It was not the cautious and conservative spirit of the king alone that he had occasionally to overcome. Still more was he clogged and not seldom exasperated by what he called the stupid old bureaucracy, which had to be got out of its accustomed ruts whenever anything new and bold was to be done. He fairly bubbled over with humorous anecdotes, evidently relishing, himself, his droll descriptions of the antiquated "Geheimrath" (privy counsellor), as he stared with his bleared eyes wide open, whenever anything unusual was proposed, seeing nothing but insuperable difficulties before him and then exhausting his whole ingenuity in finding the best sort of red tape with which to strangle the project. His patience tried to the utmost, he, the minister would then go to the king and tell him that such and such a rusty official could no longer be got along with and must necessarily give place to a more efficient person; whereupon the "old gentleman," melting with pity, would say, "Oh, he has so long been a faithful servant of the State, would it not be cruel to cast him aside like a squeezed-out orange?--no, I cannot do it." "And there," said Bismarck, "there we are." I ventured to suggest that an offer to resign on his part, if he could not have his way, might make the king less tender of his inefficient friends in high places. "Oh," said Bismarck with a laugh, "I have tried that so often, too often, perhaps, to make it impressive! What do you think happens when I offer my resignation? My old gentleman begins to sob and cry--he actually sheds tears, and says, 'Now you want to leave me too?' Now when I see him shed tears, what in the world can I do then?" So he went on for a while, from one funny anecdote to another and from one satirical description to another. _Bismarck's Test of Von Moltke_ Bismarck then came back to the Austrian war and told me much about the diplomatic fencing which led up to it. With evident gusto he related story after story, showing how his diplomatic adversaries at that critical period had been like puppets in his hands, and how he had managed the German princes as they grouped themselves on one side or the other. Then he came to speak of the battle of Koeniggraetz, and especially of that "anxious moment" in it before the arrival of the Crown Prince in the rear of the Austrians, when some Prussian attacks had failed and there were signs of disorder among the repulsed troops.