CHAPTER XL
1900
KING LEOPOLD II
On the 4th of April, 1900, England was startled and shocked by the news that the Prince and Princess of Wales had been shot at. They were on their way to Denmark, and their train was at rest at Brussels when a young ruffian named Sipido fired two shots at the Prince point blank. Happily both shots missed their aim. Those who were with him assured me afterwards that the Prince never flinched or moved a muscle of his face. He was absolutely cool and unconcerned—probably the only person present who showed no emotion. England was deeply incensed. We could not think why a Prince who was so dearly loved both at home and abroad should have been the object of this wanton and murderous attack. I wrote at once to congratulate him on his escape and by return of post received the gay, light-hearted letter which was so characteristic of him:
“Copenhagen, April 7.
“I am most grateful for your kind letter of sympathy on what might have been very serious, but fortunately ‘M. l’anarchiste’ was a novice at pistol shooting—as I cannot imagine how he missed me at two yards. However, ‘All’s well that ends well,’ and the sympathy shown us has been most gratifying.”
Royal personages need some courage to face these attempts, which on one occasion King Umberto, after being shot at, turning round to his equerry, coolly called the “buonamani del nostro mestiere!”[48] A later attack was more successful and more tragic!
Three men besides Sipido, who turned out to be a mere boy of fifteen, were tried for the outrage. But the Belgian authorities did not behave well on this occasion. The three accomplices were acquitted and young Sipido was sentenced to be placed under police supervision until he should come of age—an amazing sentence for such a crime! Probably not without connivance he escaped to France and was only sent back to Belgium under the extradition treaty between the two countries at the demand of the British Government. It was made out that the attack was a protest against the Boer War; but there was an undercurrent of hostility on the part of Belgium which had been strengthening for some time. That hostility was the work of King Leopold.
The relations which existed between the old King Leopold, the Nestor of Europe, as he was called, and Queen Victoria, are well known. When his son came to the throne in 1865, the friendly relations between him and his English cousins continued. The King was a great collector of Chinese works of art, and the Prince of Wales brought him one day, in 1870, to my father’s house to see the porcelain and enamels which I had brought back from Peking. The terms on which they then were could only be called cordial and affectionate, and thus they lasted until after the year 1878, when the Congo Free State was established.
The policy of the King, and the cruelties to which it led, entirely alienated the Prince of Wales, whose kind heart could brook nothing of the kind; while the rumours which were current all over Europe as to the private life of the King made him personally odious to Queen Victoria; the position became more and more strained, until at last the King’s visits to England were more or less private and secret; on more than one occasion I met him prowling about the streets of London unattended, and evidently wishing to avoid recognition, though he spoke to me once when I came suddenly upon him and he could hardly help it.
I had good reason to know how bitterly he felt the coldness of his English relations, accentuated as it was by the deservedly violent attacks upon him in the English Press, for in 1903 I was _Président d’honneur_ of the International Jury at the quinquennial exhibition of the Royal Agricultural and Horticultural Society of Belgium held at Ghent. The King came and it was part of my duty to accompany him round the show. When we came to the Congo section, he took me on one side and spoke to me for the best part of an hour upon the subject of his grievances against England, insisting upon it that he had been most cruelly traduced; he maintained that the barbarities of which the Belgian officials had been accused were all lies, and, pointing to the exhibits, he said, “How could we have obtained these results if we had been guilty of such atrocities. Is it credible that free men would come to serve us if we treated them as your press says that we do.” The words “free men” gave something to think about! My position was awkward, to say the least of it.
Yet although “There’s such divinity doth hedge a king,” the altar in King Leopold’s case had long since been bereft of its sanctity; I could but take refuge in the ambiguous truth that newspapers often deal in exaggeration, adding that the libretto of Offenbach’s _Grande Duchesse_ perhaps made a mistake when it made Hortense Schneider sing: “Il faut toujours ajouter foi à la gazette de Hollande.” The King laughed, and for the moment the ugly corner was turned, but I had been careful not to lead him to suppose that anybody could hold him guiltless.
His animosity against England increased with time. Five years later I was again President at the Ghent Exhibition. This time when the foreign representatives were formally presented to him, the King turned a glassy eye upon me, and said: “I think I have seen you before. Was it here, or could it have been at Bruges?” This from a King who had known me for twenty-eight years, and had always been most friendly, and was, moreover, endowed with the royal faculty of never forgetting a face, seemed rather chilling, especially as he with obvious intent plastered my French colleague, the Vice-President, with pretty speeches. Again I had to go round the show with him, but he never once uttered a word.
King Edward, when I told him that Sir George Holford and myself were going over to Ghent, very graciously wrote personally to the King, asking that we might be allowed to visit the gardens at Laeken. King Leopold instructed his Grand Maître de la Cour to tell me that the glass houses at Laeken were under repair, but that if, in spite of that, we “should make a point of going,” etc., etc., etc. Needless to say we did not “make a point of going.” King Edward was very much amused when I came back to London and told him what had happened. He recognized his Leopold, knowing full well that the discourtesy was aimed at himself. His loving cousin was an artist in pin-pricks.
The King was not a prepossessing person. He was a tall, thin man, during his later years rather bent, lame, and limping with the help of a stout cane, on which he leaned heavily; yet never during a long tramp through the Exhibition galleries showing the slightest trace of fatigue. A long grey beard fell over his breast, masking the lower part of his face, of which the features were good, though his eyes were shifty and unpleasant. He had a soft voice, but a soft voice is not always agreeable—his certainly was not, for he had a curious, rather mincing utterance, speaking as Agag walked—delicately, but not in such a way as to inspire confidence.
He was undoubtedly a first-rate master of affairs, as General Gordon and all other men of business who had dealings with him well knew; such a man once told me that King Leopold was the shrewdest financier whom he had ever come across; yet with all his cleverness he left behind him a tangle of affairs, public and private, which in no creditable fashion became a fat oyster for the lawyers of his country to wrangle over.
It was a fortunate thing for the world that he died when he did. Had he lived till now, Belgium would hardly have played the heroic part which she did in August and September, 1914. It is whispered—indeed, it is an open secret—that documentary evidence exists to show that King Leopold was deeply engaged to Germany, and that he was prepared, not without reward, to allow Germany to invade France through Belgium. Sir Robert Walpole once said that every man has his price, the only difficulty being to ascertain what that price is. In King Leopold’s case the problem was easy. Not in vain had he studied the story of Danaë, and the penetrative powers of the shower of gold were familiar to him!
Happily at the critical moment of her direst need, Belgium has been blessed with a King worthy of her own heroism, a King indeed of the Belgians, _primus inter pares_.
1901
When we celebrated our silver wedding on the 31st of January, 1899, we had the rare happiness of seeing around us our nine children, all safe and sound. That, alas! can never happen again.
1903 AND 1905
I have dealt elsewhere with the death of Queen Victoria and with the coronation of King Edward. I have also spoken of the part played by the King in foreign affairs: I feel inclined to say one more word upon that subject here. In the spring of 1903, the year after the coronation, the King had made up his mind to visit his friend the King of Portugal, and afterwards to go to Paris. It was a poorly kept secret, well known to all those who were in any way behind the scenes at the time, that the King’s ministers were very much averse to his paying those visits officially as King of England; they would have preferred that he should travel as Baron Renfrew, or Duke of Rothesay, or under any of those titles by which kings and queens are wont, ostrich-like, to hide their absolutely patent incognito. The Government dreaded any ceremonial on account of the unpopularity which had been carefully worked up abroad against England at the end of the Boer War. In France, moreover, the ill-will caused by the Fashoda business was supposed to be still rankling. Ministers were afraid lest some affront should be offered to the King which might lead to diplomatic complications. His Majesty, however, with that perfect confidence in himself which distinguished him, was determined that his first visits to Lisbon and Paris after his coronation should be marked by all the ceremonial due to his exalted position. As the French statesman whom I have already quoted in a former chapter, said: “Il savait ce qu’il pouvait oser.” The visit to Lisbon was a brilliant success. The King was received with acclamation and his popularity was boundless; it could not be otherwise; but ministers were still nervous about the reception with which he might meet at Paris. They desired that all official demonstrations should be waived and that he should be received with no more ceremony than might be accorded to a traveller of distinction; they even suggested that there should be no Presidential banquet, though they did not object to an informal luncheon(!), but that was the utmost which, so far as they were concerned, they were prepared to consider permissible. The King put his foot down and would submit to no restriction. He was King of England, and as King of England he would enter Paris, in the full assurance that he would meet with a worthy welcome. Sir Edward Monson, who was at that time Ambassador at Paris, and who was to meet him at some half-way station, was urged to advise the King, on reaching Paris, to make a speech which should tend to conciliate those who might be less amiably disposed. His Majesty gave the Ambassador to understand that he knew quite well what he was about, and that he was not afraid of the responsibility which he had taken upon himself. When Paris was reached the reception at the station was perfectly polite and courteous, but quite cold, lacking any sign of enthusiasm. This I was told by a French friend who was present.
Now for the transformation scene. The King drove straight to the Embassy, where he received a deputation from the British Chamber of Commerce. In reply to their address, he made a speech in which he took occasion, in those gracious terms of which he was such a master, to express his feelings of friendship for France and his love of Paris, speaking of the joy that it was to him to find himself once more among the Parisians as one of themselves. The words uttered by him circulated like wildfire, and from that moment any gloom that there might have been (and indeed was) had been dispelled, and the sun shone over a friendship which paved the way for historic results. No honest man would attempt to detract from the merits due to Lord Lansdowne and the ministers who cemented and nursed the good understanding between France and England. No honest man can say that their efforts were not greatly helped by the charm and the tact which achieved so marvellous a popularity, and smoothed away so many asperities.
Nor were these efforts of King Edward’s mere flashes in the pan, born of ephemeral excitement or the thirst for personal popularity that would have been utterly foreign to his keen, eager mind. They were strenuous attempts to exert in the cause of peace all those powers of fascination with which he had been so generously gifted. He knew full well how potent a factor for good or for evil the attitude of a king could be in public affairs. He felt himself to be in the highest sense the representative of his country, and he was determined to spare no effort, to shirk no detail, in his endeavours to improve its position in the world. That was with him the first and foremost consideration.
Two years after the famous first visit to Paris as crowned King came one of the first results of the “Entente.”
##