At these shooting parties the emperor is accustomed to wind up the day with a most extraordinary kind of drink, of which he himself is very fond, and of which he insists upon everybody’s partaking, assuring them that it will help them to sleep.  It consists of the following ingredients:  White beer, sugar, citron peel, ginger spices, the yolks of at least a dozen eggs, Rhine wine, Madeira, and old Santa Cruz rum.  All this, after being thoroughly stirred, is placed on the fire and slowly heated, several large pats of butter being added to the concoction while it is warm.

It need scarcely be said that it requires a stomach as strong as that of the emperor to be able to absorb several glasses of such a drink before retiring, and it is asserted at the Court of Berlin that there are many of his subjects of high rank who feign illness when commanded to join the imperial hunting parties, solely because of the apprehensions they entertain of being called upon by the kaiser to drink this extraordinary brew.

For shooting wild-fowl, hares and other small game, William uses a very dainty and extremely light fowling-piece, specially constructed for him, which he raises to his shoulder with one hand, and with extraordinary rapidity takes a remarkably sure aim; but when it comes to hunting the wild boar, stag, elk, bear and big game in general, the killing of which requires a heavier gun, he is naturally forced to adopt other devices.  His crippled left arm being useless to support the weapon, his body jaeger, specially trained for this particular duty, steps forward and offers either his arm or his shoulder for the support of his master’s rifle.  This, bien entendu, when his majesty is engaged in stalking.  In cases where the chase takes the form of a “battue,” a species of horizontal bar is affixed at right angles to the tree beside which the emperor stands, and it is on this support that the kaiser rests his gun when shooting at the driven game.

Handicapped as William is by this crippled arm, his record of 33,967 head of game killed with his own hand, during the past two decades, is a very remarkable one.  It may be found in his “Game Book,” published a few months ago for private circulation among the royal personages and court circles of the Old World.

Comprised in this grand total are some pieces which do not fall to the lot of every sportsman.  Thus there are a couple of “aurochsen,” which is a species of bison-like wild cattle, still to be found strictly preserved in the private domains of the Emperor of Russia.  Unless I am mistaken, there are only about five hundred of them left, and, in spite of all the efforts made to foster the breed, they are so rapidly diminishing in number that ere many years are past they will surely become extinct.  In pre-Christian times they roamed all over Germany, and were, and still are, larger, fiercer, and much lighter colored than the American buffalo.