ROYAL betrothals and weddings have within the last few years been of frequent occurrence at the Prussian Court. Many people seem doubtful as to whether these marriages were the result of political arrangement or of the mutual attraction which is the chief factor in such affairs where humbler folk are concerned. Of my own personal knowledge I am able to affirm that politics and worldly considerations have had nothing to say in the matter.

German royalties are peculiarly fortunate in having an unusually wide range of choice. The Fatherland is rich in numerous prolific princely families, quite unremarkable for wealth or extent of territory—some indeed are conspicuously poverty-stricken—but all of them classed as ebenbÜrtig, that is equal in birth, to royalty, and therefore the female members are eligible as brides for the occupiers of the most powerful thrones. The Empire has long been the happy hunting-ground for would-be bridegrooms.

The first royal Verlobung which took place within range of my cognizance was that of the young Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, son of the Duchess of Albany, who was staying in Berlin Schloss at the same time as the two nieces of the Empress, the Princesses Victoria and Alexandra of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburg—two bright, pretty, fair-haired girls who had come to spend the season at Berlin with their aunt.

The Princess burst into my sitting-room with the news one evening.

“Dick and Charlie are engaged,” she said, skipping about all over the room. “Isn’t it nice? Just think! Dick and Charlie!”

“Dick” was the pet name of the Princess Victoria, the eldest of five sisters.

I expressed my astonishment and pleasure at the news, and the Princess gave me several reasons why she was not so surprised as some people, although I am convinced that she really had known very little beforehand. But at any rate she thought it most interesting that they should become engaged “in Mamma’s sitting-room.”

The following September the Crown Prince announced, in a series of laconic telegrams to his friends, his own engagement to the young Duchess CÉcile of Mecklenburg-Schwerin.

“We are engaged.—William and CÉcile,” was the message sent by the happy Braut-paar.

The Crown Prince had from early youth been frequently in love with various pretty young girls within the range of his acquaintanceship. But these harmless little love-affairs, so frank, so delightfully obvious, and so soon dispersed into thin air by the advent of some new and equally ineligible charmer, culminated at last in his meeting with the young Duchess CÉcile, a dark-eyed, clear-complexioned, tall, slim maiden, just out of the schoolroom.

Any one seeing the happy pair together need not have troubled to ask if they were in love with each other. It was palpably the case, and they had not the least desire to conceal the fact. When the young Braut came to stay at the Neues Palais after her engagement, a very small party—just the ladies-in-waiting and the two young Princesses—were dining together in the Apollo-Saal, for the Emperor and Empress were absent for the day. Suddenly a great clattering was heard outside the window overlooking the terrace, and the Crown Prince appeared on horseback, having ridden up the stone steps. His young Braut was charmed at his daring, and they sat down at table side by side, obviously absorbed in each other, while the ladies talked about the weather and tried to be as unobtrusive as possible. They were as genuinely and whole-heartedly attracted, as palpably all-in-all to each other, as the poorest young couple who bravely face the world together. Nothing but personal liking entered into their marriage.

It is a pity that people are so sceptical as to any royal alliance being founded on any other than political considerations. Yet politics are rarely either forwarded or hindered nowadays by matrimonial arrangements; and if propinquity, as most people believe, is the chief factor in bringing about the usual love-affair, then it is obviously most natural for a prince to be attracted towards the pretty girl—for many princesses are remarkably pretty—whom he meets on equal terms, with whom there is no consciousness of difference of rank, the girl who has been brought up in the same atmosphere as himself, with whom familiarity has bred a certain contempt for court ceremonies and court traditions, who is related, perhaps, like himself, to various crowned heads whom they both call “Uncle,” one with whom he has a common ground of interest, bonds of relationship and mutual knowledge.

As soon as the announcement of this engagement became public, the postcard shops of Berlin, whose name is legion, became mere picture-galleries for the illustration of every possible moment of the life and movements of the young couple. A whole army of photographers must have been employed to lie in wait and photograph them under almost every conceivable circumstance of their lives. Certainly German royalties are very good-natured in this respect.

First there was the official photograph of the Braut-Paar sitting hand-in-hand, as is the orthodox photographic pose in Germany for all newly engaged couples. Then there was a card called “The First Congratulations”: rows and rows of little schoolboys and girls of Schwerin, each with a bouquet of wilted flowers in the hand, and the girls with wreaths entwined in their hair, presented in turn their offerings to the smiling young Duchess, while the Crown Prince stood by, helping things along to the best of his ability. “The First Drive” pictured them both in a sort of dog-cart, duly chaperoned, taking the air together, and there were dozens more cards portraying them at tennis, drinking tea in the garden, or nursing the dogs. One felt that one knew how every moment of their time was employed.

Although they were engaged in the month of September, their marriage did not take place until the beginning of the following June. Ordinary weddings usually mean a time of considerable stress to every one concerned, but they are epochs of honeyed leisure as compared with the multiple ceremonies attendant on royal functions of the same kind.

For weeks beforehand no one dared to let their thoughts wander from the impending event. A few days before the State entry of the bride into the town, we all had to leave the New Palace and migrate to Berlin.

A State entry means, for the bride, not only an entry in State carriages but in State attire, wearing semievening dress and a long train.

The day before it took place the bride arrived with her mother, the Duchess Anastasia, and took up her residence for the night in Belle Vue, which was outside the city boundary. The next day, which turned out remarkably hot, almost too hot to be agreeable, all Berlin was astir early, and the streets were lavishly bewreathed and beflagged. Along the route large wooden stands had been erected, for as far as the populace is concerned the entry is the only part of the State ceremony which they can enjoy, as the wedding itself takes place privately in the Chapel of the Schloss.

So the good people of Berlin are astir betimes, and take their places along the Tier-Garten, or as near as they can to the Brandenburger Tor, at a very early hour, quite regardless of the fact that the procession will not start before three. But they know there will be plenty to be seen. Royal carriages, carrying notable personalities, will pass to and fro, and the Emperor and Empress, the “little Princess” and her brothers, will doubtless be in evidence. So they stand from hour to hour waiting patiently in the heat. In the stables great activity prevails. The eight fine black horses which draw the bride’s State carriage have been daily exercised together, wearing the heavy red brass-studded harness. The coach itself is made almost entirely of glass in the upper panels, and is most beautifully painted and decorated. Three gorgeously-clad footmen cling behind it, and two equally gorgeous pages hold a seemingly precarious and uncomfortable footing behind the coachman’s box, crowded up between it and the curvature of the coach itself in a very complicated and mysterious manner. The ponderous vehicle swings heavily from side to side, and has a peculiar cross-Channel motion.

Its progress down towards Belle Vue is watched by crowds of delighted spectators. The sight of its eight slowly-pacing horses, each wearing wonderful plumes of ostrich feathers, and led at a foot’s pace by grooms in red coats encrusted with gold lace, fill the crowd with joyful ecstasy. They forget the heat and thirst and the long hours they have already waited.

All the master-butchers of Berlin are very active and not a little apprehensive, for it is an old-established privilege of their guild to ride, in top-hats and frock-coats, at the head of the bride’s procession, and they are divided between the fearful joy and doubtful pleasure of the enterprise. They have been diligently pursuing equestrian exercise for the last few weeks. Many who never made acquaintance with a saddle before—except in the form of mutton—have been learning, at the nearest “Tattersall,” some of the elementary mysteries of horsemanship. Quiet, staid horses of mature years have suddenly risen in price, and horse-dealers have reaped a rich harvest from certain ancient but good-looking crocks which know how to walk with an air of magnificence.

All these black-coated gentry assemble at the entrance to Belle Vue. They are in the happy position of seeing to advantage all that goes on. They may not look quite as smart as the mounted Uhlans of the escort, but they add a quaint, homely German touch to the picture which is very agreeable.

Only State carriages are allowed to drive, as they do on this occasion, along the gravelled centre of the avenue of lime-trees on Unter den Linden. All the Stall-Meisters, Sattel-Meisters, Wagen-Meisters and other stable functionaries are assembled in Belle Vue Garden, while the Master of the Horse in his plumed cocked hat casts an eye over the horses and hopes that those well-trained quadrupeds will not be stirred out of their usual calm by the unaccustomed character of the day’s proceedings.

From the Schloss there is an excellent view of the long procession as it at last comes slowly up the Linden. It stops at the Brandenburger Tor, where the BÜrger-Meister—the Lord Mayor of Berlin—has the pleasing duty of making a speech of welcome to the bride, who is expected to make a short speech in reply. A bouquet is also presented by one of a galaxy of palpitating white-clad maidens, and, headed by the black-coated butchers, amid the fluttering pennons of the Uhlans the big coach swings slowly on its way, the bride smiling and bowing incessantly. Never was anyone more joyously responsive than the future Crown-Princess, who possesses in a high degree that capacity for appearing pleased and amused which is so invaluable to royalties. She probably does not know how to look bored. The world is to her an intensely amusing, interesting place. That day she drove triumphantly into the hearts of the people, where she has remained enthroned ever since—a stimulating, charming presence.

Besides the bride, the coach contained the Empress and the Mistress of the Robes, and when it turned at last from the shouting, waving populace into the courtyard of the Schloss, the butchers having previously ridden in at one gate and out again at the other, the Emperor, who had driven up earlier from Belle Vue, was standing at the entrance to welcome his future daughter-in-law, while the bridegroom waited at the head of his regiment, which formed the guard of honour for the occasion.

The wedding itself took place three days later, at five o’clock in the afternoon. Those people who were not invited to be present at the wedding ceremony in the chapel itself received invitations to the Bilder Galerie or Picture Gallery, through which the wedding procession must pass.

It is a very mixed assembly, for all having any connection with the bride or bridegroom, professors, school friends, teachers, footmen or their families, fellow students, all receive tickets. They must appear in evening dress, and some very strange costumes are seen among the ladies. One I remember, an obviously home-made and inartistic affair, was trimmed with real water-lilies, which in the heat had turned a dismal brown, and long before the procession drew near were depressingly dying on the ample bosom of the lady who wore them. Everybody had to stand all the time, and footmen holding scarlet cords kept back the crowd as well as they could from encroaching on the space left in the centre. There was a much better view here of the procession than in the chapel itself, especially for the front rank of spectators, among whom I was luckily placed. In the second row was a very stout woman, who leaned frankly upon me for support, and tried unblushingly but unsuccessfully to push her way to the front. When frustrated in this manoeuvre, she complained loudly of my disobligingness, and said that she had received her entrance card from an Ober-Kastellan, and that she could not understand how I could therefore expect her to remain in the second row. I had to lean back on to her to prevent myself being pushed on to the red carpet, and she again became tearfully indignant, not to say unpleasant; but fortunately the procession began to arrive and saved any further trouble.

It was headed by two heralds in tabards, and by twelve pages in red, and then came the bride in a dress of silver tissue led by the bridegroom in uniform. She had on her head the small jewelled crown which every Prussian bride wears on her wedding day, and her train was carried by four young ladies. The Empress followed with the bride’s brother, the Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, and the Emperor with the bride’s mother, the Grand Duchess Anastasia. They were followed by a crowd of other royalties walking, as is the custom, hand-in-hand, sometimes one Prince conducting two Princesses, or one Princess being conducted by two Princes. They all looked very much amused at themselves, and those who happened to know me grinned delightedly and nodded as they passed. Prince Arthur of Connaught was there, and the very tall Duchess of Aosta, who walked with a tiny little Japanese gentleman. The Princess, who walked with Prince Joachim, made very friendly demonstrations as she went by, and choked with laughter when I responded by a very deep curtsy.

When the last of the procession had vanished we were all driven out at once, and an army of housemaids with brooms entered and began to sweep up the dirt and litter which the people had left behind. It was strange that on the most ceremonious occasions, when people were waiting round red carpets to welcome royal guests, or ambassadors weighed down with state secrets were on the point of getting into their carriages after audiences with the Emperor, always a print-gowned housemaid with a broom made a jarring appearance, wielding her implement coolly in the midst of state functionaries as though sweeping were the most important business of life. Sometimes she had scarcely disappeared before royalty itself emerged.

The Lutheran wedding-service is very simple. It begins with the long address of the clergyman to the bridal couple, admonishing them as to their duties to each other and the world at large. As everybody stands the whole time—for no chairs are admitted into the chapel, excepting one or two for specially exalted guests—this address is apt to appear longer than it really is. Each lady is in Court dress, wearing the regulation veil and long, heavy train which she must hold on her arm during the service, as it is not to be displayed until the Defilir-Cour which follows immediately afterwards. From the chapel the newly-married pair walk into the adjacent Weisser-Saal, where with the Emperor and Empress they stand to receive the congratulations of the invited guests, who pass quickly before them bowing, the ladies with their trains spread out. When the bride and bridegroom have made several hundred bows and the Cour is at an end, an adjournment is made to dinner, which is laid in several different rooms at small round tables, excepting the one where the royalties sit, which is fairly large. Here more quaint ceremonies take place. The Prince FÜrstenberg as Marshal of the Court serves the Emperor with soup, and the other royal guests are also waited on by pages and gentlemen of birth, who take the dishes from the footmen. The Lord-High-Steward or Truchsess pours out the wine, and in the middle of the dinner the Emperor proposes the health of the newly-married pair.

The dinner, in spite of the attendant ceremonies, is not allowed to be too prolonged, for the great climax of these stately formalities still remains to be performed—the most beautiful, but perhaps for the hard-worked bridal pair also the most tiring of all—the famous Torch Dance, seen nowhere but at the Prussian Court, and when once seen, never to be forgotten.

The wedding procession returns to the beautiful Weisser Saal, where a regimental band, usually that of the Garde du Corps, is stationed in the gallery. Here, at a signal from an official, the music begins: slow stately marches are played, old-world tunes that seem an echo of past times. The royal ladies are all seated with their parti-coloured trains, which seem somehow to be the chief feature of all state functions, spread out in front of them—while rows of red-clad pages stand behind their chairs waiting to advance when the time arrives.

From the side entrance of the Saal, stepping in time to the music, enters the Marshal of the Court carrying his wand of office, preceding a double row of twenty-four pages who bear large torches. In stately rhythm they move once round the room, when the Marshal stops, and bows to the bride and bridegroom, who at once descend from the slightly-raised platform where they sit, and hand-in-hand, preceded by the torch-bearers, with four ladies carrying the bride’s train, the group moves round the Hall in time to the music. I have seen this ceremony four times, at as many royal weddings, and cannot express its wonderful fascination, its mixture of poetry and romance, its glamour of colour, its irresistible charm to the beholder. There is the lulling monotony of sound, the flicker and smoke of the torches, the brilliant blending of many tones, the dignified movement of the dancers, the crowd of seated royalties opposite the crowd of standing courtiers. It takes on something of the aspect of a fairy tale, is reminiscent of “Cinderella” or of a half-forgotten ballad of bygone days.

The bride and bridegroom having made their tour of the room once alone, return and separate, the bride now taking out the Emperor and her own nearest male relative, while the bridegroom leads out his mother and that of the bride, and they again march slowly round the room. All the ladies’ trains, excepting those of the bride and the Empress, are carried by four pages, the two exceptions by four ladies who themselves wear trains. And so round after round bride and bridegroom return and hand out the rest of the Princes and Princesses in turn.

In order to hasten matters, towards the end three or four of the younger ones are linked together on either hand, and a chain of happy, smiling youth treads the last stately measure round the Hall.

The Torch Dance finishes, and the torch-bearers wend their way out, followed by the long glittering procession, away to the private apartments. The ceremonies are at an end. It is nine o’clock, and presently, if you listen, you may hear the cheers of the people in the street greeting the bridal couple as they drive quickly through the summer darkness on their way to the station.

After they are gone, there remains only one small ceremony, which is often very unceremonious—the scramble of the courtiers for the so-called Garter of the Bride. Hundreds of pieces of white satin ribbon marked with her cipher are distributed by the Mistress of the Ceremonies, and for a few moments pandemonium seems to reign. At the last wedding I was flung bodily into the arms of a Kammer-Herr, a gold-laced official of great dignity; and some of the royalties returning to their apartments were plunged into the vortex of the struggle and severely hustled and pushed about before a passage could be made for them. The distributing lady was then kindly but firmly requested to pursue her avocations in a side corridor farther away.

The wedding of the Emperor’s second son, Prince Fritz, to the Duchess Sophie Charlotte of Oldenburg took place in February, on the same day as the celebration of the Silver Wedding of Their Majesties, who on this occasion walked hand in hand in the bridal procession, the Empress wearing a wreath of silver myrtle as well as a beautiful diamond tiara given to her by her husband.

This Silver Wedding was, of course, the occasion of many spontaneous tributes of affection towards Their Majesties; and the Court Chaplain—he who attempted to guide our Christmas carols—being an indefatigable man, had determined that this notable day ought to be ushered in by an aubade, an early-morning song, to be performed by the Court ladies and gentlemen outside the bedroom door of the Emperor and Empress. It was to be sacred in character; but, instead of taking some old-established favourite, he was moved to ask a musical friend to write something special to fit the occasion. Like most “specially-written” melodies, it was rather uninspired, but by dint of constant practice at most inconvenient times we got a more or less hazy idea of it, and hoped that it would make a deep impression.

I think we were all a little resentful at having to rise so early on what we knew would be a long, fatiguing day. The poor Court Chaplain, who had to come over from Potsdam, must have started in the chilly darkness of the winter morning. I myself, unaccustomed to rising quite so early, fell asleep again after being awakened, and had to dress in feverish haste and rush downstairs without any breakfast. We were gathered, a group of rather sleepy, not conspicuously good-tempered people, at the entrance to the narrow corridor leading to the private apartments, where we waited an unconscionable time, growing every moment more nervous, and studying the little ill-written scraps of music-paper on which we had jotted down, somewhat undecipherably, our several parts. Everybody inquired of his neighbour what we were waiting for, but no one seemed to know, excepting the leading soprano, who frowned angrily when we whispered and put her finger reprovingly on her lips.

We were obviously much in the way of certain JÄgers and footmen, who were passing up and down with garments and boots; and at last some of us grew restive and threatened to depart.

At that moment a JÄger, who had cast disapproving glances at us as he passed to and fro, came and told us that His Majesty had left his room and was not likely to return, whereupon we felt much disappointment, but subsequently congratulated ourselves on the happy chance that had led the Emperor away—for our attempt at harmony turned out a most dismal failure, owing to the chief soprano getting nervous and starting on an absolutely false note. No less than three beginnings were necessary before we got really “off,” and the suppressed titterings of the bridegroom, Prince Fritz, who had joined his mother, were plainly audible. Happily we finished better than we began—which is not saying much—and the Empress thanked us in her usual pleasant, kindly manner, and then hurried off after the Emperor to breakfast. It was rather hard on the poor Court Chaplain, who had risen early and taken so much trouble to reap so little satisfaction; and when I found on return to my own room that my breakfast (which I had not touched) had been taken away and eaten by the woman who waited on me, I felt that the day had not begun as auspiciously as might have been wished.

The Crown Prince and Princess after their marriage lived at the Marmor Palais, and here all their children were born. The arrival of their first little boy, Prince Wilhelm, was an exciting day for the whole of Germany. The great event happened about eight o’clock one morning, and by eleven picture-postcards were on sale in which the Crown Princess, naÏvely represented in evening dress, was depicted holding in her arms one of those dreadful abominations called a Steck-Kissen, a sort of flat pillow much used in the Fatherland, on which was fastened with blue ribbons, something in the manner habitual among Indian squaws, a solid-looking infant purporting to be the newly-born Prince.

This same child on the same blue-ribboned Steck-Kissen was also represented on another postcard lying on the knees of the Emperor, who was smiling into the middle-distance. It bore the inscription “The First Grandchild”; but as His Majesty was at the time cruising off Kiel in the Hohenzollern, he never saw his first grandchild until six weeks after it was born. But manufacturers are not disturbed by minor details of this nature, and the cards, however unveracious, doubtless supplied a popular demand.

Later on the Emperor mentioned at table that, owing to the forgetfulness of the young officer charged with the forwarding on board of his mails, the telegrams informing him of the happy event did not reach him for a good many hours after they arrived in Kiel; and it was from a congratulatory message handed on board from the Sultan of Turkey that His Majesty first heard that he was a grandfather.

The fact that the Empress was a grandmother and she herself an aunt made the Princess very thoughtful for a time. She indulged for some time in long fits of silence, pondering this new development. A few days after her nephew came into the world, as we were driving in the Wildpark together, she remarked with a certain wistful wonder, “This time last week I was not yet an aunt, and Mamma was not a grandmother. Poor Mamma!”

The christening was of great interest to her, because the youngest Hohenzollern Princess is always chosen to carry the infant to the font. She practised this ceremony a few times with a cushion, to which was pinned a long table-cloth to present the white satin train which babes of the Hohenzollern race wear at the ceremony. This train is embroidered with the name of every prince or princess who has worn it; and a new strip has to be added for every christening, so that the imagination refuses to consider the length to which it must inevitably extend in the course of ages. It is carried by four ladies of noble birth, and is actually fastened, not to the infant itself, but to the white satin cushion on which the child is laid.

Royal christenings are usually celebrated in the long Jasper Gallery in the New Palace, a magnificent apartment which, owing to its length, was the favourite scene of indoor sports for the Princess and her friends when wet weather prevented their indulgence outside. Only the week after the christening sack-races were held in the stately apartment, and the mirrors which had lately reflected the stately tread, the brilliant uniforms, and the trailing dresses of courtiers, now duplicated and reduplicated a seemingly endless procession of wildly-hopping maidens with jerking pigtails, who, shrieking with laughter and accompanied by many tumbles, bumped along over the marble pavement to the goal. The seventy-five Stifts-Kinder had been invited to the palace; but the afternoon turned out hopelessly wet, so that the “Gymkhana” which had been planned had necessarily to take place indoors or not at all, and the Jasper Gallery proved itself an excellent place for egg-and-spoon races as well as for the needle-threading and bun-eating competitions.

A few rooms near the Gallery had been once occupied by Frederick the Great. One of them still contained his harpsichord, and in another, row upon row, were left the books he loved—all in French, not a single German one amongst them. Sometimes the children would storm violently through these older rooms, where all was left as much as possible undisturbed, just as they had been when used by Frederick. They wakened up for a few moments the sleepy, stifled atmosphere of the shut-up apartments, the faded green silk curtains waved and trembled as they passed boisterously onward; once I saw the yellow parchment label bearing the old King’s handwriting drop from the back of a book in the glass case, shaken from its timid, precarious hold by the rush of active young feet. They were eerie places, where one did not care to linger long alone when the shadows of night were falling. It was so easy to imagine a bent old figure, in a crushed-looking cocked hat, in rusty knee-boots, in a blue-lapelled riding-coat, peering round the corner to see who was disturbing the silences, watching the flight of that impetuous child of his house as her laugh echoed back towards the deserted rooms where the air had for a moment been startled into movement by the tones of her gay voice and the sound of her footsteps on the polished floor.