French, and drawing. His English and French became all but faultless, and he learned to draw in rough-and-ready, if not professionally expert fashion. Wednesdays and Saturdays, which were half-holidays, were spent roving in the country, especially in the forest, with two or three companions of his own age. In winter there was skating on the ponds. The Sunday dinner was a formal affair, at which royal relatives, who doubtless came to see how the princes were getting on, and high officials from Berlin, were usually present. After dinner the princes took young friends up to their private rooms and played charades, in which on occasion they amused themselves with the ever-delightful sport of taking off and satirizing their instructors. At this time the future Emperor's favourite subjects were history and literature, and he was fond of displaying his rhetorical talent before the class. The classical authors of his choice were Homer, Sophocles, and Horace. Homer particularly attracted him; it is easy to imagine the conviction with which, as a Hohenzollern, he would deliver the declaration of King Agamemnon to Achilles:—

     "And hence, to all the host it shall be known
     That kings are subject to the gods alone."

The young Prince left Cassel in January, 1877, after passing the exit (abiturient) examination, a rather severe test, twelfth in a class of seventeen. The result of the examination was officially described as "satisfactory," the term used for those who were second in degree of merit. On leaving he was awarded a gold medal for good conduct, one of three annually presented by a patron of the Gymnasium.

A foreign resident in Germany, who saw the young Prince at this time, tells of an incident which refers to the lad's appearance, and shows that even at that early date anti-English feeling existed among the people. It was at the military manoeuvres at Stettin:

"Then the old Emperor came by. Tremendous cheers. Then Bismarck and Moltke. Great acclaim. Then passed in a carriage a thin, weakly-looking youth, and people in the crowd said, 'Look at that boy who is to be our future Emperor—his good German blood has been ruined by his English training.'"

Before closing the Emperor's record as a schoolboy it will be of interest to learn the opinion of him formed by his French tutor at Cassel, Monsieur Ayme, who has published a small volume on the education of his pupil, and who, though evidently not too well satisfied with his remuneration of £7 10s. a month, or with being required to pay his own fare back from Germany to France, writes favourably of the young princes. "The life of these young people (Prince William and Prince Henry) was," he says,

"the most studious and peaceful imaginable. Up at six in the morning, they prepared their tasks until it was time to go to school. Lunch was at noon and tea at five. They went to bed at nine or half-past. All their hours of leisure were divided between lessons in French, English, music, pistol-shooting, equitation, and walking. Now and then they were allowed to play with boys of their own age, and on fête days and their parents' birth-anniversaries they had the privilege of choosing a play and seeing it performed at the theatre. As pocket-money Prince William received 20s. a month, and Henry 10s. Out of these modest sums they had to buy their own notepaper and little presents for the servants or their favourite companions."

As to Prince William's character as a schoolboy, Monsieur Ayme writes:

"I do not suppose William was ever punished while he was in Cassel. He was too proud to draw down upon himself criticism, to him the worst form of punishment. At the castle, as at school, he made it a point of honour to act and work as if he had made his plans and resolved to stick to them. He was always among the first of his class, and as for me I never had any need to urge him on. If I pointed out to him an error in his task he began it over again of his own accord. We did grammar, analysis, dictations, and compositions, and he got over his difficulties by sheer perseverance. For example, if he was reading a fine page of Victor Hugo, or the like, he hated to be interrupted, so deeply was he interested in the subject he was reading. Style and poetry had a great effect upon him; he expressed admiration for the form and was aroused to enthusiasm by generous or noble ideas. Frederick the Great was the hero of his choice, a model of which he never ceased dreaming, and which, like his grandfather, he proposed as his own. It is easy to conceive that after ten or twelve years of such study, regularly and methodically pursued, the Prince must have possessed a literary and scientific baggage more varied and extensive than that of his companions. And he worked hard for it, few lads so hard. To speak the truth, he was much more disciplined and much more deprived of freedom and recreation of all sorts than most children of his age."

Par paranthèse may be introduced here a reference to Prince Henry, of whom Monsieur Ayme writes less enthusiastically.

"One day," the tutor writes, "I was dictating to him something in which mention of a queen occurs. I came to the words '… in addition to her natural distinction she possessed that August majesty which is the appanage of princesses of the blood royal….'

"Prince Henry laid down his pen and remarked, 'The author who wrote this piece did not live much with queens.'

"'Why?' I asked.

"'Because I never observed the August majesty which attaches to princesses of the blood royal, and yet I have been brought up among them,' was the reply.

"William, however," continues Monsieur Ayme, "was the thinker, prudent and circumspect; the wise head which knew that it was not all truths which bear telling. He was not less loyal and constant in his opinions. He admired the French Revolution, and the declaration contained in 'The Rights of Man,' though this did not prevent his declaiming against the Terrorists."

One incident in particular must have appealed to the French tutor. Monsieur Ayme and his Prussian pupil one day began discussing the delicate question of the war of 1870. In the course of the discussion both parties lost their tempers, until at last Prince William suddenly got up and left the room. He remained silent and "huffed" for some days, but at last he took the Frenchman aside and made him a formal apology. "I am very sorry indeed," he said,

"that you took seriously my conduct of the other day. I meant nothing by it, and I regret it hurt you. I am all the more sorry, because I offended in your case a sentiment which I respect above any in the world, the love of country."

But it is time to pass from the details of the Emperor's early youth, and observe him during the two years he spent, with interruptions, at the university. From Cassel he went immediately to Bonn, where, as during the years of military duty which followed, we only catch glimpses of him as he lived the ordinary, and by no means austere, life of the university student and soldier of the time; that is to say, the ordinary life with considerable modifications and