21th January.
Most of us remember the anxiety, almost amounting to consternation, that spread over Europe towards the close of the reign of the Emperor Wilhelm I, when it became known that his eldest son, Friedrich III, was suffering from a mortal malady, and could only reign for a very brief period, if he was able to ascend the throne atoll. From what was known ofthe character and abilities of the Emperor Friedrich III, it was felt that he would be an ideal ruler ofa great nation ata time when a man of peace was wanted foresettle Europe still agitated by the after waves from the great war which came to an and in 1871, and to interest his people in commercial instead of military conquests. His eldest son, now known throughout the civilised world as the Kaiser, was said to be impulsive, hot-headed, intensely convinced of his own greatness and that of his country, anxious to prove himself second to none as a soldier, and his country second to none both on land and on the sea. He had indeed by his side a wise counsellor in his grandfather's most trusted friend, Prince Bismarck; but it was soon seen that he wanted no pilot to assist him in steering the ship of State, and he took sole charge of the helm within two years of his accession.
Considering how differea'ly the world estimated the characters of the Emperor Friedrich III and his son, it seems at a superficial glance remarkable that the results expected from the government of the former have been achieved by the latter. Peace has been maintained in Europe, while Germany has made enormous strides in the paths of commerce and industry. The Trple Alliance under the guidance of Germany has preserved the balance of power against the mighty Dual Alliance of France and Russia and meanwhile the sensibilities of France have been so well respected that the ery for the recovery of Alsace and Lorraine is dying out. With Russia, also, Germany has kept on the most friendly terms. When the Kaiser ascended the throne, the German navy was a negligible quantity; he has rapidly made it worthy of a first-class Power, able to protect the great mercantile marine that has expanded so quickly under his auspices, and not unworthy to be counted beside the most powerful army in the world.
M. Paul Blouet (Mux O'Rel!) has tion mortal may often ce' with ridicule, an Emperor by divine right never can, he is always interesting, always fresh, quite content with his fate and perfectly happy to alive.
"His versatility is perfectly marvellous, for he is a soldier, a sailor, a writer, an orator, a painter, a composer, a playwright, a sportsman; in fact, it would save me a lot of time to say what he is not.
"The good of it all is that the which he plays seems to give him more pleasure every year.
"For him the throne is no sinecure, and he does not even admit hat a Sovereign should travel incognito, and I should not wonder if he never went to sleep without first ascertaining that his crown was on his night table."
The Kaiser is a genius, and it is so rare a thing for a hereditary monarch to display more than ordinary capacity, that the world has taken entirely unnecessary alarm. Being a genius the Kaiser makes mistakes sometimes, as he did in sending his celebrated telegram to President Kruger; but he knows how to re-grieve his mistakes and he does re-grieve them. He was devoted to his grandmother, our late Queen, as he is to his uncle, King Edward, and it is very greatly to be regretted that a section of the English. Press, headed by the generally responsible and respectable "Spectator," should have so debased itself of late to the sowing of discord between Great Britain and Germany. We overseas Englishmen, who are constantly mixing in our commercial and social life with Germans, realise how foolish and wanton this course of action is: but there are-hundreds of thousands of Englishmen who only England know who are influenced by these calculate ed misrepresentations without thinking, that if we have enemies on the European continent, those who are always decrying Germany are pli ing the game of those enemies. Great Britain has no better friend in Europe than the Kaiser, and he has shown often his anxiety that Germans and Britons should remain the good friends which they have ever been except for brief intervals which have happily passed away in their turn. Germany has every reason. to be proud of an Emperor who has crowd-el so much into his forty-four years of life, and has led her to such rata of he bt Roza Mucus FIED. The only reliable preserver and which closely resem! matter natare provides for nourishing and recently sketched in a few lively: sentences the German Emperor as he appears to the super! observer "Impulsive, whimsical, always original, never caring a jot what for fair people will say or think of him,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.