“Well, Your Majesty,” replied the other, “this is my first year of volunteer service, in the First Regiment of Guards, and my captain is very strict. I am due at the barracks in three-quarters of an hour, and it is impossible for me to get there now except with the utmost haste. I shall be late unless Your Majesty will be so gracious as to release me.” Much pleased with his gardener’s punctuality, the Emperor sent him to don his uniform with all speed and ordered his carriage to be brought around immediately. Then motioning to the grenadier to take the seat beside him, they set off for the town with a gallop. The company was already in line as the carriage drew up at the barracks, but the Emperor spoke to the captain in person, explaining that it was his fault that the man was late and asking that he should not be punished. * * * * * * * * Still another instance of King William’s unfailing kindness and consideration to all classes is shown in the following incident. At a grand review held on the field of Tempelhof, the Emperor’s sharp eyes suddenly discovered a sergeant-major who could scarcely stand upright and whose deathly pallor betrayed either serious illness or some violent emotion. He rode up at once to the man and asked what ailed him. “It is nothing, Your Majesty, I am better already,” was the answer; but the tears in the eyes of the bearded soldier belied his words. The Emperor’s gaze rested on his pale face with fatherly kindness and he said encouragingly, “Do not try to conceal anything from me, sergeant; you too wear the Iron Cross, so we are brothers in arms, and comrades should have no secrets from each other.” Unable to resist this exhortation, the sergeant responded, “Alas, Your Majesty, just now as we were marching out here, my only child, a promising boy of six, was run over by a wagon, and I do not know what has become of him.” The Emperor immediately sent an adjutant to appropriate one of the near-by conveyances occupied by spectators for the use of the sergeant, whom he excused for the rest of the day, and the anxious father with tears of gratitude in his eyes hastened home to his family. * * * * * * * * A touching trait of the Emperor’s character is shown in his habit of making the rounds of the hospitals in time of war to assure himself personally that his wounded subjects were receiving the necessary care, and cheer them with a kindly word of encouragement or some slight gift. In the bloody year of 1866 the Woman’s Aid Society built a private hospital in Berlin, which King William frequently honored with his presence. Among the patients was a musketeer who had lost his left arm. “Your Majesty,” said this man one day to the King, “I am twenty-four years old to-day. To have had the happiness of seeing the King on my birthday—I shall never forget it, sire!”