After the special envoys had returned from Berlin, the Prince writes to his daughter a letter on the duties of motherhood, which was decidedly candid for those rather prudish days: "Lord Raglan's and Captain de Ros's news of you have given me great pleasure. But I gather from them that you look rather languid and exhausted. Some sea air would be the right thing for you; it is what does all newly-made mothers the most good when their 'campaign is over.' I am, however, delighted to hear you have begun to get into the air. Now pass on as soon as possible to cold washing, shower baths, &c., so as to brace the system again, and to restore elasticity to the nerves and muscles. "You are now eighteen years old, and you will hold your own against many a buffet in life; still, you will encounter many for which you were not prepared and which you would fain have been spared. You must arm yourself against these, like Austria against the chance of war, otherwise you will break down and drop into a sickly state, which would be disastrous to yourself, and inflict a frightful burden upon poor Fritz for life; besides which, it would unfit you for fulfilling all the duties of your station. "In reference to having children, the French proverb says: _Le premier pour la santé, le second pour la beauté, le troisième gâte tout_. But England proves that the last part of the saying is not true, and health and beauty, those two great blessings, are only injured where the wife does not make zealous use of the intervals to repair the exhaustion, undoubtedly great, of the body, and to strengthen it both for what it has gone and what it has to go through, and where also the intervals are not sufficiently long to leave the body the necessary time to recruit." The Princess had a favourable convalescence, during which her active mind was troubled by an article on Freemasonry. Her father, to whom of course she turned for counsel, had never consented to be initiated as a Mason, though his sons, King Edward and the Duke of Connaught, both became enthusiastic members of the craft. The Princess seems to have been troubled by the idea that her husband's connection with the order--he had been appointed patron of the Masonic Lodges of Prussia and head of the Grand Lodge in Berlin--would in some way lessen the confidence between them. Prince Albert endeavours to reassure her with a paradox which she probably found quite unconvincing: