wever, useful rather for ventilation than for any other
purpose, since the key would not enter. Looking about for some means
of securing the door against possible intrusions on the part of G.
with a new soup, I discovered the trunk of a young tree standing
against the wall. The next discovery was recesses in the wall on
either side of the door, which suggested the evident purpose of the
colossal bar. With this across the door one might sleep in peace,
and I did till eight o'clock in the morning.

G. had been instructed to call us at sunrise if the morning were
fair. As it happened, our ill luck of the evening was repeated in
the morning. A thick mist obscured all around us, though as we
passed down to civilisation and Lugano the sun, growing stronger,
lifted wreaths of white mist, and showed valley, and lake, and
town bathed in glorious light.

CHAPTER III.

THE PRINCE OF WALES

We in this country have grown accustomed to the existence of the
Prince of Wales, and his personality, real and fabulous, is not
unfamiliar on the other side of the Atlantic. But if we come to
think of it, it is a very strange phenomenon. The only way to
realise its immensity is to conceive its creation today, supposing
that heretofore through the history of England there had been
no such institution. A child is born in accidental circumstances
and with chance connections that might just as reasonably have
fallen to the lot of some other entity. He grows from childhood
through youth into manhood, and all the stages, with increasing
devotion and deference, he is made the object of reverential
solicitude. All his wants are provided for, even anticipated. He
is the first person to be considered wherever he goes. Men who
have won renown in Parliament, in the camp, in literature, doff
their hats at his coming, and high-born ladies curtsey.

It is all very strange; but so is the rising of the sun and the
sequence of the moon. We grow accustomed to everything and take
the Prince of Wales like the solar system as a matter of course.

Reflection on the singularity of his position leads to sincere
admiration of the manner in which the Prince fills it. Take it for
all in all, there is no post in English public life so difficult
to fill, not only without reproach, but with success. Day and night
the Prince lives under the bull's-eye light of the lantern of a
prying public. He is more talked about, written about, and pulled
about than any Englis