He continued: “Look here! There they talk of my attachment to the dynasty. Well, that is quite correct, but it was more so under the father, the old master. I had all along wanted to retire at his death, and if I remain it may be taken as certain that I do so only on an understanding that I continue the old policy I have followed hitherto, and am protected from foreign influence and from the interference and misgovernment of women, which was never carried to such lengths as it is at present. I would therefore beg of you to call attention to the Progressist journals, to these Court Jacobins--use that word--who receive their orders from Charlottenburg, through the women whose names figure at the head of the Address, Frau Helmholtz, Schrader, and Stockmar, whose late husband was Secretary to the Englishwoman when she was Crown Princess. These Byzantine hypocrites, these democrats who wag their tails and crawl more abjectly than the most extravagant absolutist, would like to degrade me from being a servant of the State and of its head into a Court menial, although of course it is both my right and my duty to form my own opinion and maintain it like anybody else, all the more as I bear the responsibility for the mistakes, or, as in the present instance, the obvious follies that are committed in important matters.” He continued to dilate on this theme for a few minutes; and then again suggested that I should make use of the pamphlet of Duke Ernst of Coburg. He sent for Rottenburg, and told him that in using it elsewhere the passages which I should quote were not to be employed. When Rottenburg had gone I asked: “Are you quite sure that it was he who wrote it? It is very strong for him, although from the style, which is rather vulgar and careless, it might well be his work, besides which he is acquainted with the facts through being closely connected with the Queen.” He replied, smiling: “He himself told me so” (in English). I then spoke of his autobiography, which I described as badly arranged and prolix. “Yes,” he said, “he has somewhat the same failing as Beust. He can suppress nothing--not the most trifling circumstance respecting what he has done or tried to do, and collected.” I inquired as to the instructions respecting Beust’s book. He replied: “That must wait. We have now more important matters to deal with. Later on, perhaps. For the present you might get them to give you the book. I have underlined a few things which appear to me to be incorrect. But now I must try to get some sleep. At present my pulse goes on an average fifteen beats in the minute faster than it did during the preceding reign.” I took my leave, with good wishes for his speedy improvement. I had been with him about twenty minutes. In the following three days I wrote the desired article, and sent it to the _Grenzboten_, where it appeared in No. 17, under the title, “Foreign Influences in the Empire.”