Blanden was appointed to a seat by the mother, while the daughter sat on the other side of her father. These precautionary measures astonished him slightly; he did not imagine that he must first prove himself to be a man towards whom it was possible to entertain serious intentions. The conversation turned upon politics, which, at that time, were the salt of every East Prussian dinner-table. The Regierungsrath pushed his vedettes carefully forward, and, with the vanguard of his articles of belief, made a retrograde movement, as he remarked that a superior enemy's force stood before him. Not on any account would he injure his cause with Herr Von Blanden, and manifested himself a temperate, tolerant man, to the great amazement of the Kreisgerichtsrath sitting opposite to him, with whom he had often broken a lance at table over these very questions. "We are not yet ripe for a constitution," said Kalzow, "at least, not for a constitution according to the modern English and French form. We are a patriarchal people, and what would become of our bureaucracy if Parliament should speak the decisive words? In England and France it is quite different; there they have no such official power representing the intelligence of the whole State, yes, which, as it were, it has absorbed within itself. I cannot imagine a Prussia with a constitutional organisation: we shall never live to see that, little as I fail to recognise the advantages of such institutions." "But, my dear friend," interposed the Kreisgerichtsrath, "you have always hurled unqualified anathemas at them." "It depends upon the nature of the soil, dear friend," replied the Regierungsrath; "elsewhere these plants may thrive capitally, it is impossible with us." "I cannot see that," said Blanden, "I believe that we, too, shall one day occupy the position that is due to us amongst Europe's nations, if we become the equals of advanced peoples by means of a free constitution. Until then, I hesitate to count Prussia amongst the leading civilised states. The bureaucracy alone, best of Regierungsraths, cannot assist us to it. I have travelled far over the world, I know the Celestial Empire." "You mean China?" interrupted the Räthin. Unbroken silence reigned around. "Yes, _gnädige_ Frau, and I assure you that officialdom is excellently organised there. The candidate undergoes his examination before the _Wald der Pinsel_,[2] in Nankin." "_Wald der Pinsel_?" asked the Regierungsrath. "So is the college for examinations designated there." "That term of ridicule has surely been invented by some candidate who failed," suggested the Gerichtsrath.