Blood and Iron

radle at Schoenhausen; wonders that gather '

th of six children, three dying in infancy. He was born April 1, 1815, but a few months

ering soldiers, the infant Otto sleeps peacefully in his oak-carved Gothic cradle. A century later,

e of those thick-walled mo

ways, and old forest, and not far away is the village church with the square stone tower; hard by, also, the kattenwinkel, or Katte's corner, at the confluence of the Havel and the Elbe; and on the house

eed-time and harvest strange

en as prizes in the long Napoleonic wars; and in turn, after incredible political adventures, running over years, the child before us, gro

hild in the big Gothic cradle, before which we now tip

. Mortgages falling due could not be paid; the king extended credit for four years; and in the interim Prussian

been tilled by feudal-laborers, practically sl

rcks were better off than their neighbors, still the ti

nherited Kneiphof, Kuelz and Jarchelin estates from his co

was a carp pond. Karl was fond of hunting in the old beech forest. Such we