The Queen then made the acquaintance of one of the cradles of her race, driving out to the country palace of Herrenhausen, which had been the home of the Electress Sophia, and where George I. was residing when he was summoned to be king of England. At five o'clock, in the heat and the dust, her Majesty resumed her journey, "with a racking headache." At Magdeburg Prince Frederick William appeared, "radiant," with the welcome intelligence that his Princess was at the Wildpark station. "There on the platform stood our darling child, with a nosegay in her hand." The Queen described the scene. "She stepped in, and long and warm was the embrace, as she clasped me in her arms; so much to say, and to tell, and to ask, yet so unaltered; looking well, quite the old Vicky still! It was a happy moment, for which I thank God!" It was eleven o'clock at night before the party reached Babelsberg--a pleasant German country house, with which her Majesty was much pleased. It became her headquarters for the fortnight during which her visit lasted. In addition to enjoying the society of her daughter, the Queen became familiar with the Princess's surroundings. Daily excursions were made to a succession of palaces connected with the past and present Prussian royal family. In this manner her Majesty learnt to know the King's palace in Berlin, while the poor King, a wreck in health, was absent; Frederick the Great's Schloss at Potsdam; his whimsical Sans Souci with its orange-trees, the New Palais, and Charlottenburg with its mausoleum. The Queen also attended two great reviews, gave a day to the Berlin Museum, and met old Humboldt more than once. Among the other guests at Babelsberg were the Duke of Saxe- Coburg and Baron Stockmar. The Prince Consort's thirty-ninth birthday was celebrated in his daughter's house. At last with struggling tears and a bravely said "_Auf baldiges wiedersehn_" (to a speedy meeting again), the strongly attached family party separated. The peculiar pang of separation to the Queen, she expressed in words which every mother will understand. "All would be comparatively easy were it not for the one thought, that I cannot be with her (the Princess Royal), at that very critical moment when every other mother goes to her child." The royal travellers stayed over the Sunday at Deutz, and again saw Cologne illuminated, the cathedral like "a mass of glowing red fire." On reaching Osborne on the 31st of August, the Queen and the Prince were met by Prince Alfred--who had just passed his examination and been appointed to a ship--"in his middy's jacket, cap, and dirk."