It was not until the 6th of October that I again saw the Prince, having on the previous day received a letter from Sachse inviting me to call upon him. When I entered the antechamber Philippsborn was with the Chief. At six minutes past one he sent Theiss to call me in to him. I remained for about three-quarters of an hour. He was in plain clothes and in evident good humour. On reaching me his hand he said: “Well, doctor, how are you? How are the patients getting on?” I: “The patients? Whom do you mean, Serene Highness?” He: “Why, the newspapers.” I: “They are as ill as ever, or I should rather say, as stupid.” He: “Well, just at present we could also find use for a doctor in the Foreign Office. Things are getting very dull there. Bülow is seriously ill, and is hardly likely to recover. I shall not see him again after his holiday. And Gastein has not done me any good either. I was obliged to work too much there, and yet to no purpose. I felt very well at Kissingen, but now--my health was better when I left Berlin on the closing of the Reichstag than it is at present. It was just the same as long ago as 1877. I then took a longer holiday than usual, but business followed me like my shadow. Radowitz is also not well. He, too, complains, and requires some rest. There is now some talk of looking for assistance to one of our Ministers abroad, Alvensleben and Stirum being mentioned, as well as Schlözer, who is in favour with the Crown Prince. With us the trade of a Minister is exhausting, and they sometimes even die of it, as Brandenburg did after the Warsaw-Olmütz events. A vast amount of nerve power is used up, particularly in the Foreign Office among the elderly gentlemen. Fresh friction continually arises. It was the same in former times, when three Ministers went out of their minds.” He named them, Kernitz was one, and then continued: “He (the King) has been wearing out others besides, for instance, Falk, who retired solely on account of exhaustion and worry. He (Falk) has no reason to complain of me, I took his part in all questions. The King was always against him whenever he wanted to carry something through. I advised him not to take it so much to heart. When the Most Gracious, who is entirely under the influence of the Queen and the Court Chaplains, sent him an order which he had to execute, he should have pointed out that it must have his counter-signature if the King wanted to keep up constitutional appearances, but that his own convictions made it impossible for him to sign it, and he should then have waited to see what would happen. But he is too easily offended, and so he tendered his resignation--really on account of a mere trifle, because a Herr von Hagen (so I understood him to say), an utterly insignificant creature, a blockhead, a coarse, stupid Junker, who had collected signatures to an address against him, had been elected on to the Managing Committee of the General Synod. (?) But the real