than our mutual friend Abeken, while the answer has come from the Chief. Abeken undertook the defence of the Radziwills against the charge that their palace has become the centre of Berlin Ultramontanism owing to the fact that he is accustomed to visit them, and because they are related to the Court and therefore sacred in his eyes.”[5]... “Doubtless the idea of raising Abeken to a seat in Olympus, or the Chamber of Peers, will now come to nothing, as the Chief has discovered his intrigues with the Ultramontanes. So it will not be ‘Lord Abeken,’ after all.” _March 8th._--To-day wrote the following article for the _Kölnische Zeitung_, from the Chief’s instructions as communicated to me by Bucher: “In the speech made by the Imperial Chancellor in the Upper House the day before yesterday he spoke of petitions in favour of the Pope which, during the session of the Reichstag, were ordered or countermanded just as the members of the Centre Party found convenient. Then proceeding to the seizures of papers by the police authorities in Posen, the Prince said that among these he had seen certain letters ‘which the police considered it necessary to bring to the knowledge of the highest authorities in order to put them on the right track with a view to subsequent investigations in another direction.’ The speaker further remarked that one of these letters was from a prominent member of the Centre Party to a priest of high position, a canon in Posen who has recently been much talked of. If I rightly remember, it said: ‘Do not send us any more petitions to the Reichstag.’ A similar instruction, in the French language, was despatched at the same time to the Province of Posen by a well-known German bishop, who also said: ‘Stop sending petitions for the present. They do no good in the Reichstag, and only lead to unpleasant discussions.’ ‘But,’ continues the former writer, ‘do not fail to forward these petitions later on at regular intervals, only address them not to the Reichstag but to the Sovereigns direct, upon whom they will in any case produce a greater impression.