Standing at the window of my hotel in Stuttgart, I watched a crowd before the Central railway station. Evidently something important was about to take place. What! Only the day previous all Stuttgart had strained its neck staring at a big Zeppelin air-ship. It was the week of the Gordon Bennett balloon race and every hotel, every lodging-house was full. It was also the Richard Strauss festival week, with the formal inauguration of the two magnificent opera-houses in the Schlossgarten. So it was not difficult to guess that an important visitor was due at the station. Hence the excitement, which increased when the King of Würtemberg dashed up in an open carriage, the royal livery and all the rest making a brave picture for his loyal subjects.

I\'ve seen several kings and kaisers, but I\'ve never seen one that looked "every inch a king." The German Kaiser outwardly is a well-groomed Englishman; Franz Josef of Austria—I\'ve not met him since 1903, when our carriage wheels locked and he, a lovable old man, gallantly saluted [Pg 169] my companion—he is everything but kingly; the late King Edward when at Marienbad was very much the portly type of middle-aged man you meet in Wall Street at three o\'clock in the afternoon; while William II of Würtemberg is a pleasant gentleman, with "merchant" written over him. It is true he is an excellent man of affairs, harder working than any of his countrymen. He is also more democratic, and with his beloved Queen daily promenades the streets, lifting his hat half the time in response to the bowings and scrapings of patriotic Swabians.

The train arrived. The crowd grew denser. Zealous policemen intercepted passers-by from coming too close to the royal equipage; an old peasant woman carrying a market-basket was nearly guillotined by the harsh reproaches of the officers. She stumbled, but was shunted into the background just as the King reappeared in company with Prince August, greeted with wild cheering. The crowd, its appetite increasing by what it had fed on, remained. What next? Ah! The personal servants and valets of the youthful aristocrat from Berlin emerged from the station and entered a break. No baggage as yet. "Drat the folk!" I exclaimed, "why don\'t they clear out and leave the way for pedestrians." But it was not to be. A murmur arose when finally a baggage-wagon decked by the royal colours appeared. Trunks were piled on it, and only when it disappeared [Pg 170] did the crowd melt. I thought of Gessler\'s cap on the pole and William Tell. Curiosity is perhaps the prime root of patriotism.

Finally, as too much Strauss palls, also too much Stuttgart. I first visited the pretty city in 1896 en route to Bayreuth, and on my return to New York I remember chiding Victor Herbert for leaving the place where he had completed his musical education. He merely smiled. He knew. So do I. A Residenzstadt finally ends in a half-mad desire to esca............