pageantry and pomp, except as reminding him of superannuated, though still revered, historical traditions and events that are landmarks in a great military and maritime past.  He would not care to see his King always, or even frequently, in uniform, as he would be apt to find in the fact an undue preference for one class of citizens to another.  His idea is that the monarch ought to treat all classes of his subjects with equal kingly favour.  In Germany it is otherwise.  The monarchy relies on military force for its dynastic security, as much, one might perhaps say, as for the defence of the country or the keeping of the public peace, and consequently favours the military.  Moreover, the peoples that compose the Empire have been harassed throughout the long course of their history by wars; a large percentage of their youth are serving in the standing army or in the reserves, the Landwehr and the Landsturm; finally the Germans, though not, as it appears to the foreigner, an artistic people, save in regard to music, enjoy the spectacular and the theatrical.

Accordingly we find the Emperor artistically arranging everything and succeeding particularly well in anything of an historical and especially of a military nature.  The spring and autumn parades of the Berlin garrison on the Tempelhofer Field—­an area large enough, it is said, to hold the massed armies of Europe—­with their gatherings of from 30,000 to 60,000 troops of all arms, serve at once to excite the Berliner’s martial enthusiasm, while at the same time it obscurely reminds him that if he treats the dynasty disrespectfully he will have a formidable repressive force to reckon with.  Hence at manoeuvres the Emperor is accompanied by an enormous suite; whenever he motors down Unter den Linden it is at a quick pace, which impresses the crowd while it lessens the chances of the bomb-thrower or the assassin.  The scene of the reception of Prince Chun at the New Palace was a great success as an artistic performance, and the pageants at the restoration of the Hohkoenigsburg and at the Saalburg festival were of the same artistic order.

The Emperor’s theatrical interest and attention when in Berlin are concentrated on the Berlin Royal Opera and the Berlin Royal Theatre (Schauspielhaus), and when in Wiesbaden on the Royal Festspielhaus at that resort.  When in his capital he goes very rarely to any other place of theatrical entertainment.  His interest in the royal opera and theatre both in Berlin and Wiesbaden is personal and untiring, and he has done almost as much or more for the adequate representation of grand opera in his capital as the now aged Duke of Saxe-Meiningen did, through his famous Meiningen players, for the proper presentation of drama in Germany generally.  The revivals of “Aida” and “Les Huguenots” under the Emperor’s own supervision are accepted as faultless examples of historical accuracy in every detail and of good taste and harmony in setting.

In a well-informed article in the Contemporary Review Mr. G. Valentine Williams writes: