A little farther up from the Lehrte Station is the greatest hospital in Berlin, and it is now used as a collecting-place for soldiers who have been wounded and are now well and ready to go back to the front. Here they go through their final examination to make sure that they are able to go back. [Illustration: _Steuben Statue at Potsdam._] It is an hour's ride from Berlin to Potsdam, and you can easily see why the Hohenzollerns have chosen this as a place to live. It is so cunning, so little. The tiny houses are of a yellow color. It is a soldier town. Every man is a soldier, and soldiers practise all day long in front of the Town Palace of Frederick the Great. In the street in front of the palace is a tree, the "Petition-Linden," where people used to come to present their woes to old Fritz. On the other side of the palace is the statue of General Steuben, a replica of which was sent over as a gift from the Germans to America. Potsdam is most beautiful at sunset. One can stand on the old bridge and look out over the water. When the shadows begin to fall, the old knights on the bridge seem to move and to climb down from their places. Hark! One can hear the click of their spurs, the rattle of armor. One by one they leave the bridge and move toward the old palace in the darkness. A TRIP DOWN THE HARBOR OF HAMBURG. My most unique experience in Germany was my trip down the Harbor of Hamburg, for strangers are absolutely forbidden near the docks, and foreigners poking around are arrested. My trip was made just by chance. An American girl and I took a trip up to Hamburg Christmas week last year. I was offered letters of introduction to people there, but I said we didn't want them, that we were going only for fun, and we didn't want to be bothered by meeting strange people. I had been in Hamburg once several years before, but neither of us knew much about the place. The first evening, or rather afternoon--it was dark at four o'clock--that we were there, we started out for a walk. We went through St. Pauli, the famous sailor quarter, where in times of peace the sailors spent their time when their ships were in port. As this was Christmas week, the shooting galleries and side-shows were open, but the places were not crowded, as it was too early. Only a few soldiers, sailors and children were walking about the place. One place had a figure of a soldier in the window. He was stepping into a room where a woman was holding a little baby in her arms. On a card was printed what the soldier was saying, "Excuse me, young man, but I would like to make your acquaintance. I am your dad." [Illustration: _Sailors Learning to Do a Washing in the Seamen's School at Hamburg._]