WILHELMSHÖHE
The most agreeably situated of all the various dwelling-places occupied
in the course of the year by the Emperor William and his family is
without doubt the splendid palace of Wilhelmshöhe, standing on the
hillside amid beautifully wooded scenery within two miles of the town of
Cassel, which can be seen from its upper windows, sheltered snugly in a
long depression of hills, its red roofs lying warm across the soft
blueness of the distant mountains behind.
The Court stays here every year during August, when the damp heat of the
New Palace, which lies so low, becomes too suffocatingly unbearable. The
Emperor in Wilhelmshöhe changes his uniform every afternoon for an
ordinary flannel or tweed suit, and wearing a Panama hat, tramps
energetically among the woods and hills, working off a little of the
adipose tissue which, in spite of his activities, has in the last year
or two made some slight encroachment on his straight, lithe figure. He
has a horror of growing stout, and keeps the enemy at bay with
characteristic pertinacity.
Once at a fancy-dress ball given by Prince Adalbert, his sailor-son at
Kiel, the Emperor came to it, unknown to the guests, wearing the dress
of his own ancestor the Great Elector, a full-bottomed flowing wig and
the long coat and breeches appropriate to the period. During the first
part of the ball the dancers were masked, and the Emperor was talking
with a lady who, believing him to be the Crown Prince, whom she knew
very well, said to him archly:
“Your Imperial Highness is splendidly disguised. How did you make
yourself appear so stout? A little cushion stuffed inside somewhere, I
suppose?”
His Majesty told this story against himself several times, especially
when the lady, who previous to her marriage was attached to the service
of the Empress, happened to be present. He would roll his eyes in
pretended anger while he said:
“Of course there was no cushion--there was only me; but I believe she
said it on purpose. She knew who it was all the time.”
It was a toilsome business to tramp so many miles in the hot sun, and
though the Empress herself was at that time a good walker, she had hard
work to keep up with her energetic husband, while the Princess frankly
confessed that she was half dead after one of “Papa’s” brisk
constitutionals. Elderly Germans, especially at Court, do not walk much
habitually. They occasionally take exercise of the kind as a “cure,”
making it into something of a solemn, ponderous rite, strolling along
under the forest trees hat in hand, with frequent pauses to look at the
scenery; but this is not what the Emperor understands by walking.
Every Sunday morning the ladies and gentlemen of the suite used to
assemble before church time on the terrace opposite the great statue
(copied from the Farnese Hercules) which stands away at the top of the
hill crowning the artificial rock terraces, caves and cascades made by a
former Landgraf of Hesse-Cassel. This statue is so large that a man can
stand inside the club upon which Hercules leans. The weather was always
judged (or misjudged) according to whether _Herkules_ loomed near or
retired into the background. After standing a little, and chatting in
the usual desultory way of people who meet often and rarely have new
experiences to confide, the Empress and Princess would appear, followed
by the Emperor.
On my first visit to Wilhelmshöhe, as we wended our way to the little
chapel in one wing of the Palace, the Emperor said that he hoped I would
“sing in a loud, deep voice” in church, because the singing was usually
very bad. I commented on the slowness of German hymn-singing, and His
Majesty told me how surprised he was once, when visiting at Windsor
“with Grandmamma” a year or two before she died, to hear the organ burst
out suddenly into the Austrian National Anthem, not knowing that it had
been adopted as an English hymn-tune.
The way to the chapel was through a long matted corridor hung with queer
old-fashioned paintings of distorted-looking animals.
Just before the door of the royal pew hung on each side of the wall two
pictures of ferocious cows whose eyes followed with a threatening glare
as people went in or out of chapel. Underneath the cows was placed the
alms-dish for the contributions of Their Majesties and the Court.
The Emperor and Empress occupied two special gilt and red-velvet chairs,
and the Court ordinary cane-bottomed ones--also gilt--which made a great
scraping on the floor as we rose to pray or sat down to sing according
to the usual German custom.
The congregation consisted chiefly of a few officers and foresters with
their wives and children, and a well-meaning choir sang timidly in the
gallery up above.
The dining-room and neighbouring salons in Wilhelmshöhe were beautifully
furnished in Empire style and in late Louis Quinze. The fine view from
the windows, away over the undulating hills beyond Cassel, helped to
beguile the rather wearisome standing about and half-hearted
after-dinner conversation. One of the old generals who wanted to improve
his English always came ponderously in my direction if he saw me
glancing at some of the English fashion-papers lying on the table, as he
declared himself deeply interested in “ladies’ toilettes.” I was always
rather apprehensive when he turned over the leaves, looking at them
carefully through his eyeglass, and when he got to the hair
“transformations” usually thought it best to retire before he reached
pages of a still more intimate nature.
Jerome Bonaparte inhabited Wilhemshöhe for seven years when he was King
of Westphalia, and introduced all the Empire sofas and chairs. The salon
of the Princess was a delightful room with a parquet floor, panelled and
painted white, and the mahogany furniture was upholstered in a most
beautiful tone of striped yellow satin. Leading from it was the
breakfast-room, with striped red-stain wall-coverings hung with pictures
of the children of the House of Hesse-Cassel, to whom the Schloss
belonged before they lost it by fighting against Prussia in the war of
1866. These unfortunate infants of two or three years were dressed in
stuffy, heavy, thickly-embroidered garments of black and red velvet, and
wore stiffly-starched, scratchy-looking ruffs round their poor little
chubby necks.
In Wilhelmshöhe Schloss Napoleon III. was lodged after being taken
prisoner by the Germans. In the Empress’s sitting-room is the
writing-table he used, with the hole burnt in it where he always laid
his cigar.
Not far from Wilhelmshöhe, just a pleasant drive of an hour or so, past
yellowing cornfields, under rows of apple and cherry trees, lay
Wilhelmsthal, a charming country-house lying in a tiny hamlet far from a
railway station, also built by an Elector of Hesse and inhabited by the
before-mentioned King Jerome. This delightful little summer Schloss has
hardly been touched in its arrangements since the Great Napoleon’s
brother left it. All the beds remain with the French eagle spreading its
wings above the green silk curtains; the Dresden china figures he looked
at every day still occupy their places on the shelves; the china
timepiece that struck the hour yet stands beside his bed, though it has
long ago ceased to measure time. The tourist can lean out of the windows
of his bedroom and see the carp, descendants of those he used to feed,
or perhaps the very same fish, swimming about in the pond a little
distance away. It is a place where time seems to have stood still for
the last hundred years.
The Emperor in Wilhelmshöhe liked to ride at about seven o’clock in the
morning, while it was still comparatively cool. He was almost invariably
accompanied by the Empress, as well as by any other members of his
family who happened to be staying at the castle.
It was a pretty sight to watch the procession of horses coming two by
two from the stables across the road, each horse led by a groom, while
two _Sattel Meisters_ in cocked hats and much embroidered uniforms
walked behind them, all being under the command of two officers, the
Emperor’s _Leib-Stall-Meister_ and that of the Empress.
A former Master of the Horse to His Majesty, Baron von Holzing-Berstett,
was one of the judges at the International Horse Show at Olympia a few
years ago.
All the tourists from the hotel opposite used to assemble outside the
Schloss gates, under the stern control of two gendarmes, who kept them
penned on one side of the road.
The horses were halted in the shadow near the big pillared portico of
the Schloss, and as soon as the attendant gentlemen and ladies emerged,
were brought up and walked round the terrace by the grooms till a start
was made. As a rule the Emperor and Empress were very punctual, and
nothing annoyed His Majesty more than to be kept waiting. A lady always
rode in attendance on the Empress, but as one of those who could
ride--only two out of the four were able to do so--was usually absent on
her holidays at this time, I often was called upon to supply the place
of the absent _Hof-Dame_. The Princess, when her lessons began again,
had to ride at five in the evening instead of seven, so I very
frequently managed two rides a day, and even sometimes three. Often I
was summoned in the early morning from my repose by a breathless
footman.
“Will _gnädiges Fräulein_ please get up at once to ride with Her
Majesty? The Countess has a cold. In five minutes the horses will be
round.”
So that I became an expert in quick dressing, and generally managed to
be ready in time.
The Emperor’s suite was always fairly large, and as each of his sons
when he accompanied his father had also his attendant gentleman, often
consisted of sixteen or seventeen persons, without counting the
officials and grooms.
His Majesty in Wilhelmshöhe nearly always wore the comfortable green
Jäger uniform in which to ride, whereas in _Neues Palais_ he almost
invariably rode in Hussar uniform. We usually moved off from the Terrace
in three or four rows, one behind the other, and the clatter of hoofs
was like that of a troop of cavalry. The morning air from the mountains
came in gusts fresh and sparkling like wine. As soon as His Majesty
appeared round the curve of the drive, the sentry flung open the little
iron gate leading on to the road, and the rows of people outside
immediately produced and waved their clean pocket-handkerchiefs, which
at once aroused apprehensions in the breast of the timid equestrian
somewhat doubtful of his own powers. The horses of the Emperor and
Empress were, of course, specially trained to ignore these loyal
demonstrations, but those of the suite, especially if newly introduced
into the stable, sometimes exhibited symptoms of surprise.
Practically only one good riding road exists in the neighbourhood of
Wilhelmshöhe, but this is a very delightful one, through the lovely
wooded grounds outside the park up into the forest on the mountain
slopes, and then across a beautiful stretch of grass along the brow of
the hills with a wide view on all sides. As soon as they reached the
softer ground in the forest the Emperor and Empress would start off at a
brisk stretching canter, followed by the rest of the party. After a
night’s rain it was not agreeable to ride in the second and third row,
for the dirt cast up by the horses’ hoofs was rather adhesive, not like
the hard clean sand of Potsdam, which fell off again as soon as dry. For
several miles the canter would be kept up, and then the horses were
breathed a little and trotted homewards again. Very often the Empress
finished her ride at the big statue of Hercules, where carriages were
waiting and grooms to take the horses home.
One day the Princess had ridden alone with me, and we were returning
from the “Hercules” together in an automobile. The road down the steep
hillside towards the castle is cut in a series of zigzags with very
sharp turns, and at the first of these, the chauffeur failing to turn
early enough, the car as nearly as possible toppled over the edge, its
front wheels being just on the verge when he was able to stop. Another
inch would have sent it over, crashing down among the trees. The
Princess said afterwards that it was “a thrilling moment,” and I agreed
that it was one of those deeply interesting intervals of time which make
one feel keenly alive. She did not move or say a word as we hung, but
gripped her riding-whip rather hard, and only when the big car slowly
backed and turned into a safer position gave a long deep sigh of
relief. She rather enjoyed novel sensations, and especially gloried in
the description of her own emotions at the critical moment. Like the fat
boy in “Pickwick” she wanted to make “your blood run cold” with the
narration of hairbreadth escapes and dangerous situations.
When the afternoons were too hot to walk, His Majesty almost invariably
played lawn-tennis. Grass courts are non-existent in Germany--at least
they are used only by those people who do not take lawn-tennis
seriously; and all good courts are made of a kind of concrete first used
at Homburg, the composition of which is supposed to be a secret. It is
an excellent preparation, possessing a certain elasticity approximating
to turf, and has the advantage of drying quickly. Even if turf lawns
could be grown as they are in England--and I have never met with any
that remotely resembled their close, fine texture--the heavy
thunderstorms which prevail in that district during the hot weather
would frequently make it impossible to use them.
His Majesty plays lawn-tennis in rather crude-looking shirts and ties,
and usually wears a Panama hat. Unlike most men, he looks perhaps less
well in such a “get-up” than in anything else. Young officers from the
neighbouring barracks are often sent for to join in a set, and the
_Ober-Gouvernante_, who was an expert player, often had to upset all her
arrangements for the afternoon on being requested to play with His
Majesty. As the Princess grew older she became quite a respectable
player, and all the young princes, especially the Crown Prince and
Prince Adalbert, were good at the game, which is exceedingly popular in
Germany.
In the evenings, when it grew rather cooler, a picnic supper was often
eaten in some spot among the hills. Sometimes we drove there in
carriages, and it was the pride of the Master of the Horse to turn out
four or five four-in-hands, which made a great sensation among the
tourists as they emerged from the gates of the Schloss.
The Royal Stables possessed some very fine black Mecklenburg horses
which were used on these occasions, but the all-conquering automobile
has lately been preferred by His Majesty, who likes to get quickly over
the ground, and also to go farther afield than horses can take him.
Those suppers in the hills were very amusing, especially if, as often
happened, the Emperor decided that he and the Empress should do some of
the cooking. In spite of all assertions to the contrary, the Empress
knows nothing whatever about cooking, although a good part of the
civilized world pictures her as daily bending over saucepans and mixing
ingredients for puddings. The nearest approach to the culinary art which
she has ever practised was dexterously “tossing” a pancake, which she
did very neatly, and was exceedingly gratified by the applause of the
surrounding ladies, one of whom dropped hers on to the ground. It
happened, of course, at one of these picnics, which are accompanied by
portable stoves and several cooks with the necessary implements and
materials of their trade. Some of the gentlemen of the suite, those
imbued with the old Prussian spirit of economy which believes in
limiting avenues of expenditure, often expressed impatience and
disapproval of these suppers.
“Now look!” said one of them to me: “there are four carts for the
kitchens alone--horses, coachmen, grooms; think of the work all this has
caused these poor cooks"--he glanced at four white-clad individuals who
were peaceably pursuing their avocations under the shade of a tree, and
appeared to be quite as happy as the rest of us.
“I think they really enjoy it,” I said deprecatingly; “of course it _is_
a trouble--picnics usually are; but there are plenty of horses in the
stables--they may as well come out here as not.”
He shook his head and sighed.
“Ah, it is a different spirit,” he said sadly. “My father used to tell
me how simply the Old Emperor William lived. Never took more than one
adjutant with him, not this crowd"--and he waved his hand at the row of
gentlemen whose gaze was concentrated on the Emperor engaged in
concocting some kind of a strawberry _Bowle_. “Never used more than one
carriage if he could help it, at most two. Look at that procession"--and
his gaze wandered dubiously to the long line of vehicles which stood in
the shade a little way down the hill. We could hear the clink of bits
and the stamp of the waiting horses.
“The Old Emperor William,” I ventured, “was King of Prussia for a good
while before he became German Emperor; he could not change his habits
later on. Besides, everybody lives more extravagantly now; even the
working classes----”
He groaned and shook his head, and murmured something which sounded
disapproving and prophetic of disaster.
One day at dinner in Wilhelmshöhe one of the guests was a water-finder,
and when, as usual, we all went out on the terrace, he produced his rod,
a ramshackle affair like a piece of iron wire, and we were all invited
to try our skill. Many of the gentlemen were frankly sceptical, and the
only one of them with whom the rod made any definite movement was the
worst unbeliever of them all.
The Emperor was very annoyed at their unbelief, and said that he was
going to send the gentleman with the divining-rod to South Africa, where
he would be able to discover not only springs of water, but diamonds and
gold. His Majesty had recently been gratified by the fresh discovery of
small diamonds in German-African territory, and exhibited with great
glee his cigarette-case in which they had been mounted. He explained to
us all that they had been found, not, as is usual, embedded in blue
clay, but lying on the surface loose in the sand, and that one of the
German workers on the new railway had gathered up a handful in a few
minutes. He also gave it as his opinion that they had blown along from
some as yet undiscovered mine somewhere in the hills.
I suggested in a whisper to the Princess, who was very triumphant over
these German diamonds, that they had probably blown over the frontier
from British territory, and she immediately communicated this theory of
mine to her father.
“No, no!” roared the Emperor in pretended anger. “Blew over from British
territory indeed! nothing of the kind!” He scowled portentously and--as
was his habit--shook a monitory finger in my direction.
When the Court returned to _Neues Palais_ from Wilhelmshöhe after the
Emperor returned from the great autumn manœuvres, as long as the fine
weather lasted--and the autumn in Potsdam is wonderfully beautiful--he
would make excursions on his little river steamer the _Alexandria_ along
the beautiful chain of lakes which is one of the great charms of that
district.
The private landing-stage had been built by His Majesty of wood in
quaint Norwegian style, with two large waiting-rooms and a wide balcony
overlooking the water. Ranged on shelves round the rooms was every
variety of Norwegian bowl; some brightly-painted red ones with dragon
beak and tail, others very beautifully carved in Norwegian patterns.
They had most of them been brought back from Norway by the Emperor
himself. The chairs were of the uncompromisingly hard Norwegian peasant
type, made entirely of wood and without any attempt at adaptation to
human contours. The sailors who manned the _Alexandria_ were some of the
crew of the _Hohenzollern_, and looked very smart in their white-duck
uniforms.
As a rule we went in the steamer to the _Pfauen-Insel_ or Isle of
Peacocks, where was a very queer little Schloss, built to resemble an
imitation ruin, though the imitation was very badly done. It had been a
favourite resort of Queen Louise of Prussia and her husband, and
in the cupboards upstairs were still to be found some most
extraordinary-looking old bonnets of hers of the coal-scuttle type. Not
far from the Schloss was a _Rutsch-Bahn_ or toboggan slide, which the
Princess liked immensely, and always insisted that I should join her in
one of the dreadful “rushes,” which were accomplished in little boxes
something like sleighs, with room for two people inside and one man
outside, who had to stand on the runners and push off from the top. We
went down at a tremendous pace, finally landing on the grass at the
bottom, where we bumped terrifically till the impetus was spent. The man
behind always had to lean over the inside occupants and grasp at two
handles in front of the car.
In a sheltered angle of the Schloss itself the supper-table was spread
by the footmen with the cold viands which had been brought from the New
Palace. All round lay the shining water, and there was a constant
rustling and whispering of the reeds as they bowed and curtsied to the
night wind. Sometimes on the warm September evenings the Emperor would
remain a long time at table talking and smoking by the light of candles,
enclosed in tall glass chimneys to protect them from the draught. No one
was permitted to smoke excepting His Majesty--chiefly, I believe,
because the Empress has a very strong dislike to the odour of tobacco.
Usually the “visitors’ book” of the Schloss was produced some time
during the evening, and every one present signed it. It contained many
interesting signatures of long-dead-and-gone celebrities, and the firm,
clear writing of the Emperor and Empress Frederick occurred frequently,
as well as that of the “Old Emperor” and Bismarck.
If during the cruise the weather turned colder, the supper was taken to
the landing-stage--the Matrosen Station, as it was called--and eaten
there in the Norwegian rooms, the guests sitting uncomfortably on the
Norwegian chairs. No opportunity of eating out of doors was ever lost,
and when time did not allow of an excursion, supper was served on the
terrace just outside the windows of the palace, where the orange trees
scented the air, and the mosquitoes were kept at bay by braziers of
charcoal on which juniper berries were burned.
Sometimes, instead of going by water to _Pfauen-Insel_, the court drove
in carriages to Sacrow, a small Schloss uninhabited except by the
_Kastellan_ and his wife, situated in a lovely tangled wilderness of
garden overlooking the water. To get to the other side it was necessary
to use the ferry, and when the Princess crossed it in the afternoon with
her ponies, she would assist the ferryman to warp his craft over the
river. Once when we went to Sacrow with an automobile, the shirt-sleeved
waiter from the adjacent restaurant, the blue-jerseyed man in charge of
the ferry and the Princess worked all in a row, walking slowly along the
rope, gravely performing their task together, while the two chauffeurs
in their elegant royal livery regarded this pleasantly democratic
picture with hardly concealed surprise and amusement.
The woods round Sacrow were the most beautiful of any in the
neighbourhood, threaded with sandy paths which skirted the water side.
In one part were the kennels of the _Königliche Meute_ or royal pack of
hounds, which we visited once or twice in the summer-time before the
hunting began.
During the autumn and winter these hounds hunted two or three times a
week at Döberitz after wild boar, carted from one of the Emperor’s
neighbouring forests. The meets were attended almost exclusively by the
officers of the regiments stationed in Potsdam, and very often by the
Emperor. The Empress, although very fond of riding, was not at all keen
on hunting, and rarely appeared except on St. Hubert’s Day, which is a
very ceremonial occasion, the horses being decorated with green
ribbons, and every one riding in pink with chimney-pot hat, whereas on
ordinary occasions the round velvet hunting-cap and black coat may be
worn.
The Emperor invariably gives a hunting dinner on the evening of this
day, when all the gentlemen invited appear in pink, each one wearing in
the buttonhole of his coat the spray of oak-leaves which is the trophy
presented to everybody “in at the death.” When the Emperor is present at
a hunt, he himself distributes the bunches of oak-leaves; otherwise it
is one of the duties of the M.F.H.
The riding-horses of His Majesty are mostly big-boned weight-carriers of
English or Irish breed, trained in the royal stables for six months or
so before being ridden by the Emperor.
Those of the Empress are in charge of a second official, who is
responsible for their good behaviour.
Once, as Their Majesties rode together in the early morning in the
neighbourhood of Potsdam, the horse of the Empress stumbled and fell,
turning a complete somersault and throwing its rider on to her head,
fortunately without serious injury, thanks to the hard straw hat she was
wearing.
It is a very dreadful business for an Empress to fall from her horse,
even when she receives no particular harm. It usually happens before a
crowd of people, some of whom are necessarily held responsible for the
accident; and on this occasion one or two of the officials became
hysterical and shed tears, while the Emperor, under the stress of the
incident, used some rather sharp and very excusable words of censure.
The adjutants scattered themselves wildly over the surface of the earth
in search of a doctor, while Princes Oskar and Joachim, who were also
riding with their parents, did the same.
Prince Oskar discovered no doctor, but did manage to find a droschky
with a miserable-looking horse and a very dirty, unkempt driver, who was
sitting peacefully dreaming on his box in front of a house, waiting for
his “fare,” a young officer, to come out. Prince Oskar immediately
ordered him to come and drive Her Majesty home, but the droschky-driver
demurred, saying he was already engaged and could not leave his fare in
the lurch. The Prince insisted, but the faithful cabman, perhaps
doubtful of the _bona fides_ of the affair, still refused the proffered
honour of driving the Empress home; so finally the Prince drew his sword
and bade him in the name of military authority (paramount in Germany) to
proceed with him at once to the indicated spot, bringing his droschky
with him. So grumbling loudly all the way, the disgusted Jehu did as he
was bid, obviously still convinced that he was the victim of some
practical joke, and presently found himself the centre of a brilliant
but agitated circle of people, all talking and suggesting different
things.
Her Majesty, who protested at being treated as an injured person, as she
felt perfectly well except for the momentary alarm, would have much
preferred to remount her horse and ride home quietly without so much
unnecessary fuss; but had perforce to get into the evil-smelling, dirty
vehicle with her lady-in-waiting, and escorted by her two sons and one
or two crestfallen officials, arrived home, where a very frightened
young military doctor, who had been somehow unearthed from a
neighbouring barracks, thought after a short examination that it was
advisable for the Empress to keep her bed. He was then dismissed with
appropriate thanks, and the Court doctor, who had been summoned from
Berlin, immediately ordered Her Majesty to get up and go about as usual.
The flutter in the Palace that day was indescribable, and one of the
strangest things was the absolute divergence of opinion among the
spectators of the accident. No two of them agreed as to the exact manner
in which it took place, and the discussions about unimportant details
grew almost acrimonious.
The droschky-driver reaped most advantage from the occurrence, and
still relates to an admiring Potsdam the part he played in extricating
Her Majesty from a serious dilemma.