Chlodwig zu Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst remained at Strasbourg till October 1894, when, at the urgent request of the Emperor William II, he consented, in spite of his advanced years, to accept the chancellorship as Caprivi's successor. The Kaiser's "great friend" Philipp, Prince of Eulenburg wanted his cousin Botho zu Eulenburg to be Caprivi's replacement, but Friedrich von Holstein, the head of the political department of the German Foreign Office, was able to persuade William II not to appoint a Eulenburg as chancellor. However, Philipp, Prince of Eulenburg then managed to convince the emperor to appoint the aged Chlodwig zu Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, who was the German ambassador to France in 1881 when Eulenburg served in the Paris embassy, as the new chancellor. During this time, Eulenburg repeatedly advised Wilhelm that the best man to be chancellor was Bernhard von Bülow, whom Eulenburg painted in the most glowing terms; he wrote in February 1895 to Wilhelm saying that "Bernhard is the most valuable servant Your Imperial Majesty possesses, the predestined "Reich" Chancellor of the future".