IV—"AN INVITATION TO DINE WITH THE EMPEROR"
Directly I arrived in Luxemburg, I was honored with an invitation to dine with the Emperor William the following day at one o'clock. Most of the guests were stopping at the Hotel Staar, and the cars were to leave there in good time. I went with Adjutant-General, Lieutenant-General von Gontard, Acting General à la suite. The street close to the Imperial residence was railed off, the barriers being withdrawn by the soldiers to let our car pass. The Emperor lived in the house of the German Minister and had his private apartments on the first floor. On the ground floor was the chancellerie, where enormous maps of the theaters of war were mounted on easels, and next to it was the dining-room, quite a small apartment.
The guests, all in field uniform, without any display, for-gathered in the chancellerie. I myself was dressed in the most flagrant, everyday clothes—in the field nothing is carried for show. Among the Emperor's suite I recognized a couple of old acquaintances, the Headquarters Commandant, Adjutant-General, Colonel-General von Plessen, and the President of the Navy Council, Admiral von Müller, of Swedish descent, who spoke Swedish as fluently as German. The others were his Excellency von Treutler and Lieutenant-General Baron Marschall, Colonel von Mutius, acting aide-de-camp, the Princes Pless and Arnim and the Emperor's body-physician, Dr. Ilberg. We were thus ten all told.