Memoirs of Bertha von Suttner: The Records of an Eventful Life (Vol. 2 of 2)Suttner, Bertha von
History
Memoirs of Bertha von Suttner: The Records of an Eventful Life (Vol. 2 of 2)
Suttner, Bertha von
Peace; Suttner, Bertha von, 1843-1914; Women -- Austria -- Biography
The prince stood not far from me in a group, and was talking with
General Türr. I was able to get a good look at him. Of rather more than
medium height, of slender and supple figure, he was then at the
beginning of the fifties, but not yet turning gray. He wore a closely
trimmed, dark beard, and his expression was unusually melancholy. He
came up to me and offered me his hand. He was delighted, he said, to see
me, for he had long known of my devotion to the cause for the
furtherance of which he now desired to work as energetically as he
could. He remained some time in conversation with me.
“One thing occurs to me to say to you,” he remarked in the course of the
conversation; “you see this work going on here,” pointing toward the
Museum; “this shows the tendency of my aims and endeavors; it is
intended as a corrective,”—and now he indicated the crags of Monte Carlo
visible in the distance and crowned with the Casino,—“a corrective to
that inheritance which is so hateful to me.”
I especially recollect among the transactions the indignant and pathetic
protest of the Frenchman, Pierre Quillard, against the atrocious
massacres being perpetrated on the Armenians at that time, and
unfortunately still going on. Thus our Congresses definitely assumed the
burden of furnishing a forum for the complaints and for the defense of
all the persecuted,—a service which the governments, relying on the
principle of nonintervention, still refuse to undertake.
In the course of the day we members of the Congress inspected the castle
which is the home of the Prince of Monaco, and which rises high above
the crags. It is an antiquated edifice with battlements, outside
stairways, and porticoes. In the cloistered private garden there is an
endless profusion of flowers. Palms as high as a house stand there on
rocky ground, to which every atom of soil had to be carried. The state
rooms we saw for the first time in the evening, when they were all
ablaze with light, at a gala reception given in honor of the Congress;
the officials of Nice were also invited. Especially imposing is the
throne room, although the throne of such a tiny kingdom is not imposing.
My attention was attracted in this room to a kind of tower of flowers
reaching to the ceiling. I was told that this was the throne, with its
seat, its steps, and its baldachin, all masked by this gigantic screen
of flowers.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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