Baron Alphonse de Rothschild told me in later years
that sixteen clocks were carried off from Ferrieres whilst King
(afterwards the Emperor) William and Bismarck were staying there. I
presume that they now decorate some of the salons of the schloss at
Berlin, or possibly those of Varzin and Friedrichsruhe. Bismarck
personally had an inordinate passion for clocks, as all who ever visited
his quarters in the Wilhelmstrasse, when he was German Chancellor, will
well remember.
But he was not content with the clocks of Ferrieres. He told Jules Favre
that if France desired peace she must surrender the two departments of the
Upper and the Lower Rhine, a part of the department of the Moselle,
together with Metz, Chateau Salins, and Soissons; and he would only grant
an armistice (to allow of the election of a French National Assembly to
decide the question of War or Peace) on condition that the Germans should
occupy Strasbourg, Toul, and Phalsburg, together with a fortress, such as
Mont Valerien, commanding the city of Paris. Such conditions naturally
stiffened the backs of the French, and for a time there was no more talk
of negotiating.
During the earlier days of the Siege of Paris I came into contact with
various English people who, having delayed their departure until it was
too late, found themselves shut up in the city, and were particularly
anxious to depart from it.
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