The train of the Empress left Berlin at eleven o’clock on Friday night, and before that the Princess had retired to bed, though it is not easy to sleep in a station among the hootings and trumpetings that accompany the comings and goings of trains. All through the night the train travelled slowly, with many jerks and stops, for it was not due to arrive until ten o’clock next morning at the place where the Emperor would join it. The route lay through the most beautiful forest scenery of the Thüringer-Wald. At nine o’clock we breakfasted in the train with the Empress, and shortly afterwards stopped at a station surrounded by an enormous crowd. There were the usual tiers of faces pressed to the railings row above row. No ceremony was observed on this occasion. The Emperor could be seen in his green hunting-uniform crossing the line with his adjutants, and the Empress and the Princess descended to the platform to welcome him. He looked very brown and well from his long sea-voyage, and was obviously in very good spirits. After a few minutes the train started again, no luggage having been transferred, as the train that brought His Majesty had been coupled on to that of the Empress. At one o’clock we all dined together in the restaurant car, where the ladies wore hats and simple walking-dresses, without jackets. A long table ran down the centre of the saloon, and one of the gentlemen, whose duty it was, showed us our places. The Emperor and Empress sat facing each other at the middle of each side. There was very little room for the footmen to pass round behind the chairs, especially for those unfortunate men who, in the course of their service at court, had acquired a certain rotundity of figure; and as the train jerked and swayed along it was all that some of them could do to avoid being flung, soup and all, over the people they were serving. The _consommé_ was handed round in little bowls with curved-in rims, but at the best it was a very elusive liquid, and most of it evaded pursuit and was taken back to the kitchen.