The King went driving this morning and I am told that he came home well pleased, for there was lusty cheering along the line. Frederick Augustus hasn't mentioned my affair at all. Disappointment made him rather gloomy and he begins to treat me again in the right royal Saxon fashion: I am air for His Highness. * * * * * _After Supper._ The family will wait upon His Majesty in a body tomorrow, to congratulate him on his recovery. After that, _Te Deum_ in the cathedral, which the court and authorities must attend by command. "Your Imperial Highness's pew will be in readiness, but my sublime master has not deigned to graciously announce that he wishes to receive Your Imperial Highness,"--this from the toad Baumann, who but yesterday licked my boots. * * * * * DRESDEN, _November 16, 1902_. Another straw indicating the direction of the wind--the ill-wind. King George commanded Bernhardt to be madman no longer and come and live in Dresden. Since his arrival he has paid assiduous court to all members of the royal family, but me. He called on the royal ministers, the courtiers, the high civil authorities, but my apartments have seen him not. I don't blame the boy for making the best of the situation, but was it really necessary to offer gratuitous insult to the only relative that stood by him when in trouble? Doubtless, he took his cue from the King, who cut me dead while, with the rest, I thanked God for his recovery. * * * * * _November 20, 1902._ The Tisch is openly talking Sonnenstein. "The royal apartments are ready for her reception," she let fall yesterday. Old Andrew, my confidential servant, told me. She shows me the face of a bull-dog about to spring at a victim, a sea-green devil filled with vinegar and gall, but affects icy courtesy. Frederick Augustus is down in the mouth. If he knows of any evil intention against me, he evidently made up his mind to hold his tongue and avoid scenes. Richard keeps on saying: "Don't worry. After all, what can they do to you?" He doesn't know, or doesn't want to understand that, while the law holds out protection for all, from pedlars and vagabonds to and including prime ministers, royalty itself is only technically above the law; in _praxis_ we are beyond the benefits of all law, human and otherwise. To be sure, a Cit is sometimes unjustly treated, but with tenacity and a small amount of courage, he finds his remedy in the courts and in the press. To royal princes and princesses the King is both judge and executioner, as the cases of the Duke of Saxony and Bernhardt show. Maybe it pleases His Majesty to cloak his tyranny by convoking a commission, but what of it, since the commission is invariably made up of his creatures, trained, if not commanded, to do the all-highest will and nothing but the all-highest will?