Always solitary, he gave himself up almost entirely to his fantastic whims. When he did not drive out he would spend the night on the lake, or in the brightly-illuminated concert-room of his castle. For some years he cherished a mad scheme of employing a number of detectives to make the round of his kingdom and listen to all they could hear about his person. His was a curious double nature: to his great sympathy for the republic of Switzerland and the hero of freedom, William Tell, he united the wish for a Bastille, where every person who dared to express a different opinion from his own might be incarcerated for life. The lattices and walls with which he surrounded his castles show better than all rumour how he avoided his fellow-men. To a learned scientist was allotted the task of finding a desert island or distant land which might be exchanged for Bavaria, and where the absolutist state which he dreamt of might be established. Although he had such a high opinion of his royal dignity, he forgot it on a thousand occasions; and so much was this the case that at his last court reception in Munich his mother found herself constrained to bring the gathering to an end. His outbreaks of violence became more frequent; his struggles against the disease weaker. At times everything seemed indifferent to him. At others he heard steps behind him and turned round in fear; but no one was to be seen. He saw reptiles crawling on the floor, but discovered the next moment that the lacquey who obediently stooped to pick the animal up had nothing in his hand. He would endeavour to trick the servant by demanding that he should see things which he himself did not see, and would fall upon him in anger and contempt when he had allowed himself to be betrayed into these subterfuges. When Ludwig drove out he was in the habit of bowing deeply to a particular tree in the wood; and clad in his coronation robes, with his sceptre in his hand, he would also bow respectfully to the statues of the French kings. Several times he caused the snow to be covered with stones, so that in winter he might imagine it to be summer. But despite all he retained his power of acute observation. He never ceased to a certain degree to think logically and to pursue steadily any act or design. Even during the last years of his life there were days and weeks when he was in full possession of his mental powers. CHAPTER XXXV The Last Meeting between Mother and Son During one of the last winters of his life Ludwig unexpectedly invited his mother to visit him at Neuschwanstein. For the first two days he fell in with her habits, driving out with her and keeping her company in the evenings. But he soon returned to his usual mode of life. When he said good-night to her he would go for his long solitary drive; and he slept till late in the forenoon as his habit was.