I wonder if Ludwig II was really mad, or if he was only a born poet and dreamer who had the power to try and realize his dreams in bricks and mortar, as few poets ever had. He drained the treasury of his country to build these palaces, and it was not hard perhaps for his dull and greedy relatives to shut him up so that they might reign in his stead. One of his extravagances was to have the Wagner operas performed at midnight, his favorite hour, with no one present but himself. We have had many glimpses of the Empress of Austria. She is an imperial looking woman with her splendid figure and her gorgeous hair, still bright brown, wound in close braids round and round her head. The day when we drove from Linderhof to Hohenschwangau, she walked! It took us six hours to drive and it took her ten hours to walk. She was accompanied by one forester and her Greek teacher, a young man of about thirty. She recognized us, for we have met her several times walking in the forest. She bowed and smiled very sweetly to us. Her face is tragically sad in repose. She lives in great retirement since the mysterious death, murder, or suicide, of her only son Rudolph, who was found with his mistress killed in a hunting lodge. * * * * * Baden Baden. August 1. We left Bayreuth day before yesterday. The operas were all that the most enthusiastic Wagnerian ever told you. They are given in the following sequence; the “Rheingold”, the “Walküre”, “Siegfried” and the “Götterdämmerung.” It is all very impressive, more like a religious function than an amusement. We stayed at the house of Carl Boller, _kaufmann_, had pleasant rooms infested with paper flowers and china knickknacks, but clean to a nicety and smelling only of new oil-cloth. The theater is finely situated outside the town on a hill. At four in the afternoon the audience of sixteen hundred and fifty souls assembled. The exterior of the building is ugly and humdrum but the acoustics are perfect. Shortly before the time for the beginning of the opera a band of trumpeters sounded forth a splendid call, different on each occasion and taken from some theme in the act following. At the third trumpet call the doors are shut, and the fellow who is shut out must wait till the act is over before they are opened. The theater is so constructed that it is claimed every seat is equally good, and while one may have one’s preference this is practically true; that there are no bad seats is certain. The floor slopes down like that in a circus but not so steep. The orchestra is out of sight. When the audience is comfortably seated the lights are turned low, the women take off their bonnets and the wonderful overture begins.