Chapter VIII Stories of Court Life
Musical Honours for Bertha—Bertha in a Temper—Luncheon at Court—A Tantalizing Procedure—A British Experience
“Call out the guards when Fraulein Krupp drives up,” ‘phoned the War Lord to the officer du jour from the Council Room between writing a treatise on a scrap-of-paper policy and making an outline of his speech, “An Appeal to Royalism,” later delivered at Königsberg.
To have fifty men under a lieutenant exercise their feet on a given spot to the tune of fife and drum for the benefit of a person not born to the purple seems to William the highest honour conferable, a delusion bred by militarism. In the same spirit, the War Lord of Bismarck’s time sent his Chancellor the patent of lieutenant-general. “That won’t buy me a postage stamp,” remarked Bismarck.
The Iron One would have preferred a pipe of tobacco, while his War Lord went about for three days patting himself on the back for his act of generosity and telling everybody within reach of the good fortune which, thanks to his grace, had befallen Bismarck, “really a mere civilian.”
Bertha was too young to see the absurdity of the gratuitous manoeuvre, “the sausage intended to knock the side of bacon off the hook,” as they say in Hamburg. It cost the War Lord nothing, made healthy exercise for the soldiers, and Bertha, still a child in experience and mode of thought, was impressed when Count Keller, pricking up his ears at the sound of the drum like an old army horse in a tinker’s cart, shot out of his seat, raised his hat and bowed low.
“Signal honour, upon word, Fraulein; unprecedented—almost,” he added in an undertone.
And Countess von Bassewitz, rolling her eyes in loyal ecstasy, squeezed Bertha’s arm. “Majesty must be exceeding fond of his godchild to treat you like an equal—almost,” she too added.
Drum and fife still made for ear-splitting discord when Count Keller handed Bertha out of the carriage. His lordship, by the way, was now congratulating himself on having been deprived of the seat of honour. Small doubt, if he had taken it, it would have been reported to the War Lord, and Majesty, bent on showering Royal honours on the commoner, would have been furious.
Two lackeys at the door, more at the bottom of the stairs, still more on the first landing—men-servants seem to be the only commodity lavishly provided at the Berlin Court.
“Kammerherr, the Noble Lord von ——” (mentioning some Masurian village) “commanded to the sublime honour—Fraulein Krupp’s service” (long intervals between half-sentences to show that the speaker was really a Simon-pure Prussian aristocrat) “beg to submit—with Fraulein’s permission—I will conduct Fraulein to her apartments.”
Bertha did not understand half the titled personage trumpeted in nasal cacophony, but a word or two from little Bassewitz explained. Then ceremonious leave-taking, as if it was for years; assurances of “unexampled pleasure experienced,” of “more in store,” and “Majesty is so graciously fond of Fraulein—she ought to be so happy”; in fact, there wasn’t a girl “in the wide, wide world so favoured,” and more polite fiction of the sort.
Up two flights of stairs; corridor thinly and shiningly carpeted; electric bulbs few and far between. Ante-room, saloon and bedchamber. In the first threadbare, red plush furniture. The bedchamber was hung in cretonne of doubtful freshness.
“I trust Fraulein’s slightest wishes are anticipated. Princess von Itzenplitz last had these apartments, and was graciously pleased to express her highest satisfaction,” boasted the kammerherr.
Her Grace of Itzenplitz may have done so, but the richest girl in the world was not inclined to put up with such third-class hotel accommodation!
When the kammerherr had bowed himself out Bertha sat down on the edge of the bed and had a good cry. Received like a princess, and housed like a charwoman! But she wasn’t going to stand it, not she, Bertha Krupp.
Her assertiveness, newly acquired, but all the stronger for that, made her give a vicious pull to the bell-rope. She hardly noticed that it came off in her hand when a lackey, scenting baksheesh, responded.
“My servants, quick!” she ordered.
“Beg Fraulein’s pardon, they haven’t yet arrived from the station.”
“Didn’t Count Keller provide a conveyance for them?” she demanded peremptorily, hoping that her words would reach that worthy. “They must be sent for instantly.”
There were sounds of carriage wheels in the courtyard below.
“Wait,” cried Bertha; “there they are at last!” She handed the servant a small gold coin. “For the driver; let him keep the change.”
The footman withdrew with a broad smile. No doubt he robbed the cabman of half the generous tip.
Torrents of “Ohs!” and “Ach Gotts!” when the Essen contingent came in. They had waited more than half an hour for the expected royal carriage, and then in despair took the only public vehicle available.
Bertha’s tirewoman inspected the apartment while giving vent to her outraged feelings. “Darling Fraulein can never sleep in that bed. It’s as hard as rocks.”
“I know,” said Bertha. “But what is to be done?”
“I will send Fritz to fetch in the car your own bed, all except the frame,” decided the tirewoman after reflection.
“But wouldn’t that be an insult to my hosts?” Bertha asked.
“Rubbish! The late Queen Victoria always carried her bed along, even when she came to visit her own daughter in Berlin. Besides, we can plead doctor’s orders,” said Frau Martha; and when the heiress still seemed doubtful she added: “On my own responsibility, of course; you don’t know anything about it. The Baroness will back me up, I’m sure.”
The Krupp footman was accordingly dispatched, and returned two hours later with the bed-furnishings.
Meanwhile Bertha, all in white silk—according to the Court Marshal’s command—was waiting upon Her Majesty, who fondly kissed her and inquired most affably after her mother—a regular set of questions afterwards repeated by the War Lord, all his sons, and daughter. They are not very original, these Hohenzollerns.
The Krupp heiress, who, as intimated, was first inclined to be rather proud that the guards were called out in her honour, loathed herself for that weakness ten minutes after penetrating the Imperial circle, for the incessant reference about that piece of pomp made by the royal family and their titled attendants was simply maddening. “Unheard-of honour”; “Must remember it to the end of your days”; “Most unique spectacle in Europe”; “How thoughtful of Majesty”; “Too bad madame, your mother, didn’t witness it,” were among the least stupid comments assailing Bertha’s ears on all sides. The War Lord himself went into raptures of delight, being as pleased with his surprise, as he called it, as a schoolboy with a new top, and then forestalled possible further speculations on the matter of his dispensations of honour by announcing that, in honour of Bertha, he would partake of the family luncheon.
More effusions of delight, more congratulations showered on Bertha: “He must love his godchild very dearly”; “He wouldn’t have done that for the Emperor of China.”...
Luncheon at Court! Bertha had pictured to herself a grand function: courtiers in gold lace, swords at their side; ladies in grand toilettes; swarms of servants in showy liveries; a dozen or more courses, under the direction of the Lord Steward of the Household; golden dinner service à la American multi-millionaire; “heavenly music,” and so forth.
Alas! And Bertha had brought her appetite along, the appetite of a growing, young, country lass from a food-worshipping household!
The ladies were dowdy, the gentlemen in ordinary uniform or dressed in abominable Berlin taste; over-loud music, with which the War Lord persistently found fault with both time and execution. The average Kapellmeister “had not the shadow of a perception” of the composer’s artistic intentions. His views were “plebeian, necessarily—maybe his mother was a washerwoman, poor wench”; and, after all, the War Lord himself must conduct to “get proper results.” Of course, everybody was “convinced” of that.
“Majesty” was too “lenient.” It was “truly heartrending” to hear music so “butchered,” etc.
“En famille,” they called it, and Bertha sat at the end of the table between two cadets, younger sons of a principality not much larger than Richmond Park.
“Fraulein,” whispered one, forgetting, under the impetus of youthful confidences, to speak through his nose; “Fraulein has dined beforehand, of course?”
“Why, no,” she replied innocently, “and I am powerfully hungry.”
“Then you will stay so”—this from the loquacious petty prince.
At that moment the soup was put before the War Lord, and he fell to demolishing it at starving bricklayer’s rate. When he had about half finished, the family and guests were served, and when he was through, his plate was removed and so were the rest. Bertha had had two spoonfuls, and the petty prince, who had gulped down four or five, grinned broadly.
Fish, entrée and fowl were offered, and ruthlessly yanked away in the same rapid gunfire fashion. To an empty stomach this teasing with coveted food was uncanny!
“I hope you have dined well,” said the Empress, after the party adjourned to the “Cup Room” for coffee. “Was the service satisfactory?”
“Excellent,” lied Bertha.
The coffee had an abominable oily taste. “From my colonies,” explained the War Lord. “Mighty good, when one gets used to it.”
But Bertha noticed that while his guests were served en bloc, he brewed coffee for himself and wife in a silver Vienna machine.
Desultory conversation: church building, social reform, Bismarck, orphans, knitting socks for soldiers’ children. Ill-concealed yawns. The War-Lord would have a game of billiards, and then off to the park on Extase (his favourite saddle-horse).
“Ride or drive, which do you prefer, Bertha?” he said to the Krupp heiress, going out.
“As Uncle Majesty commands,” lisped the young girl, very much embarrassed.
“I promised Louise a sleigh ride. Perhaps she would like to go with her,” suggested the Empress.
“All right. Two horses and outrider.”
An outrider—something, to be sure, but going to the park “with that kid.”
Princess Victoria Louise was eleven then, and intellectually no more advanced than a child of four. Poor child! her father’s ear trouble seemed only one of the dreadful inheritances that stamped her a sufferer from Hohenzollern disease. And Bertha had fondly imagined that she was to be classed with grown-ups!
“Did Fraulein enjoy her lunch?” asked the motherly Frau Martha, when summoned to help her young mistress change for the outing.
“Plenty to eat, but no chance to eat it,” replied the Krupp heiress sullenly. “Get me a sandwich or two, or I shall faint.”
“We were told,” wailed Frau Martha, “that lunch was dinner for servants, and this was the menu: half-bottle of small beer each, yellow peas in the husks, three inches of terribly salt boiled beef, three potatoes each, two carrots, and no bread.”
The Krupp servants, it seems, were no better treated than those of the Prince of Wales (afterwards King Edward) and the untitled attendants of other royal highnesses and majesties, those of the King and Queen of Italy, for instance.
In the ‘nineties it was common report in Berlin diplomatic circles that the Prince of Wales kept away from Berlin because he “could not induce any of his favourite servants to be of the party,” these favourite servants being the same whom the then Court Marshal, von Liebenau—a drill sergeant with a gold stick—designated “as the hungriest and most impudent set of menials” he ever had the misfortune to encounter in the exercise of his duties.
Why the epithets?
His Royal Highness’s valet and his grooms had politely asked for eggs and bacon for breakfast, and they would not have cold pork and potato salad for supper, even though that be the Empress’s favourite menu to go to sleep on.
And those “impudent Englishmen” had the temerity to ridicule the solitary bottle of small beer graciously allowed them by His Prussian Majesty; and about this and more the first groom of His Britannic Highness and the Berlin excellency had an exciting passage of words, memorised, rightfully or wrongfully, as follows:
The Englishman: “The other attendants and myself cannot possibly worry along on the breakfasts furnished, rolls and bad tea; and salt pork and lentils for dinner is not what we are used to.”
The Prussian Bully: “Nor do you seem to be used to household discipline. But I will have no more of your English impudence. I will inform the Prince of his servants’ unruly behaviour.”
The Chief Groom: “Thank you. His Royal Highness will then engage board for us at a hotel, and there will be an end to starvation diet.”
On another occasion pease pudding, pork, roast potatoes and beer were sent to the rooms of Queen Marguerite’s chief tirewoman for dinner, at the Neues Palais, a couple of hours before she was expected to dress Her Majesty for a State banquet. The dame refused it, and sent for the Empress’s chief titled servant, Baroness von Hahnke, stating in plain terms that, unless she were furnished with food suitable to her rank and station, she would drive into town to dine, even at the risk of being late for Her Majesty’s service.
The Baroness, frightened out of her wits, told the Empress the facts, and the Imperial lady gave Count Puckler (responsible for the sins of the kitchen) a terrible talking-to before her other titled servants. At the same time she ordered a suitable dinner for the Italian lady from her own cuisine—a dinner the extras of which upset the budget for some weeks to come.