The chief pets of her existence at this time are two ponies, which, together with a small victoria upholstered in pale blue satin, have been presented to her by the then reigning Sultan of Turkey, who was afterwards deposed. These two little creatures, named Ali and Aladdin, are of a pale fawn-colour, with long white silky manes and tails, and when drawing the small blue-lined victoria, which has a diminutive groom perched on a small seat behind, make an extremely exotic circus-like effect on the country roads round Homburg. The Princess always drives herself, and delights in flourishing a rather large whip, which it is necessary frequently to apply to the ponies’ fat sides, for they are of a somewhat sluggish disposition; but their appearance outside the Schloss gates is hailed with delight by the crowds who stand waiting there waving their hats and handkerchiefs on all sides. Cronberg, the residence of the late Empress Frederick, now in the possession of her daughter the Princess Frederick Charles of Hesse, is within driving distance of Homburg. At this time the children of another sister of the Emperor are staying there--the Greek princes and princesses, whose father was then Crown Prince and is now King of Greece. As the Princess of Hesse is herself the mother of six sons, two pairs of twins among them, there is no lack of playfellows for the Princess and Prince Joachim, who frequently exchange visits with their young cousins. Cronberg is a beautiful house built in old German style, quite different from the peculiar Greco-French character of most palaces in Germany. It is pleasant to watch the cataract of white-clad children rushing in and out of the doorways, displaying that universal characteristic of their age--a desire to penetrate to unusual places, such as kitchens, cellars and attics. They have glorious games on rainy afternoons in the upper regions of the old Homburg Schloss, in whose cobwebby, dusty rooms, among old forgotten lumber, are to be found many curiously interesting things--old portraits of dead and gone Landgrafs and Landgravines, pictures of the children of the old house, attired in the cumbersome finery which in past days hampered unfortunate infancy, pieces of queer armour, ancient blunderbusses and rapiers, old moth-eaten furniture with the silk worn into rags. I had developed an unsuspected talent in the direction of _Versteckens_--the ever-popular hide-and-seek--more especially in the rôle of seeker, and distributed the thrills of which the game is capable with even-handed impartiality, not forgetting that even the child of least originality, who hides in the most perfectly obvious place with large portions of his anatomy plainly visible, likes to have, so to speak, a run for his money, and enjoys the hovering discovery best when it retires baffled on the verge, and the wrong cupboard is frequently and persistently searched.