A BISMARCKIAN TRADITION.
Bismarck is made a Prince, and now sighs for his ancestral home at Sdionhausen, in Pomerania. The mansion is not princely, only a country house of good proportions. The front entrance bears the Bismarck arms, a clover leaf encircled by three nettle leaves. Tradition tells us that long ago a great lord, with a hundred horsemen, came to Pomerania to win the hand of Gertrude, a beautiful Princess of the House of Bismarck. She being already betrothed, refused him. The nobleman was so enraged that he stormed the castle and slew Gertrude's father, after which exploit he entered the lady's own room, all flushed with victory, and throwing his arms about her neck, exclaimed, "I come to break you, you golden clover of my heart. You are no nettle, and don't sting. The clover leaf causes no pain." But suddenly he sank to the floor, weltering in his own blood ! The fair Gertrude had stabbed him to the heart with a dagger which she had concealed about her person. " So," cried she, "I am nettle when I will, and'can sting. And so do nettles ever sting the man who seeks to break a clover leaf of the Bismarcks!"
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Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 18, Issue 1106, 29 August 1871, Page 2
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201A BISMARCKIAN TRADITION. Hawke's Bay Times, Volume 18, Issue 1106, 29 August 1871, Page 2
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