d myself to weave a story, or rather a
dozen stories, for my companion, and did not perceive that while I was
inventing a history for him he had most ungratefully decamped, leaving
me in a cloud of tobacco-smoke and difficult conjectures.

When I descended to the Saal the next morning I found him there
before me; he was seated at breakfast before one of the windows, which
commanded a view over the platz and the distant mountains. And here let
me ask, Have you ever been in Hesse-Cassel? The chances are, not. It is
the highroad--nowhere. You neither pass it going to Berlin or Dresden.
There is no wonder of scenery or art to attract strangers to it; and yet
if accident should bring you thither, and plant you in the 'Koenig von
Preussen,' with no pressing necessity urging you onward, there are many
less pleasant things you could do than spend a week there. The hotel
stands on one side of a great platz, or square, at either side of which
the theatre and a museum form the other two wings; the fourth being
left free of building, is occupied by a massive railing of most
laboured tracery, which opens to a wide gate in a broad flight of steps,
descending about seventy feet into a spacious park. The tall elms and
beech-trees can be seen waving their tops over the grille above, and
seeming, from the platz, like young timber; beyond, and many miles away,
can be seen the bold chain of the Taunus Mountains stretching to the
clouds, forming altogether a view which for extent and splendour I
know no city that can present the equal. I could scarce restrain my
admiration; and as I stood actually riveted to the spot, I was totally
inattentive to the second summons of the waiter, informing me that my
breakfast awaited me in another part of the room.

'What, yonder?' said I, in some disappointment at being so far removed
from all chance of the prospect.

'Perhaps you would join me here, sir,' said the officer, rising, and
with a most affable air saluting me.

'If not an intrusion----'

'By no means,' said he. 'I am a passionate admirer of that view myself.
I have known it many years, and I always feel happy when a stranger
participates in my enjoyment of it.'

I confess I was no less gratified by the opportunity thus presented of
forming an acquaintance with the officer himself than with the scenery,
and I took my seat with much pleasure. As we chatted away about the town
and the surrounding country, he half expressed a curiosity at my