hold that the experiences and utterances of Prince Bismarck which have been selected by Moritz Busch with great discrimination, include many passages that are trivial and frivolous. Among these they often reckon those strong characteristics which most strikingly reveal the Chancellor’s nature, with its spontaneity, sober-mindedness, and impartiality, and its almost plebeian unpretentiousness and simplicity. Whoever admires the typical featureless hero of the German novelist, a concoction of undiluted magnanimity and sentiment, will turn from the portrait drawn by Moritz Busch with a feeling of embarrassment and repulsion; but those who have educated their taste by a study of the realistic authors will be enchanted with a picture the minutest details of which are vivid and characteristic, even if their views do not agree with those of the Imperial Chancellor.” The Scientific Supplement to the _Leipziger Zeitung_, which was otherwise by no means well disposed towards me, and had indeed taken a variety of exceptions to the book and to its author, honestly and impartially recognised the true tendency and significance of the work, saying that it contained “records which may prove of the highest value to future historians, indeed a great deal for which it will one day be the only trustworthy source.” “As evidence of its value as a mine of historical materials which is in some respects unique,” the critic then gave a number of well-chosen extracts. A few other organs of the German daily press expressed themselves in a similar sense. As already mentioned, however, the great majority of the newspapers were more or less decidedly unfavourable. This was partly through a lack of political and general education, then because the critics in question were incapable of appreciating the historical significance of the work and lacked moral seriousness, while obviously it was also due in part to low motives, hatred of the principal subject of the work, wounded vanity, resentment against the author for having published expressions of the Chancellor which referred slightingly to party catchwords and party heroes, gave evidence of little sympathy with the Jews, and--in the opinion of the critics--did less than justice to certain belletristic products of recent decades. Finally, it was evident that envy of the prospective success of the book was also one of the influences at work. The author was indiscreet, and his gift was a mere collection of trivialities, spicy stories, gossip, and scandal. He was tedious, he had the soul of a flunkey, he had neither taste nor literary ability, &c.