temporary detention after the capitulation of Sedan.  Here at the Gymnasium, or lycee, founded by Frederick the Great, the boy was to go through the regular school course, sit on the same bench with the sons of ordinary burghers, and in all respects conform to the Gymnasium’s regulations.  The decision to have the lad taught for a time in this democratic fashion was probably due to the influence of his English mother, who may have had in mind the advantages of an English public school.  The experiment proved in every way successful, though it was at the time adversely criticized by some ultra-patriotic writers in the press.  To the boy himself it must have been an interesting and agreeable novelty.  Hitherto he had been brought up in the company of his brothers and sisters in Berlin or Potsdam, with an occasional “week-end” at the royal farm of Bornstedt near the latter, the only occasions when he was absent from home being sundry visits to the Grand Ducal Court at Karlsruhe, where the Grand Duchess was an aunt on his father’s side, and to the Court at Darmstadt, where the Grand Duchess was an aunt on the side of his mother.

An important ceremony, however, had to be performed before his departure for school—­his confirmation.  It took place at Potsdam on September 1, 1874, amid a brilliant crowd of relatives and friends, and included the following formal declaration by the young Prince: 

“I will, in childlike faith, be devoted to God all the days of my life, put my trust in Him and at all times thank Him for His grace.  I believe in Jesus Christ, the Saviour and Redeemer.  Him who first loved me I will love in return, and will show this love by love to my parents, my dear grandparents, my sisters and brothers and relatives, but also to all men.  I know that hard tasks await me in life, but they will brace me up, not overcome me.  I will pray to God for strength and develop my bodily powers.”

The boy and his brother Henry stayed in Cassel for three years, in the winter occupying a villa near the Gymnasium with Dr. Hinzpeter, and in summer living in the castle of Wilhelmshohe hard by.  Besides attending the usual school classes, they were instructed by private tutors in dancing, fencing, and music.  Both pupils are represented as having been conscientious, and as moving among their schoolmates without affectation or any special consciousness of their birth or rank.  Many years afterwards the Emperor, when revisiting Cassel, thus referred to his schooldays there: 

“I do not regret for an instant a time which then seemed so hard to me, and I can truly say that work and the working life have become to me a second nature.  For this I owe thanks to Cassel soil;”

and later in the same speech: 

     “I am pleased to be on the ground where, directed by expert
     hands, I learned that work exists not only for its own sake,
     but that man in work shall find his entire joy.”