On the 13th of July, 1870, three men sat round a dinner table at Berlin. Three notable men; Bismarck, the host, Von Roon, the War Minister, and the silent Moltke. All three were profoundly dejected. They could not eat, and their wine was distasteful to them. Bismarck had arrived the day before, from Varzin on his way to Ems to urge the King to summon Parliament for the purpose of mobilizing the army. For war was in the air. Indeed, as he drove in his open carriage through Wussow, he saw his old friend, Pastor Mulert, and answered his kindly greeting with a thrust of his hand in quart and tierce. The old clergyman took the hint. As he was about to leave his carriage to enter his house a sheaf of telegrams was put into his hands, informing him of the repeated audiences which Benedetti, the French Ambassador, had had of the King upon the subject of the Spanish monarchy. Bismarck was up in arms. He considered that Benedetti had no justification for thrusting himself upon the King and ignoring the King’s ministers, nor was he pleased that the King should have so far lowered himself as to treat directly with Benedetti, and even listen to threats. He should have referred him to the Foreign Office. But there was worse to come; Bismarck was discussing with the two soldiers the propriety of resigning office when a further telegram arrived from the Embassy at Paris, announcing that, in the interests of peace, the Prince of Hohenzollern had abandoned his candidature. Such a _kō tou_ to the arrogance of France was more than could be tolerated! To haul down the flag in such a fashion would be a shameful thing! While the three men were chewing the cud of their misery there arrived the famous telegram from Ems, signed by Abeken, who was in attendance upon the King. It ran as follows: “His Majesty writes to me: ‘Count Benedetti stopped me on the promenade in order to urge me, in what became a very peremptory fashion, to authorize him at once to telegraph that I bound myself for all time never again to give my consent if the Hohenzollerns should return to their candidature. I pointed out to him rather sternly that to give such an undertaking _à tout jamais_ was what no man ought to or could do. Of course, I told him that I had received no news and that, inasmuch as he had been informed from Madrid and Paris sooner than myself, he must see that my Government was taking no hand in the game.’ Since then His Majesty has received a letter from the Prince.