"Your Majesty had not authorised me to spy upon the Princes," replied Stieber, "but in the meantime I had prepared myself against the possibilities of your Majesty doing so. Here are three sealed documents containing all there is to be known about their Royal Highnesses since I have had the honour of serving."
By 1854 the chief agent had become a personage in Berlin, and although the nobility of the higher rank would not receive him, Stieber found many valuable acquaintances among the wealthy "climbers" of the capital who were eager to be associated with the powerful chief confidant of the King. When the special-service department was in full running, Stieber was given orders to apply its methods to foreign countries and accordingly by 1860 Austria, Bohemia, Saxony, Luxembourg and France were under the observation of his employees. In 1855 the Reichstag voted an appropriation of about £15,000 in order to "secure for the State the benefits of useful intelligence," the secret-service agent himself drawing some £1800 yearly from the fund. At this time, says a writer of the period, Stieber was the most prominent official in the kingdom. All were conscious of being closely watched by himself and his agents and everyone was aware that ruin and dismissal could be brought about at the nod of the chief, and accordingly Stieber effected the entrance of himself and his wife into some of the best houses in Berlin under veiled threats of disclosing secrets of moment unless his advances were respectfully received. About this time, too, Stieber began that collection of decorations which were to testify to the high honour and esteem in which his King and country held him. He had no proper military uniform and that which on official occasions he was wont to wear resembled not a little the quasi-regimental garb of the commissionaire. By 1860 it had become heavily covered with medals and decorations.