THE REMINISCENCES OF CARL SCHURZ
operation between him and them for common ends. Some of them thought that Bismarck's conversion to liberal principles was really sincere, that he was charmed with his popularity and that he would thenceforth endeavor to keep it by being in the true sense a constitutional minister. Others were less sanguine, believing as they did, that he was indeed sincere and earnest in his endeavor to create a united German Empire under Prussian leadership; that he would carry on a gay flirtation with the Liberals so long as he thought that he could thus best further his object, but that his true autocratic nature would assert itself again and he would throw his temporarily assumed Liberalism unceremoniously overboard as soon as he felt that he did not need its support any longer, and especially as he found it to stand in the way of his will. Excepting on the occasion of a formal leave-taking call I was not to see Bismarck again until twenty years later. And again I had, then under very different circumstances, highly interesting conversations with him which I shall duly record in these reminiscences when I reach that period of my life.
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