It is impossible to describe the enthusiasm and wild delight with which the people of Germany heard of these events.

Now the press was free, now they also were going to be free and great and strong.

All the resistance of authority was overthrown; nothing, it seemed, stood between them and the attainment of their ideal of a united and free Germany.

They had achieved a revolution; they had become a political people; they had shewn themselves the equals of England and of France.

They had liberty, and they would soon have a Constitution.
Bismarck did not share this feeling; he saw only that the monarchy which he respected, and the King whom, with all his faults, he loved and honoured, were humiliated and disgraced.