¶ A few days after this sensational defiance of Democratic leaders, Bismarck announced his decision: "We shall carry on the finances of the state without the conditions provided for in the Constitution." ¶ Bismarck was not surprised at the storms of protest. "Some progressive journals hope to see me picking oakum for the benefit of the state." The comic newspapers pictured Bismarck as a ballet dancer, pirouetting over eggs marked Right, Law, Order, Reform, Constitution. ¶ The King became alarmed. ¶ "I see how this will end," said the King. "Over there, near the opera house, in front of my windows, they will cut off your head, and mine a little afterwards." ¶ "And after that, sire?" asked Bismarck spunkily. ¶ "After that, why we shall be dead!" ¶ "Oh, well, all must die," cut in Bismarck indifferently, "and the question is can a man die more honorably than for his country? I am fighting for your cause, and you are sealing with your own blood your rights as King, by the grace of God. ¶ "Your Majesty is bound to fight! You cannot capitulate! You must, even at the risk of bodily danger, go forth to meet any attempt at coercion!" ¶ As Bismarck spoke, the King grew more and more animated. "He began to assume the part of one fighting for kingdom and fatherland," wrote Bismarck, in explaining the situation. * * * * * ¶ The giant's very soul glowed with fiery indignation. It was not in his nature to hesitate, as to means. He wanted these 12,000,000 thalers for the army--and was not that enough? True, he could not say in the open that he wished to expel Austria--but must an elephant step on your foot? ¶ He had no scruples, moral or material; such are for lesser men. Hamlet-questioning princes, if you please, may soliloquize on life and its inner meaning; but not your Otto von Bismarck, with his clear view of the little lives of men and with his correct conviction that if the intervening thirty-nine German states are to be made a unit in a German Empire, then under Heaven or under Hell, the thirty-nine states must be seized, even in a hurricane of bullets if necessary. Could anything be simpler? Had not the "German problem," as it was called, been talked to death generation after generation, and had not lawyers, poets, preachers, philosophers and petty princes unnumbered come and gone with their impossible enterprises looking to National glory and political legitimacy? ¶ Bismarck was, as usual, everlastingly correct in his political instincts; and furthermore he had the iron will to power to support him in this great Prussian conflict; yes, and the wizardry in manipulating human nature that, in the end, would cause even obstinate, opposed political leaders to do our giant's bidding.