WHEN Metternich returned home on 13 March 1848 after
being dismissed, he said to his wife: 'Oui, nous sommes tous
morts.' ¹ Bismarck would not give up so easily. He was free
to lead the life of an independent country gentleman. But
forty years in the service of the state, twenty-eight years
in supreme power, had spoilt him for retirement. He had
always been easily bored; now he was bored all the time.
'I was turned out at 75, but I feel young, far too young
to do nothing. I was used to politics; now I miss them.'
He dreamt at first of an early recall, and said before leaving
Berlin: 'Le roi me reverra.' When the public and the
politicians ignored him, he came to feel that he was already
dead, and he aimed instead at a revenge from beyond the
grave. He would appeal from the present to the future.
'What the newspapers write about me is so much dust
which I brush off. I only care what history will say about
me later.' Herbert dashed off a bitter, spiteful account of
his father's dismissal, which Bismarck approved, ² and
took as his example. He would write a grandiose survey of
his entire career in the same spirit, exalting his achieve-
ments and scoring off all his enemies past and present.
Schweninger encouraged the project in order to give
Bismarck something to do. Cotta, the publisher, agreed
to take six volumes and to pay the fabulous sum of £5,000
a volume. Here was work which would last Bismarck's
lifetime.

Bucher settled at Varzin to organize the material and to
write at Bismarck's dictation. The work made slow pro-

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