In the afternoon Erkert started for St. Petersburg. After he had gone the Prince asked me, “Do you ride, doctor?” “I do not fall off, your Serene Highness,” I said, “and in the East I have repeatedly, for a fortnight at a time, spent eight to ten hours daily on horseback; but I am afraid I should not cut too good a figure, and I should not like to make an exhibition of myself before you.” He then gave orders that I should be taken over part of his estate in a carriage. He himself and Count Herbert proceeded on horseback in another direction, the Prince wearing a soft green-grey felt hat with a very broad brim, a grey jacket lined with fur, which made him look stouter than he really is, and a quilted silk vest. We went to dinner between 5 and 6, and were afterwards joined by the Councillor of Embassy, von Holstein. The Chief was in high good humour and very talkative. He first spoke about Moritz von Blankenburg, whom he described as “my oldest and dearest friend” (I now forget how his name came up), asserting that he had “acted very imprudently in the affair with that shabby Diest.” “I had told him,” he said, “in the course of conversation on the Bodencredit shares, that possibly Bleichröder, who had the administration of my money, might have bought some such securities for me on one occasion. I could not really know, however, as all my surplus income went to Bleichröder, who made all large payments on my behalf, and acted on his own discretion in these matters. There would therefore be nothing wrong in it if he made some money for me without my knowledge in securities of this kind. Blankenburg had related what I had said as a fact, and Diest made use of this in Court. Bleichröder ultimately proved from his books that no such purchase was ever made. That was of course very satisfactory, but in the meantime Blankenburg’s clumsiness had thrown a temporary slur upon my good name, and that led to our falling out.”