anded into a
carriage, which drove off at full speed to the Chateau de Glinicke. I
could scarcely catch a glimpse of the country around Potsdam, which
seemed to me very lovely.

"When we got to Glinicke, which belongs to Prince Charles, I was handed
over to some of the ladies-in-waiting of the princess. Handed over is
the only word, because I felt more like a prisoner than anything else,
and they tried to make 'little Rachel' presentable according to their
lights. One of them, after eyeing me critically, suggested my wearing a
dress of hers. In length it would have done very well, only I happen to
be one of the lean kine, and she decidedly was not, so that idea had to
be abandoned. They may be very worthy women, these German ladies, but
their inventiveness with regard to dress is absolutely _nil_. When the
idea suggested by the first lady turned out to be impracticable, they
were a bout de ressources. You may gather from this, mon ami, that the
beginning and the end of their strategie de la toilette are not far
apart. There was one thing that consoled me for this sudden exhaustion
of their limited ingenuity. Between the half-dozen--for they were half a
dozen--they could not find a single word when the first and only device
proved impossible of realization. Had there been the same number of
French women assembled, it would have been a kind of little madhouse; in
this instance there was a deep silence for at least ten minutes,
eventually broken by the knocking at the door of one of the maids, with
Herr Schneider's compliments, and wishing to know what had been decided
upon. The doleful answer brought him to the room, and what six women
could not accomplish, he, like the true artist, accomplished at once.
'Get Mdlle. Rachel a black lace mantilla, put a rose in her hair, and
give her a pair of white gloves.' In less than ten minutes I was ready,
and in another ten, Raphael, Schneider, and I embarked on a pretty
little steam-yacht lying ready at the end of the magnificent garden for
'l'Ile des Paons' (Pfauen-Insel, Peacock Island), where we landed
exactly at eight. But my troubles and surprises were not at an end. I
made sure that there would be at least a tent, an awning, or a platform
for me to stand under or upon. Ah, oui! not the smallest sign of either.
'Voila votre estrade,' said Schneider, pointing to a small lawn,
separated from the rest of the gardens by a gravelled walk three or four
feet wide. I declined at once t