Meanwhile, during the time of the World’s Exposition of 1889 in Paris, a Peace Congress had been held there, presided over by Jules Simon. This was taken as an opportunity for creating also the institution of Interparliamentary Conferences. The year before, two men—Randal Cremer, member of the English Parliament, and the French deputy Frédéric Passy—had set to work to form an Interparliamentary Union. They enlisted the support of a number of their colleagues, and in the year of the Exposition these assembled in a first conference (of the English Parliament three hundred members were present), and it was agreed that adherents should be secured from the popular assemblies of all the European countries, and that every year an Interparliamentary Conference should be held. For the next conference, the second, London was named as the place of meeting. To all this the contemporary world paid but little attention, one might say paid none at all. But I followed these events with the eagerest and most hopeful interest. Through the monthly periodical Concord, the organ of the London Peace Association, I was kept informed of what was going on, and I read attentively the reports of all the speeches delivered in the assemblies, and of the resolutions passed. But as yet the idea of taking part in the movement myself, otherwise than with my pen, never entered my mind. XXVI INTERCOURSE WITH FRIENDS In port · Trip to Vienna · Literary circles · Balduin Groller · Theodor Herzl · Letter from Count Hoyos · Letter from Friedrich Bodenstedt After our return from Paris we remained quiet and secluded at Harmannsdorf. An uneventful life, but no empty life. There is no way in which a life can be better filled than with labor and love. Of course there is not much to tell about it. The reminiscences of my youth, with all its betrothals and art-plans and varying adventures, have certainly made more amusing reading. The period of storms was past; we were now in port. The midday sun of youth no longer blazed, and now there lay on our horizon something like the tints of evening. But not yet time to lay aside work; there was yet much to be done. And we had to bear a great grief, to fight a hard battle. It was not sorrow of our own that weighed upon us, but the sorrow of the world; we took the field not against personal enemies, but against the enemies of mankind—cruelty and falsehood!