XLIX
THE SEVENTH WORLD’S PEACE CONGRESS AND THE SEVENTH INTERPARLIAMENTARY CONFERENCE IN BUDAPEST
General Türr’s visit at Harmannsdorf · Anecdotes from his life · Garibaldi’s appeal to the governments · Our journey to Budapest · Reception and preliminary festival · Opening of the Congress · From Türr’s address · The historical Millennial Exposition · Élie Ducommun gives a report on the year’s events · Debate: Armenian horrors · Address to the pope · Letter from Dr. Ofner · Excursion to the Margareteninsel · The youngest member of the Congress · Exciting debate about dueling · Nepluief and his institution · Deputation from the Society for the Protection of Animals · Conclusion of the Congress · Preliminary festival of the Conference · Soirée at the Parkklub · Opening session in the House of Magnates · Second session · Soirée at the Prime Minister’s · From the protocol · Apponyi on the participation of Russia in the conferences · The Russian consul Vasily and his action · Excursion into the future · Visit at Maurus Jókai’s · Gala operatic performance · End of the Conference · Opening of the “Iron Gate”
Now we were getting ready to start for Budapest, where, during the Millennial Festival, the Seventh World’s Peace Congress and the Seventh Interparliamentary Conference were to be held.
General Türr was chosen as chairman of the Congress. On the twenty-sixth of August we were surprised by a dispatch from Türr announcing that he was coming to Harmannsdorf. He had arrived in Vienna from Rome, and before continuing his journey to Budapest he wanted to fulfill a promise made long before to visit us in our home.
It gave us great delight, and in order to show it we prepared a grand reception for him. Before the entrance to the palace a triumphal arch was erected, adorned with the inscription
WELCOME, STEPHAN TÜRR
and when the carriage that brought him from the station, whither My Own had gone to meet him, drove up, a double line of our foresters performed a fanfare. Türr was greatly pleased with the fun.
Although he was then seventy-one years old, he was as fresh and martial and elastic in his bearing as if he had been only fifty at most. At our house he added another to his conquests. Not to speak of myself, our pretty niece Maria Louise, who was twenty-two, was so fascinated by him that she begged a cousin who was a painter and happened to be with us to make a life-size portrait of the handsome old warrior. The portrait was painted and she hung it in her boudoir.
My diary has the following entry under date of August 26:
On arising I find a dispatch from Türr. Wire reply and make preparations. Arrival at four o’clock. Much fun over triumphal gate, banners, and fanfare; looks fine. At the very first, long chat in the billiard room about the Congress. Still much to be done in preparation, but the larger part has already been begun by his friends, and through his influence many advances by the government. Dinner with the whole family. Then black coffee in the garden. Very interesting stories. On the whole, he is full of gayety, goodness, and wit—like all men of the highest distinction who have been condemned to death two or three times!
Of the anecdotes from his experiences, which he intermingled with his conversation, I jotted down a few afterwards in a condensed form:
In the year 1868 he came to Vienna, commissioned by King Victor Emmanuel, whose adjutant general he was, to bring this message to Emperor Franz Joseph: “Tell the Emperor that in me he has not only a good relative but also a good friend.” Türr told us in what a friendly manner the Emperor received the message and the messenger—although he had once been proscribed and under the ban as a revolutionist.
Türr had no specially good things to say of Bismarck. From his conversations with the Chancellor he quoted the following remarks: “After supper I brought Rechberg to the point of letting me buy Lauenburg—I wanted to prove that this Austrian would sell what he had no right to.” And again: “I have not succeeded very well in persuading my king that we must wage war against Austria, but I have brought him to the very edge of the ditch, and now he must leap.”
Türr was once talking with a Chinaman about civilization. “Do you know,” remarked the man from the Middle Kingdom, “that your liberté, fraternité, égalité, are very fine, but a fourth thing is necessary.”
Un harmonisateur.
“What is that?”
The Chinaman, making a gesture suggestive of whipping, said, Le bambou.
Türr is also somewhat of the opinion that it would be a good thing if men could have some of their bad qualities whipped out of them, especially some of their stupidity. La bêtise humaine est in-com-men-su-ra-ble ... and that word is still too short!
Ach Götter,
Schneidt’s Bretter!
With this sigh of resignation he used to conclude his observations over this or that piece of immeasurable stupidity among men.
He told us ever so much about his life as a soldier. He had already passed his fiftieth year in military service, for he had entered the army in 1842. During this half century he had seen so much that was horrible on the various battlefields, that he had consequently become an enemy of war:
It was in May, 1860. We were marching with Garibaldi’s thousand heroes against Palermo. In the neighborhood of the market place of Partenio we had a glimpse of something that filled the hardest-hearted of us with horror. Beside the road a dozen Bourbon soldiers lay dead, and a pack of dogs were gnawing at their bodies.... We approached and saw that the soldiers had been burned. Garibaldi expressed his indignation at this in a terrible outbreak of rage. He could hardly hold in till he entered the little town. The inhabitants received him with joy, but he shouted to the exulting people in a voice trembling with wrath:
“I have seen here a barbarous deed—the partisans of freedom have no right to give way to such inhumane cruelty....”
The people listened in deep silence to the general’s outburst of passion. Finally some one came forward and said:
“We must acknowledge that we have done wrong, but before you condemn us, listen to what happened here; perhaps you will find our action comprehensible....”
And the people conducted the general to a group of houses. He was taken into four or five of these houses and shown a heap of women and children, all scorched and burned to cinders. “This is what the Bourbon soldiers have done,” they cried; “they drove the women and children into these houses, set the houses on fire, and would not let one escape. They guarded the doors until the wretched creatures struggled with death in the flames. We heard their screams of agony and hurried to help them; but it was too late.... In our bitter indignation we could only wreak our vengeance for the innocent victims by hurling the monsters into the fire in turn, and then we brought them out into the road.”
Türr told us also of the document that Garibaldi, after the campaign was concluded, sent to all the crowned heads of Europe, urging them to form a league of peace. No notice was taken of this action and it is generally unknown. The only trace of it still remaining is the remark in the encyclopedia under the name Garibaldi: “Brave, patriotic, disinterested, warm-hearted, but without deep political insight, a visionary.” But it was really General Türr who suggested that attempt. Again I quote his own words:
One evening at Naples I was with Garibaldi on the balcony. The general, according to his usual custom, was contemplating the sky full of glorious stars. For a long time he was silent; at last he said:
“Dear friend, we have again done only half a job. God knows how much blood will still have to be shed before the unity of Italy is established.”
“May be ... but, general, you can be contented with the great result that we have brought about within six months. The shedding of much blood might be avoided if better views should obtain among the rulers.... If, as far as it were possible, an agreement might be entered into by the European countries; if what Henry the Fourth and Elizabeth, Queen of England, centuries ago dreamed, and what Minister Sully so beautifully described, could be brought about,—who knows but the king’s noble idea might even then have been realized, if a fanatic’s dagger had not struck him down. But it would seem as if the time had now come to carry it out, so as to save Europe from other dreadful massacres and battles. General, you have accomplished a great work; you would seem to be the very one to bring an appeal to the rulers and the nations in the interest of peace and confederation.”
We talked for a long time about this, and the very next morning Garibaldi brought the appeal which, with a few modifications, we sent to the powers. Since that time I have often had that appeal printed. Whenever opportunity has offered I have striven to call the attention of those in power and the great public to Garibaldi’s lofty ideas. And now, when the peace workers and the representatives of the nations are about to assemble on the occasion of the Millennial Festival, I am going once more to bring forth the never-to-be-forgotten leader’s inspired words of exhortation. It will not fail to be interesting—amid the conservative tendencies—to hear ideas of the so-called “revolutionists and subverters,” dictated as they were by the purest philanthropy; for those men sought to overthrow nothing except the dikes that block freedom and progress.
General Türr pulled out of his pocket a copy of Garibaldi’s appeal and handed it to me. It is an interesting document, and it makes one realize how thoughts which are regarded as new have been conceived many years back, and how they are swallowed up in forgetfulness, no matter how eloquently they may have been spoken. Ever again and ever again they have to emerge, like something new, surprising people, until at last they become common property.
In this appeal Garibaldi points to the enormous armaments of the sixties (what would he say to-day!); he laments that in the midst of so-called civilization we fill our lives with mutual threats against one another. He proposes an alliance of all the states of Europe; then there would be no more fighting forces on land and sea (that we should be now building air-fleets he did not foresee), and the enormous funds that have to be withdrawn from the necessities of the nations for unproductive, death-dealing purposes might be made available for ends that would improve property and lift the level of human life; these latter are then enumerated.
The document also gives satisfactory answers to possible objections. “What will become of the multitude of men who are serving in the army and in the navy?”
Rulers would have to study institutions of common utility if their minds were no longer absorbed in ideas of conquest and devastation.... In consequence of the advance in industry and the greater stability of commerce, the merchant service would soon take care of the whole personnel of the navy; the immense and innumerable works and undertakings which would spring up because of peace, the alliance, and security, would employ twice as many men as are serving in the army.
The appeal concludes with warm words addressed to those princes to whom “the sacred duty is intrusted of doing good and cherishing that greatness which is higher than ephemeral false greatness,—that true greatness the foundation of which would be the love and the gratitude of the nations.”
General Türr returned that same evening to Vienna and went the next day to Budapest, where he finished the laborious preparations for the Congress.
Two days before the Congress opened we three followed him there. I say “we three,” for we took our niece Maria Louise with us; we wanted her to enjoy this journey and the social festivities with us.
I see us on board a Danube steamer. It was a beautiful, sunny September day. There was quite a little peace band of us,—Malaria, Dr. Kunwald, the Grollers, husband and wife, and Countess Pötting, “die Hex”; of friends from abroad,—Frédéric Passy, Gaston Moch and his wife, Yves Guyot the former Minister, publisher of Le Siècle and a great free trader before the Lord, the Grelix couple, and M. Claparède from Switzerland.
So we had already a little Congress on deck; even at meals our company clung together. We passed by Pressburg, by Gran with its proud episcopal palace, and at Waitzen a deputation from Budapest which had been sent out to meet us came aboard,—three members of the Congress committee, and with them a reporter of the Pesti Napló (the “Budapest Journal”). It was already evening and all the lights were ablaze when we slowly came into port. On the dock stood other members of the committee, among them Director Kemény, who greeted us with an address; and gathered about was a dense throng shouting Éljen! (“Hail!”) at the top of their voices. Carriages in waiting whirled us all to the Hotel Royal, where General Türr and a number of other colleagues were already awaiting us. That was the day of our arrival, September 15. By the entries in my diary I will now bring in review before my memory the week of the Budapest Congress and Conference.
September 16. Interviews the whole morning. Leopold Katscher brings me newspapers and tells about the preliminary labors. Luncheon in the Hotel Hungaria given by General Türr with only a few intimate friends. Visits with Karolyi, Banffy, and others. In the evening of this day before the opening of the Congress all the delegates are invited to a reception in the great drawing-rooms of the Hotel Royal. Türr and Count Eugen Zichy, the great Asiatic traveler, act as hosts. At supper various addresses: Pierantoni, a giant in stature, with a stentorian voice, speaks in Italian, and as fascinatingly as if he were a famous reader rather than a famous teacher of international law. I make the acquaintance of Dr. Ludwig Stein, professor in Bern University, whose philosophical feuilletons in the press have long been a delight to me. Frédéric Passy and Frédéric Bajer speak, and the “Peace Fury” is also obliged to take part.
September 17. Opening session in the council chamber of the new City Hall. Before the door, in the entrance hall, and on the stairs are stationed pandours, splendid in their lace-adorned uniforms and armor. It reminds one of the reception at the Capitol. The hall is packed. The galleries are densely crowded. Türr takes his place on the platform between the Minister of the Interior and the Mayor. He opens the Congress with a brief, vigorous address. Here is a passage from it:
Not so very long ago there were princes and noblemen who fought one another and exercised jurisdiction over their subjects and serfs. If any one at that day had told them that the time would come when they would be required to bring their quarrels before a judge, they would have declared that person a dreamer, a Utopian, or something worse. And now these great lords are compelled to appear before the judge, where all their former serfs stand on the same footing with them.
This change might be brought about also in the relations of the powers, and all the easier since it does not here concern two or three hundred princes and thousands of members of the high and lower nobility. We have to-day six great powers; and even these have united,—some in the Triple Alliance, the others in a friendly union; and all for the purpose of preserving peace.
Now then, only one further step is required. If these two groups unite, then the smaller states will join, and the free confederation of the European powers is accomplished.
After the session the participants in the Congress are conducted to the Millennial Exposition,—the “Historical Exposition,” ... a thousand years of Hungarian history, from the primitive simplicity of the semibarbarous time of Arpád down to the refined industry of the highly developed—let us say only quarter-barbarous—to-day. And if another thousand years pass by and again an exposition illustrates the course of development, will the little medals with the word pax on them, such as we all have attached to our clothes as tokens, at that time be found perchance among the articles of apparel?
In the evening a garden party in Oes-Budavar. Everywhere at the appearance of the troops of peace ring forth from the densely encircling public hearty shouts of Éljen!
September 18. An interesting session. Élie Ducommun reads the report about the events of the past year. In the first place the progress of arbitration and the other successes and labors of the League; then a survey of the military events in Egypt, Abyssinia, Cuba, and Madagascar; finally, the latest events in Turkey. “Whoever may have been the originators of the atrocities, every civilized man must condemn them, just as he must condemn those who permitted the atrocities.”[10]
James Capper, the sympathetic Englishman with the white, apostolic head, with the hearty, ringing voice, gets the floor. “The report of the Central Bureau,” he says, “shows so clearly the absurdity of the so-called armed peace.... What! The many armies, the terrible engines of destruction, are for the purpose of furnishing and maintaining peace, are they? and yet six million soldiers have not sufficed to prevent the infamies that have been taking place in the Orient! We should not look idly on while brigands trample down a whole nation! If I see in the street a child attacked by villains, I consider it my duty to interfere with both fists in defense of the one attacked, and if in the struggle I should have to lose my life, I would do it willingly!” Loud applause. We all feel it would be a legitimate use of force to protect the persecuted against force.
A young French priest, Abbé Pichot, moves that the Congress send an address to the Pope, begging him to grant the movement his support: it is known to him that Leo XIII had the peace cause much at heart, and that a word of approval from that quarter would be of the highest value. I spring to my feet and second the motion. I also know for a fact that the Pope has frequently of late years spoken against preparations for war and in favor of the international arbitration tribunal; but it is not sufficiently well known, because these utterances were made to a Russian publicist and an editor of the Daily Chronicle. The Catholic press and the Church generally, as well as the whole Catholic world, have failed to hear those words. How very different would be the effect if the Pope should direct these observations of his directly to the millions of his faithful. So then, I urged, let the respectful request be submitted to him that he embody in an encyclical the expressions of encouragement already often pronounced by him in the presence of the advocates of peace. Some one objects: the motion could not fail to offend those of other beliefs, especially freethinkers; no religious tendency should be introduced. Frédéric Passy explains that we are dealing not with religious but with humanitarian demonstrations. The motion is carried.
In the evening, gala performance of the opera Der Geiger von Cremona.[11]
I receive a letter from Dr. Julius Ofner, deputy to the Austrian Parliament. I give the text of it here:
... I should gladly have taken part in the deliberations on the international arbitration tribunal. The talk that is made on this point seems to me too timid, too much directed to the welfare of the states and too little to their duties; apostles do not flatter.
From a legal point of view there can be no doubt: no law without a judge; no one can decide in his own cause, and history teaches that if states desire even the most unrighteous things, they have always found crown jurists to defend them and declare them lawful. As long, therefore, as there is no tribunal erected for international differences, there will be international politeness, international morals, but no international justice. The strong is infallible; injured justice turns only against the weak. The appeal to sovereignty, which, it is said, must not be curtailed, is nothing but a cloak for the desire to be permitted to do arbitrary wrong. For all law limits the single individual for the advantage of the rest, limits arbitrariness for the advantage of universal liberty. Law and righteousness are at the foundation of all culture, and what Kant said in regard to mankind in general applies to states,—“If there were no law it would not be worth while for men to live on earth.”
There is nothing sensational in the session. The afternoon is spent at the Othon, a journalists’ club. In Türr’s company my niece and I make a call on Prime Minister Banffy.
September 20. Outing for the members of the Congress. We are taken on special steamboats to the Margareteninsel, where the committee provide a luncheon. The weather is splendid—the tables are set in the open air, surrounded by the wonderful grounds of the park. “Do you know, my dear colleagues and friends,” said General Türr, “this island was formerly a wilderness. The owner, Archduke Joseph, by clearing, cultivating, and decorating it, has made a paradise of it. So may that wilderness which to-day prevails in international life be turned by the civilizing power of the work of peace into a blooming land like the Margareteninsel.”
Of course others also speak. Deep emotion is caused, however, when an Italian delegate, a former captain on the general staff, Conte di Pampero, lifting up his eight-year-old son and standing him on the table, asks permission to speak in the name of the youngest member of the Congress, and, laying his hand as if in blessing on the lad’s head, adjures those present to bring up their children, just as he is doing, to hate war and love humanity....
September 21. Very lively debate over dueling. A delegate—Félix Lacaze from France—makes the motion that all Peace Societies shall require their members to agree to decline all duels. A great controversy arises. Count Eugen Zichy declares that if this is carried he must as a matter of honor resign from the Union. Such an obligation cannot be undertaken in certain countries and in certain circles. The English members, who are indignant that the duel is being discussed, are provoked and refuse to allow Count Zichy to have the floor a second time, although he declares he wishes to speak in the line of conciliation. Finally Houzeau de Lehaye, the ever conciliatory, offers a compromise resolution which, although declaring that nothing can be mandatory upon the members, nevertheless urges them to make every effort to discourage the use of the duel, as contradictory to the principles which they are supporting, and to secure the execution of the laws that relate to it.
I have made an interesting new acquaintance,—a Russian by the name of Nepluief. He introduced himself to me during a recess in the proceedings, and is urging me to support his ideas. He has founded in his country an institution based on the principles of education for peace. He gives the impression of being a grand seigneur, and at the same time a deeply religious man. His idea in coming here is to acquaint the Congress with the institution which he has called into life, and have it imitated everywhere. He called himself on his visiting card “Président de la Confrérie ouvrière de l’Exaltation de la Croix.” In this way he imparts an ecclesiastical tinge to his socialistic undertaking. A multimillionaire, possesser of wide landed estates and numerous factories in the Government of Chernigof, he began his career as a diplomat, but gave it up in order to devote himself wholly to the task of elevating the Russian peasants morally and materially. At his own expense he founded popular schools for industrial and agricultural training, and peasant unions which he calls “Brotherhoods.” From the first he gave these unions a share in the profits of his undertaking; later he turned over his whole property to their complete control, reserving for himself only the title of life president of these enterprises. But things did not run smoothly. For years he had to contend with the ill will of the Russian bureaucracy, which suspected him of being a socialist. Finally, however, his work of education brought him satisfactory results. He has explained his methods and experiences in a pamphlet, which he distributed to the members of the Congress. He himself departed from Budapest the same day.[12]
In the evening a banquet is given by the city.
September 22. A deputation from the Society for the Protection of Animals call upon me and beg me to support their endeavors. I reply that I have at that moment a book under way, entitled Schach der Qual (“Check to Suffering”), in which there is to be a chapter pleading for our poor dumb fellow-creatures, that are so cruelly treated.
Final session. At half past one General Türr ends the Congress with the greeting Auf Wiedersehn. The “meeting again” takes place two hours later, in the Hotel Royal, where a farewell dinner is given to the president and the committee and the rest of us. Malaria—Olga Wisinger—had taken charge of the arrangements. But even now there is no general breaking up, for many of the participants remain here in order to be present at the opening to-morrow of the Interparliamentary Conference.
We were also among those who were going to remain a few days longer. As early as the sixteenth of August the following letter had reached us at Harmannsdorf:
Interparliamentary Conference, Hungarian Group
Budapest, August 15
Your Highness:
The useful zeal and the self-sacrificing and profitable labors which you have undertaken in the interest and service of universal peace make it a pleasant duty for us to invite you, as well as your husband, and your niece the Baroness von Suttner, to the Interparliamentary Conference which is to open at Budapest on the twenty-second of September.
As you are aware, only members of legislatures can take part in the Conference; yet it may interest you to follow the sessions from the gallery and to participate in the festivities and excursions.
In this hope, etc.
Koloman v. Szell, Chairman
Aristide v. Deszewffy, Secretary
of the Executive Committee
I return to my Budapest diary.
September 23. Yesterday, as on the eve of the Congress, a great soirée in the Parkklub, cards of invitation for which were sent out by Koloman von Szell. This clubhouse is really beautiful—massive, splendid, with English comfort. All the members of the Conference are present; we have a joyous meeting with old acquaintances,—Stanhope, Beernaert, Cremer, Descamps, and others. Many ladies of Hungarian society and the wives of the members of the Conference are there. Almost all the Hungarian ministers, Baron Banffy at their head; Counts Eugen Zichy, Albert Apponyi, Szapary, Esterhazy, and many journalists and artists. Our old Passy is closely surrounded. Maria Louise looks wondrously pretty and, it seems to me, is turning the heads of several of the Magyars! Also that northern maiden, Ranghild Lund, the beauty of the conference days at Rome, is here and arousing much admiration. John Lund comes up to me and brings me a message from Björnson. I make the acquaintance of a young Countess Kalnoky (unmarried and very independent), and her free and broad-minded views greatly appeal to me. Then we are joined by a Countess Forgac; she has much to tell us of Empress Elisabeth, among other things the following: Some spirit communications had been made (presumably at a spiritualistic séance) to the effect that the place where the Crown Prince Rudolf is staying is worse than hell and no prayers are of any avail; the Empress is full of despair about it. Melinda Karolyi and I exchange glances equivalent to many exclamation marks.
Servants bring round delicious edibles and drinkables. A journalist remarks, “One need not be a member of a peace league to find this sort of international meeting decidedly pleasanter than those where bombs and grenades are served.”
To-day the opening session takes place in the House of Magnates. Before the building, on the edge of the street, fastened together with garlands of flowers, stand masts, from which float the flags of all the nations that participate in the Conference,—an object lesson for the passers-by. That conception of a “European Confederation,” still so strange, is here expressed in the language of emblems.
We reach our places in the gallery before the members of the Conference make their appearance in the hall, so we watch them as they come in deliberately and take their places. In the ministerial chairs, where of late the King’s Hungarian councilors sat, now the foreign parliamentarians are taking their seats. Frédéric Passy is between Cardinal Schlauch and Minister Darany. Gobat mounts the platform and proposes that the president of the Hungarian House of Deputies, Desider Szilagyi, be chairman of the Conference. He accepts and delivers the welcoming address. Now follow the speeches of old acquaintances,—Pirquet, Descamps, Beernaert, Von Bar, Bajer, and others. Apponyi is new and surprising to me. What a speaker! He has a tall, elegant figure, a powerful barytone voice, and an easy mastery of foreign tongues.
At the second session at four o’clock begin the actual transactions. Point I: “Permanent International Arbitration Tribunal.” Descamps report