aw us off
for Germany. Because of the war we secured transportation only as
far as Vera, and here we received information that the Prussian
Minister of War had telegraphed to the Military Inspector of
Railroads to take charge of us on our arrival a Cologne, and send us
down to the headquarter of the Prussian army, but the Inspector, for
some unexplained reason, instead of doing this, sent us on to Berlin.
Here our Minister, Mr. George Bancroft, met us with a telegram from
the German Chancellor, Count Bismarck, saying we were expected to
come direct to the King's headquarters and we learned also that a
despatch had been sent to the Prussian Minister at Brussels directing
him to forward us from Cologne to the army, instead of allowing us to
go on to Berlin, but that we had reached and quit Brussels without
the Minister's knowledge.

CHAPTER XVI.

LEAVING FOR THE SEAT OF WAR--MEETING WITH PRINCE BISMARCK--HIS
INTEREST IN PUBLIC OPINION IN AMERICA--HIS INCLINATIONS IN EARLY
LIFE--PRESENTED TO THE KING--THE BATTLE OF GRAVELOTTE--THE GERMAN
PLAN--ITS FINAL SUCCESS--SENDING NEWS OF THE VICTORY--MISTAKEN FOR A
FRENCHMAN.

Shortly after we arrived in Berlin the Queen sent a messenger
offering us an opportunity to pay our respects, and fixed an hour for
the visit, which was to take place the next day; but as the tenor of
the despatch Mr. Bancroft had received from Count Bismarck indicated
that some important event which it was desired I should witness was
about to happen at the theatre of war, our Minister got us excused
from our visit of ceremony, and we started for the headquarters of
the German army that evening--our stay in the Prussian capital having
been somewhat less than a day.

Our train was a very long one, of over eighty cars, and though drawn
by three locomotives, its progress to Cologne was very slow and the
journey most tedious. From Cologne we continued on by rail up the
valley of the Rhine to Bingebruck, near Bingen, and thence across
through Saarbrucken to Remilly, where we left the railway and rode in
a hay-wagon to Pont-a-Mousson, arriving there August 17, late in the
afternoon. This little city had been ceded to France at the Peace of
Westphalia, and although originally German, the people had become, in
the lapse of so many years, intensely French in sentiment. The town
was so full of officers and men belonging to the German army that it
was difficult to get lodgings, but after some delay we fo