Vienna, November 14, 1843.—I have been here for some days. The day before yesterday I had the honour of paying my respects to the Archduchess Sophie, whom I had known before her marriage: she received me most kindly, nor could any one be more gracious, more amiable, more animated or easy in every way. She asked me many questions about our Royal Family and spoke of them in very suitable terms and with tact and kindness. I was delighted with the interview.

Vienna, November 24, 1843.—Life here is very much more peaceful than at Berlin. The Court does not appear and all the fashionable people are still shooting in the country. Parties will not begin before New Year's Day. I have been four times to the theatre which is over by half-past nine, and three times to the house of Prince Metternich; his parties go on till nearly midnight but there are only five or six regular visitors. I have also visited Louise Schönburg; several people regularly stand round her long chair from nine o'clock to eleven. Medem, M. de Flahaut, Paul and Maurice Esterhazy and Marshal Marmont often call upon me at the end of the morning.

CHAPTER IV
1844

Vienna, January 4, 1844.—I am packing up, saying goodbye and making the thousand little arrangements which precede departure. I shall leave Vienna very well satisfied with my stay and very grateful for the extreme kindness and courtesy that every one has shown me.

Sagan, January 24, 1844.—The day before yesterday I went out in a sledge to a shooting-party; two hundred and eighty head of game were killed. Yesterday I visited a very fine reformatory which is the chief house of its kind for this part of Silesia. It is in Sagan itself, in a house which was formerly a Jesuit convent. It is a well-arranged establishment conducted upon Christian principles by Baron von Stanger. He is a widower; in grief at the loss of a wife whom he adored, he was impelled by his religious feelings to devote himself to this work of redemption. The clergyman subordinate to him is a converted Jew, a kind of Abbé of Ratisbon, most zealous and conscientious and imbued with the missionary spirit. The results so far obtained are most satisfactory.

My life here is simple, quiet and I trust useful. I have also good news of all to whom I am sincerely attached, and no more physical trouble than I can well bear. To feel oneself entirely useless, to have no serious object in life, or to be paralysed by excessive physical suffering, are I think, the only conditions under which complaints to God are justifiable. I do not mention the pain of surviving those whom one loves whole-heartedly, for that is above all things a matter of feeling, to use the admirable expression of Madame de Maintenon. Besides, the continuous exercise of one's whole energies in relieving others or helping one's kith and kin is a great means of consolation.

Berlin, February 23, 1844.—The sect of the Pietists which is the scourge of Prussia, is doing more harm here than even atheists could produce. There is no doubt that Prussia, like the rest of Europe, is agitated by revolutionary feeling and that Silesia is in particular disturbed by these movements, the consequence of a mixture of populations. These hostilities and rivalries are fomented by the Pietists in a most unchristian way.

I have seen Princess Albert of Prussia again. She looks better since her tour in Italy. I was surprised to see her sprightly and cheerful air, as her position is the more difficult, since her father's death has deprived her of her strongest support.

I hear from Vienna that Madame de Flahaut is patronising the young Hungarians who are causing trouble at the Diet of Pressburg; that she praises their opposition speeches and encourages them to come to her house. At Vienna the authorities are surprised, but their feeling will soon pass that stage. Really, this woman has not a single diplomatic fibre in the whole of her dry anatomy.

Berlin, March 19, 1844.—In honour of the Mecklenburg and Nassau families and of the Hereditary Grand Duke of Russia, we have had some carnival festivities upon a small scale which have caused me a certain amount of trouble and weariness and left me rather tired. The Duke of Nassau is a most dismal looking person and I think an unpleasant person in every respect; he looks like a regimental surgeon. The young Duchess has an admirable figure and beautiful arms and complexion, but she has red hair, with the coarse chubby face of a doll; she is simple and very kind. The Hereditary Grand Duke of Russia is better in health but by no means improved in looks. Princess Augustus of Cambridge, who married the Crown Prince of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, exactly resembles what her aunt the Landgravine of Hesse-Homburg must have been at her age. In a few days we shall assume mourning here for the King of Sweden who is certainly dead.