William I was not the only one having a hard time. Even more tragic was George I, Emperor of the German Federal Empire. He was the one truly having it rough.
Because the British had backed him onto the throne, and he himself held the title of Duke of Cumberland in the United Kingdom, the public mockingly called him Cumberland I.
From the very beginning, George I's throne had been unstable. There was a whole pile of princes, great and small, beneath him, and none of them gave him the slightest regard. Even with British support, he could do nothing to them.
As an elected emperor, his authority was about as great as that of the Holy Roman Emperor in the Middle Ages. Other than being the nominal common sovereign, he was left with little more than presiding over the federal assembly.
That was fine too. So long as he could govern Hanover, that was enough. George I had never expected the states below to obey his every word.
As a buffer between great powers, the German Federal Empire remained quite safe as long as the balance in Europe was not broken.
What gave him the greatest headache was his abysmally low prestige as monarch. Many people called the German Federal Empire the "Comedy Empire," treating this empire imposed upon them by foreign powers as a disgrace.
So many years had passed, and George I had made countless efforts, yet nothing had changed.
If the people did not even identify with the empire itself, naturally they would not identify with him as its emperor.
The states within the empire feared that George I would follow Franz's example and use pressure from public opinion to gather up the powers in their hands. They tacitly worked together to suppress his prestige.
George