"You had better go down to your cabin and get a wicker chair ready for emergency. There will be no life-belt for you in case of a collision as there are only just enough for the crew and of course they come first." I needn't say that the precaution didn't recommend itself to me. I thought to myself if the ship goes down I shall go with her; but the fog cleared off quite suddenly, and although three of the ships were lost to sight they turned up in the morning. During the cruise I heard on all sides how highly regarded the Duke of Edinburgh was as a seaman and a commanding officer, and he was undoubtedly much liked by those with whom he came in close contact. To his guests on board he was kindness itself, and he could be most entertaining. He told us his experiences of boyhood, how he had been treated just as any other middy, and subject to their backslidings also if one might judge by the account of severe punishments which had their place in the stories. He talked much of Russia, and told us how well the palace was guarded, that none but members of the Imperial Family were allowed to enter by the principal entrance, and that on one occasion he, being unrecognized by a sentry was challenged, and that he had to beat an ignominious retreat, and go round by the equerries' door. Not only were his experiences and travels most interesting, but he had an extraordinary good ear for dialect; with him a good yarn lost nothing in the telling, and he could hit off a type in a very few words. When he had an half-hour to spare in the evenings we would play a game I introduced of "drawing consequences," which is played in much the same way as the ordinary schoolroom game, except that one fills the required space with contributory drawing in place of the usual words. H.R.H. came out well under its inspiration, and the combined results of our drawings were occasionally very amusing. One evening he produced a crystal and inset was a very tiny portrait of Dowager Empress of Russia, which the company mistook for a miniature, and thought it marvellous that any human eye could see to produce it. I at once detected that a photograph was behind it, and that it was in fact a very minutely reduced and tinted photograph. I am afraid I destroyed the general illusion. The Duke smiled, he was very sincere in his love of art, and particularly proud of the talent of his sister the Princess Royal--Empress Frederick of Germany, whose pictures he spoke of in the highest terms, an opinion which I had heard frequently endorsed.