[The “mad March Hare goes in Like a Lion, But How Will He Come Out?].: [BISMARCK, Otto von].

A THOMAS NAST ORIGINAL CARTOON LAMPOONING OTTO VON BISMARCK'S RESIGNATION AS CHANCELLOR

NAST, Thomas. [BISMARCK, Otto von]. ["The Mad March Hare goes in Like a Lion, But How Will He Come Out?]. Original pen-and-ink political cartoon on flexible "Turnbull's Superfine London Board," 13 x 8 3/4", signed "Th: Nast. March-1890.

A large Thomas Nast original cartoon lampooning one of his favorite objects of satire, Otto von Bismarck, on the occasion of the latter's resignation as "Iron Chancellor" of the German Empire, as submitted to Wilhelm II, on March 18, 1890. Published in Slason Thompson's America: A Journal for Americans (Chicago), vol. IV, April 3, 1890, pp. 14-15. America was a short-lived (1897-1901) periodical espousing anti-immigrant, anti-suffrage and anti-Catholic ideas, mingled with high-minded literary ambitions, for which Nast was contracted to contribute caricatured immigrant national types, stressing their supposed weaknesses and foibles. Original art by Nast done for America is naturally scarcer than done for Harper's as it was of much shorter duration. Here Nast has drawn Bismarck standing with hands clasped behind his back, legs apart, dressed in his field coat, wearing helmet and boots, his sword and field glasses case hanging at his left side. He faces his alter ego, an anthropomorphic figure with the head of a hare, fully dressed in military costume including sheathed sword, his left hand holding aloft an upraised standard, the banner reading: "Gott mit uns under Teufel Hole Sie" ("God with us and to the devil with you"). At the time of the completion of German unification in 1871, the imperial standard bore the motto Gott mit uns on the arms of an iron cross. To Germans it was a rallying cry, "a Protestant as well as an Imperial motto, the expression of German religious, political and ethnic single-mindedness, or the numerous unity of altar, throne and Volk." The hare's right arm is held aloft, his hand holding a long-stemmed pipe labeled "Der Friede" ("The Peace"). Below the "March Hare" Nast has written "Socialism/ Caesarism/ Diplomatic Kinder Garten/ (Mud Pie)." Directly below Bismarck he has written the word "Eisen," or "Steel," probably referring to Bismarck's "Blood and Steel" speech in Berlin in 1862. On verso Nast has written in ink: "The 'mad March hare' goes in like/ a lion but how will he come out?" At the bottom he has written: "Is there any method in the/ madness of Wilhelm II?/ Prince Bismarck-'I resign.'" Written in pencil in the middle of Nast's text, is "Mrs. R. H. Hunt/ 1 inch Black," That would be the wife of Richard Howland Hunt (1862-1931), American architect, son of the American architect William Morris Hunt. R. H. Hunt had two wives, Pearl (Carley) Hunt, who divorced him February, 1901, because of his affair with their Garden City, New York, neighbor and future second wife, Margaret Livingston Watrous, to whom he was married, June, 1901. As the cartoon went to Chicago, we do not know which Mrs. Hunt owned it. There is evidence on verso of it's having been pasted in an album, and there is one small blank corner off.