The "White Lady" is considered sufficiently real by the hard-headed matter-of-fact commanders of the Prussian army, to lead to their adopting special measures whenever her appearance is reported. The moment she is seen, the sentinels within and around the royal palace are at once doubled. The object of this is not so much to protect the royal family from harm, as to prevent the sentinels themselves from following the example of the two who shot themselves while on guard at the palace in the year 1888, one, shortly before the death of old Emperor William, the other, a few days before the demise of Emperor Frederick, the men in each case declaring before they expired that they had seen the "White Lady," their story being in a measure borne out by the fact that their faces even after death seemed to be distorted with terror.
The appearances of the "White Lady" are kept as quiet as possible, the matter is never mentioned at court, save in whispers, and nothing concerning her is ever permitted to appear in print in the Berlin papers.
This dread apparition that forebodes evil to the reigning house of Prussia, is supposed to be the spectre of Countess Agnes Orlamunde, who murdered her first husband, as well as her two children, who constituted an obstacle to her marriage with, one of the ancestors of the kaiser.
The palace in which the spectre of this historic murderess appears is a huge and massive structure of grey stone, the walls of which are pierced by over one thousand windows, and which contains over six hundred rooms. Commenced four hundred and fifty years ago by one of the earliest electors of Brandenburg, it has been added to by each sovereign in turn, until it has attained its present enormous dimensions.
There is probably no structure of the kind in the world the building of which has cost so many lives. Indeed the very mortar used in its construction may be said to have been mixed with blood. The people of Berlin, who from time immemorial have been noted for their democracy and their spirit of independence, have opposed from the very outset the erection of this building in their midst as calculated to endanger their liberty, and many were the attempts that they made to arrest the undertaking, and to destroy the work already accomplished. Bloody fights took place between the mob and the troops appointed to protect the workmen, and on two occasions the populace even went so far as to cut the dams, and destroy the flood gates, deluging the foundations with the waters of the River Spree, and drowning each time many hundreds of workmen.
Even at the present moment Emperor William is engaged in an angry fight with, the people of Berlin in connection with this palace. He wishes to surround it with a terrace and a garden, which will naturally add to its beauty. At present the windows look onto the public streets, a fact which, in these days of bombs and dynamite outrages, renders it difficult to protect with any degree of efficiency. The municipality and people of Berlin, however, absolutely decline to consent to the expropriations necessary in order to enable the destruction and removal of the existing houses and buildings which interfere with the execution of his majesty's project.
Like his uncle, the Prince of Wales, the kaiser is very superstitious on the subject of the number thirteen in the case of any entertainment, and more than once has a mere subaltern who happened to be on duty at the palace as an officer of the guard, been commanded at a moment's notice to join the imperial party in order to avoid there being thirteen at the table.
This superstition is perhaps partly due to the fact that the emperor is aware of the old Scandinavian custom, from which it originates, and which still subsists among the peasantry of the west coast of France. In the Pagan days of Scandinavia, the hardy Norsemen were accustomed at all their banquets to invite the spirit of the last of their male relatives or friends to participate in the feast, and the food that he would have eaten and the mead that he would have drunk was cast into the fire, the supposed resting-place of the soul. When the Norsemen embraced Christianity, on ceremonious occasions they sat down to the banquet in parties of twelve, doing this in honor of the twelve Apostles; but unable entirely to disassociate themselves from their old heathen custom of inviting the spirit of a dead relative or friend, they constituted him,—the spectre,—the thirteenth guest at table, and his health was always drunk in solemn silence. In course of time people came to forget the traditional custom of considering a spectre to be the thirteenth guest. He was, however, associated in their minds with the notion of death, and thus the belief has grown that though a thirteenth person at table is no longer a corpse, one of the party is destined, at any rate, to speedily become one.
Throughout Brittany on the eve of the day sacred to the memory of the dead "La Toussaint," the family all sit down to a festive repast, and there is invariably a place laid at table, the plate filled with the choicest viands, and the glass filled with the finest wine or cider, for the one or more members of the family who have died during the previous twelve months. The peasantry are convinced that the spirits of their dear ones take part in this repast at one time or another during the course of the night. It is for this reason that they consider it their duty to sit up till daybreak, the women chiefly praying, the men talking in undertones about the qualities and the characteristics of the mourned ones. Wearied with watching, imbued with the most fervent and devout faith, blended with a belief in old-time legends, what wonder is it that towards dawn both the men and the women, especially the latter, should imagine that they see the spirits of their dead glide into the room, take their place at the family board, and then, after a brief sojourn in their midst, vanish with the light of the breaking day. It is a pretty and a touching idea, which is not combated by the clergy, and of which, indeed, no one possessed of any heart would seek to disabuse the minds of the poor, simple-minded peasant folks.
Of course Emperor Francis-Joseph and Emperor William are imbued with all the old superstitions peculiar to Nimrods. As an instance, they will give up an entire day's shooting, no matter how elaborate the arrangements made for it, if a hare is seen to cross their path, for this is always looked upon as being a very bad omen.