Seldom is the kaiser found in the schloss after daybreak. The entire morning is spent by him in the woods, which are so vast that one can wander about them for days without meeting a soul. Luncheon is usually partaken of at some point in the forest, and frequently during this repast a concert takes place, the performers consisting of a quartette of foresters, their instruments being mere hunting horns, and their melodies those of old hunting-songs. Within the limits of the imperial preserves is the celebrated Schorfhaide, which each year, towards the month of November, becomes the meeting place of thousands of stags. They come from all parts of Germany and Austria, this being rendered possible by the proximity to one another of the great estates of the territorial nobility, so that it would be feasible to march almost from the Adriatic to the Baltic without leaving forest glades. This annual assemblage of stags on the Schorfhaide has been taking place every autumn for untold centuries. In fact, mention thereof has been found in documents more than a thousand years old. The meetings afford an extraordinary sight, and are the scenes of numerous single combats to death between "Royals," the other stags and the deer standing round, as if to form a huge amphitheatre, and gravely watching the duel without making any attempt to interfere.
All sorts of theories have been put forward with regard to this annual concourse of stags on the Schorfhaide. Foresters, however, insist that it is nothing more nor less than a species of great animal congress, at which the various antlered tribes meet for a big "palaver" to decide matters affecting the policy and the leadership of their various clans! Far-fetched as this theory may seem at first sight, it is evident that there is something of the kind which brings stags and their mates from the remote forests of Galicia on the Russian border, from the vast Liechtenstein game preserves to the South of Vienna, and from the still larger sporting property of Belyer, in Hungary, belonging to Archduke Frederick, all the way to the Schorfhaide on the reedy banks of the Werbellin Lake, in order to flock together by thousands.
It is a matter of forest ethics, and of the law of the chase, to abstain from disturbing this annual convivium of the stags, as it is called, and while it lasts, not a single shot is to be heard in the forests around Hubertusstock. In fact, November has on this account become a species of close season there, no one interested in sport wishing to do anything that could in the least degree interfere with this, so far as I know, altogether unique custom in the animal world. The meetings, however, have been witnessed by the emperor and a few chosen companions who concealed themselves in the branches of trees, bordering on the Schorfhaide, and William is never tired of expatiating on the magnificence of the spectacle presented.
Next to Hubertusstock, the most favored shooting-lodge and sporting-estate of the kaiser, is Rominten, not far from the Russian frontier. Owing to this proximity, bears and wolves, especially the latter, of Muscovite origin, are frequently to be found in the Rominten forests, adjoining which is the celebrated imperial Trakenen stud and horsebreeding establishment, founded as far back as 1732 by Frederick the Great. Some idea of the size and importance of this stud-farm may be gathered from the fact that over two thousand hands are employed in connection with the concern. Trakenen was originally famous for elk, and an elk's horn remains to this day the Trakenen brand placed upon all horses bred there. The emperor's headquarters at Rominten are situated at a place called Theerbude. His jagdschloss or shooting-lodge consists of a handsome Norwegian block house, brought from Norway, and erected on the Goldberg on the left bank of the Rominten River. The stables are built on a most extensive scale, and the chapel, as well as all the other buildings, are constructed in the picturesque Norwegian style, which harmonizes so well with the dark fir forests by which they are surrounded.
There is no interruption of the business of slate during the emperor's stay at Rominten. Theerbude is connected with Berlin by wire, and telegrams are arriving and departing at all hours of the day.
The kaiser shoots as a rule twice a day, at four in the morning, and four in the afternoon, the drive to the hunting-grounds often taking several hours, for most of them are at a considerable distance. The various foresters' lodges, even at the most remote portion of the estates, are connected by telephone with the imperial residence, and thus the emperor is able to know at midday where the game is likely to be most plentiful in the afternoon.
When the emperor is not shooting, he transacts business with his various military and civil secretaries, and long after his guests are asleep he himself is still at work, signing state papers or reading and annotating reports. Indeed one of the most remarkable things about Emperor William is his apparent ability to do almost entirely without sleep.
On Sundays the emperor invariably makes a point of attending divine service at the Chapel of St. Hubert, opposite his residence, and subsequently is accustomed to walk to the Königshöhe, a neighboring hill on which he has built an observatory-tower about one hundred feet high, which commands a magnificent view of the surrounding forest, extending about twenty miles in every direction from the tower. Curiously enough, wild boars are not found at Rominten; but the stags there are superb, and specimens turning the scales at a thousand pounds are the rule rather than the exception.
One of the features of the Theerbude is a goblet of the time of King Frederick-William III. The vessel is held between the points of a couple of antlers, and it is only possible to drink out of it by squeezing one's face between these two points. The possessor of a rotund countenance experiences considerable difficulty in performing this feat, and is apt to spill the contents over himself, yet every one of the emperor's guests has to submit to the ordeal, for an inscription on the goblet says that all persons attending shooting-parties at Rominten for the first time must empty the vessel of its contents,—a pint bottle of champagne,—at one draught, to the health of the sovereign.
So great are the quantities of game shot by the emperor and his guests at these shooting-parties that they very much exceed the needs for the consumption of the imperial household. Formerly, it was the kaiser's custom to distribute all the surplus among the various hospitals and charitable institutions; but since discovering that these gifts of game seldom reached the persons for whom they were destined, namely the inmates, but were monopolized by the staff and the attendants of the establishments, he has given orders that the game that is not needed for imperial consumption should be sold, and the money derived therefrom turned over to the funds of the hospitals and convalescent homes under the patronage of the crown. That is why one so frequently sees in the great Central Market of Berlin, deer, stags, wild boars, etc., adorned with greenery, and with cards intimating that the quarry in question has been shot by his imperial majesty the kaiser.