The young couple were allotted a suite of splendidly decorated but very dark and gloomy rooms; and none of the passages or staircases were heated. The Princess, who had always been encouraged to turn her quick mind to practical matters, and who delighted in creating and in making, found her way blocked at every turn owing to the fact that nothing could be done in the Old Schloss without the direct permission of the King. Not only was Frederick William IV in a very bad and mentally peculiar state of health, but to him and to his Queen any attempt to change or modify anything in the ancient pile of buildings where his predecessor had lived savoured of sacrilege. To give one instance, King Frederick William III had died in the very suite of rooms allotted to the Prince and Princess, and his children had piously preserved the "death-chamber," as it was still called, in exactly the same state as it was on the day of his death. This room was situated next to the Princess's boudoir, and every time she went to her bedroom or dressing-room she was obliged to pass through it. The Old Schloss was widely believed to be haunted, not only by the "White Lady" but by other ghosts, and the door between the Princess Royal's boudoir and the "death-chamber" would sometimes open by itself. One winter evening, the Princess and one of her ladies were sitting together in the boudoir. The lady, who was reading aloud, raised her eyes and suddenly saw the door of the death-chamber, which was covered, like the walls, with blue silk, open noiselessly, as if pushed by an invisible hand. She stopped reading abruptly. The Princess asked nervously, "What's happened? Do you see anything?" The lady answered, "Nothing, ma'am," and, getting up, shut the door. But it would be absurd to suppose that the Princess allowed the ungraciousness of the King and the material discomforts which surrounded her at this time to cloud the beginning of a singularly happy married life. She threw herself with eager zest into her husband's interests, and for the time she seemed completely merged in him. Having regard to the mental equipment and demands of the Princess, it is obvious that she found in her husband great intellectual gifts. The theory that the Prince was wholly influenced by his wife, who took the lead in all, cannot be maintained. He was nine years older than the Princess, who was little more than a child when they married, and his character and outlook were formed long before. His uncle, Duke Ernest, testifies on the contrary, to the influence which the Prince exerted over his wife.