CHAPTER XVI

It is among the crowned heads and princes of the blood in the Old World that St. Hubert, the patron of the chase, finds his most fervent devotees, and nowhere is his cult followed with a greater degree of pomp and ceremoniousness, and, I might almost add, religious sentiment, than at the Courts of Berlin and Vienna.

The foremost Nimrod of Europe is undoubtedly old Emperor Francis-Joseph, who finds his only relaxation from the cares of state in stalking the chamois, and who is celebrated in the annals of sport as the most successful and fearless hunter of that excessively shy and difficult quarry.

No man living possesses a larger collection of gemsbock beards, which constitute the hunter’s trophy of this form of the chase.  They number nearly three thousand, and the only person whose score at all approximates the emperor’s is his intimate friend and crony, the aged King Albert of Saxony.  Both monarchs are now old men, with hair, whiskers and moustache, of a snowy white, but neither their years, nor their sorrows, which have contributed so much towards aging them prematurely, have been permitted until now to interfere with their chamois-hunting expeditions in the Styrian Alps.  On these occasions the two sovereigns make their headquarters at Francis-Joseph’s picturesque shooting-lodge, or rather chateau, at Muerzsteg.  They are usually accompanied by the emperor’s eldest son-in-law, Prince Leopold of Bavaria, Archduke Francis-Ferdinand, heir apparent to the throne, some younger members of the imperial family, and a few of the dignitaries of the court who have been the longest attached to the service of his majesty, prominent among whom is Baron Gudemus, grand huntsman of the empire.  The latter, by virtue of his office, holds a seat in the privy council, ranks higher than the cabinet ministers, has under his control all the game preserves, the hunting equipages, and the shooting lodges of the crown in the various parts of the empire, and is the generalissimo of the army of game-keepers, and jaegers, many thousands in number, who wear the livery of the house of Hapsburg.

Usually, the first three or four days of the stay at Muerzsteg are devoted to stalking the chamois, the two sovereigns generally remaining together, attended only by the grand huntsman, and by a few jaegers and guides, while the other members of the shooting party follow their individual devices.  The start is made each morning about an hour before dawn, so as to enable the sportsmen to be well up on the mountain side by daybreak, that being the time when it is least difficult to get within range of a chamois.