The _Bescherung_ to the servants took place about two o’clock in the _Schilder-Saal_ or Hall of Shields. Long tables were laid down the centre of the room, on which were arranged in due order everybody’s gifts. Two or three large Christmas trees were lighted, and in the corner stood the piano which was to reinforce our efforts at carol-singing. In poured a crowd of white-capped housemaids, green-clad Jägers, footmen, and _Kammer-diener_ (butlers). All the ladies were assembled in _décolletée_ evening dress, and those who had undertaken to help in singing carols were beginning to tremble, especially when the leading soprano whispered that she had a slight sore throat and couldn’t sing a note. Then the Empress, also in evening dress, arrived with the Princess and the princes in full uniform, including, until his marriage, the Crown Prince; and the choir timidly sang the first carol, which always sounded a little thin and chirpy in that large room. It was listened to with the greatest respect, if not pleasure, and then another was sung at the request of the Empress, while everybody stood patiently waiting till it was finished. Her Majesty then walked round and showed everybody their presents, which consisted of dress-pieces, counterpanes, curtains, clocks, etc. She began with the housekeeper, and as year after year the tables were arranged in the same order, the whole ceremony, if it could be called ceremony where everything was so simple and kindly, was soon at an end, and they all trooped away with their cutlery, silver, pictures and photographs--leaving nothing behind but the bare tables with their white cloths and the Christmas trees. Then, after a short pause, a general move was made to the apartment of the Empress, where carols were to be sung for the delectation of His Majesty. There was the last almost acrimonious dispute as to whether they should be sung with or without accompaniment, ending, as was confidently expected, in favour of the moral support afforded by the piano. One lady is warned about her E, which is inclined to be a little flat, and the question hurriedly discussed as to whether somebody who has been singing seconds had not better join the trebles weakened by incipient colds. Nothing is settled when the door from the next room opens and His Majesty steps in, bows, and stands in an attitude of attention not unmixed with boredom which makes everybody’s blood run cold.