It would require the Emperor himself properly to tell the story of his creation of the modern German navy, and if he has a right to call any part of his people's property his own, he is justified in speaking, as he invariably does, of "my navy." As Prince William, his interest in the subject may have been originally due, as has been seen, to his partly English parentage, his frequent visits to England, and the fact that his physical disability threatened to prevent him taking an active part in the more strenuous duties of the soldier. It is very probable that it was in the region that cradled the British navy the idea of a great German navy was conceived by him. We have seen that the Emperor, as Prince William, showed his enthusiasm in the matter by delivering lectures on it in military circles, though it was not his lot, but that of his brother Henry, to be assigned the navy as a profession. In his Order to the Navy on ascending the throne, he spoke of the "lively and warm interest" that bound him to the navy, shortly afterwards issued directions for a new marine uniform on the English model, and caused the introduction into the Lutheran Church service of a special prayer for the arm. He gave a parliamentary soirée at the New Palace in Potsdam, and before allowing his Conservative and National Liberal guests to sit down to supper, made them listen to a lecture which occupied two hours, giving particular attention, with the aid of maps and plans, to the battle of the Yalu between the fleets of China and Japan. He founded the Technical Shipbuilding Society, and took, and takes, an animated part in its proceedings, suggesting positions for the guns, the disposition of armour, the dimensions of submarines, and a hundred other details. In 1908 he delivered an after-dinner lecture at the "Villa Achilleion" in Corfu on Nelson and the battle of Trafalgar, based on the writings of Captain Mark Kerr of the _Implacable_, at which the situations of the French, English, and Spanish fleets were sketched by the imperial hand. To his admiration for the writings of Captain Mahan his persistence in enlarging the fleet is said largely to be due. He is, of course, assisted by a host of able experts, among whom Admiral von Tirpitz--the ablest German since Bismarck, many Germans say--is the most distinguished; but as he is his own Foreign Minister and own Commander-in-Chief, he is, in the fullest sense, his own First Lord of the Admiralty.