We then returned once more to the recent debates in the Reichstag, and I again expressed in strong terms the contempt I felt for the Opposition. “You were always a gentleman pitted against vain and vulgar creatures,” I said, “and in saying that I am not thinking of your rank as a Prince.” “No, I understand--a gentleman in my way of thinking,” he rejoined. “Lasker’s Jewish forwardness and presumption,” I continued, “the Professors with their priggish airs of superiority, and their empty pathos; Hänel, the self-complacent and pathetic doctrinaire--it is impossible to imagine anything more repulsive. He wanted to be Minister of Justice in ‘sea-surrounded Schleswig-Holstein.’” “Yes,” said the Chancellor, interrupting me, “they had divided the parts among themselves before the piece had been secured, and they probably have done the same thing now. Nothing came of it, however, after the interview which our Most Gracious had with me upstairs in the yellow chamber, where he remained with me from 9 o’clock until near midnight.” “And where he heard the simile of the chickens in Low German,” I added. “And then that impudent, lying, clown Richter, and the whole tearing, snarling, sprawling pack face to face with simple, solid, positive greatness. It was as if you belonged to an entirely different species.” “Yes,” he said, “when I lie down in bed after such debates, I feel ashamed of ever having bandied words with them. You know the way one feels after a night’s drinking, if one has had a row and perhaps come to blows with vulgar people--when one begins to realise it next morning, one wonders how and why it all came about.” Then after I had promised to make the corrections immediately and send them to him, he took leave of me with the words “Good evening, Busch. Auf Wiedersehen.” Busch! Not “Herr Doctor” as usual. In two hours I sent him the corrections, which I received back through a Chancery attendant before 10 P.M. There were only a few alterations in the second half. On the 2nd of January, 1882, I again visited Bucher. He complained in general of the incapable _entourage_ of the Prince, including his sons, and of Rudolf Lindau, whom they favoured because he gave card parties and made himself useful to them in other ways. (...) He was a mere tradesman without education or political knowledge. The Prince wished to make things comfortable for himself, and no blame to him, but he was mistaken if he thought the machine would still go on working as it ought to. In that respect the choice of the _personnel_ was of importance, and those who were now engaged, particularly in the press department, were almost constantly blundering. The stuff which Paul Lindau wrote for the _Kölnische Zeitung_ was also of little value.