THRASHING THE GERMAN CROWN PRINCE.

Waipawa Mail, Volume XXXVI, Issue 7752, 22 July 1916, Page 4 (Supplement)

THRASHING THE GERMAN CROWN PRINCE.

BERLIN HOTEL MANAGER S REVELATION. All German royalties are attended at table by their own butlers. The Crown Prince has an elderly butler who was once in the service of an English peer. In this connection I may relate a story that is well known in Berlin, concerning a former butler of the . Crown Prince. I was told it by a servant in the Imperial household, out L cannot vouch for its truth (writes an Englishman, who was manager of a Berlin hotel, in “Pearson’s Weekly”). As everyone knows, the Crown Prince has, like his father, a very violent temper, and when he was quite a young man his immediate attendants had to put up with a great deal irom their Royal master. The attendant, who chiefly suffered .was a servant who acted as the Prince’s butler and chief personal attendant. The Prince at that time was leading x pretty gay life, and sometimes would return to the Imperial Schloss in the early morning, not altogether sober, and sometimes in an excessively had temper, which he would vent on the luckless butler. BOUND AND GAGGED THE PRINCE Now the butler was a giant of i Prussian, an ex-cavalry soldier, and for two years ho put up with the Prince’s temper; submitted witlmut a murmur, not only to the most violent and insulting abuse from his royal mas tor, but often to personal indignities, such as having "boots flung at his head and wine in his face. The man had been drilled and schooled in all the strict discipline of the German army, and submited to insult and abuse from the heir to the throne as a thing as natural and proper as eating. But, like the worm, even a Prussian soldier will turn, and one night, when the Princo returned from some carousal in a particularly lively mood and began as usual to abuse Ins attendant, the dormant temper of the big Prussian awoke. He seized the Prince in his powerful grasp, and inflicted on him, with his own cane, a terrible chastisement. Then he bound the Prince hand and root and gagged him, and departed from ih Schloss. He was seen leaving by the soldiers on duty, but they took it lie was going on some errati \ !• ■ »J»c Prince. The man left Berlin ;i night train and was never seen' or heard of again, hut the story in Berlin is that he went to New York and obtained a good situation in the establishment of some millionai r e. After this incident the Crown Princes’ treatment of his servants greatly improved, for His Royal Highness has had a lesson that lie did not readily forget But to return to the more immedrate subject of my experiences at the hotel. . We were patronised, as 1 have said, by all sorts of famous people. Among the visitors who stayed with us were the King of Bulgaria and his son, Prince Boris. This was in 1912. Tim visit was an incognito ouo, and King Ferdinand stayed as the Baron Rochoff and li.is son simply as Count Boris of Re eh off. A MESSAGE ARRIVED FROM THE KAISER. As a rule, when a royal visitor stayed at our hotel incognito, we generally knew his or her identity. Sometimes we were officially informed of it, and if not, wo usually learned enough to make -at least a tolerably good guess aa lo our visitor’s identity before his arrival. But in the case of King Ferdinand none of us at th'. hotel had any idea oi his identity until he had been at the hotel for three days. He and his son came with hut three attendants —a .secretary and two servants —an unusualy small retinue for a royal personage. A suite of fine room's was engaged by the secretary by wire from Bucharest, and we simply concluded that Count RechofF was a Bulgarian, or some foreign nobmmnn travelling under an assumed name. Of course, we looked up th l title, and, not finding it in any bom; of reference, came to this conclusion Curiously enough, on the arrival of Count RechofF, an assistant at the hotel said he recognised him ns an Austrian hanker who had stayed at another hotel in Russia where ho had been formerly employed. However, three days later an incident occurred that led us to guess Ids identity. The Kaiser came to Berlin that afternoon, and at four o’clock a nies---■ige arrived from the Schloss for Count Bechoff. We frequently had visitors who received messages from the Imperial Schloss, but the message in this instance was delivered by an equerry who waited for a reply, and ties left us in no doubt that Count Rechoff was a royal personage. After this we had no difficulty in ascertaining his identity. One of King Ferdinand’s chief recreations was playing cribbage. He would often spend a whole morning *n his private rooms playing cribbage with Jiis secretary or with some visitor. One of his most frequent, visitors, by the way, was Baron Kuhlilnn. who was later sent to the German Embassy n London shortly before the outbreak of On one occasion King Ferdinand's love for cribbage got him into trouble with the Kaiser. The King was due U, dine at the Bel doss at 8-30 p.in. He began to play cribbage with his secretary at about seven o’clock; at eight o’clock his secretary reminded His Majesty that he was to dine at llv S. li'lo-s at 8-110, and that he had not much time to spare, as it would take h in nearly half an hour to get ready. KING FEBDI NANI) KEPT JTIM WAITING. But King Ferdinand would not leave the unfinished game, and sent a message to the Schloss asking the Kaiser to excuse him for being late, but that business affairs would prevent him arriving at the Schloss before nine (•’clock. The Emperor, I ,was told aftonvard-;. received the messenger with a very bad groce, and sent a message back o his rnval guest to say tint, if he wished', ho could postpone his engagement to dinner altogether. King Ferdinand. however, departed for the Schloss at about a ounrte • to nine, and managed, f suppose, to appease his host’s wrath somehow. King Ferdinand was. also, a greet theatre-goer. I think he attended i the- tv- < vc v night during his ten day visit to Berlin. Win n paving h-s account at the hotel his -'••eretniy discharg'd ii in English' bank-notes, and be tipped ihe hotel servants on a very generous scale.