An ominous twilight prevails in the chambers behind the screens. A door to the right leads into the room occupied by the deciphering clerks. To the left a rather broad staircase, which receives its light from a small cupola decorated with green and gold arabesques, leads to the first floor, on which is situated the official residence of the Imperial Chancellor. For the present we pass by these carpeted stairs in order to continue our inspection of the lower regions. A few paces further on, and we find ourselves in a small dark passage, which is lighted with hanging lamps, even in the day time. It ends at a folding door leading into a large chamber occupied by the Secretary of State, which looks out on to the back-yard and the garden. On the left-hand side of the passage a second door opens into the room of the Chancery attendants. Passing through this to a third door we enter a small dimly-lighted antechamber, which might--if it were possible to compare the Foreign Office to the Temple at Jerusalem--correspond to the Forecourt of the Gentiles, or be described as the space where the Proselytes of the Gate collected together. In other words, here the minor officials of the Ministry receive and despatch business with outsiders, _i.e._, with persons who do not belong to the Foreign Office. Behind the folding doors visible to the right and left of this antechamber is holy ground, unapproachable for the profane world, and only accessible to the Levites and priests. On the right Secretaries cipher, decipher, and copy despatches. To the left those who are initiated and have the right of entry find themselves first in the Central Bureau, the headquarters of the Secretaries for confidential correspondence, and then in a small labyrinth of rooms, cells, and partitions, in which officials of various grades in the diplomatic hierarchy are engaged with the secrets of the house, mostly seated a few paces, and sometimes hardly three feet, from each other. The impression left by this series of chambers is not at all a pleasant one, especially if the visitor has been previously in the Ministry of Commerce or the Imperial Chancellerie, and is able and disposed to make comparisons. In such circumstances one may perhaps think of Faust’s “drangvoll fuerchterliche Enge”: “Beschraenkt von diesem Buecherhauf, . . . . . Mit Instrumenten voll gepfropft, Urvaeter Hausrath drein gestopft.” Such is the oppressive sultriness, particularly when the visit takes place in the evening, and the steam of a dozen oil lamps is added to the smell of documents, printer’s ink, and the close air, revolting the nose and distressing the lungs, that one cannot help wondering how it is that lamps can possibly burn in such an atmosphere, and that such an accumulation of evil gases does not lead to explosions and accidents as in ill-ventilated mines.