family. There was at that time no settled English church provided for the gamesters, and service was held in the Speisesaal of one of the hotels. The Germans never could understand why English folk clave to 11 a.m. as the hour of Divine Service: they generally perform their church-going at 9 a.m. This is the hour for High Mass in the Catholic churches, and of the preaching-bouts in the Protestant places of so-called worship. It was amusing to see, on Sunday morning, as our English service drew to a close, the army of waiters hanging about the dining-room door, occasionally peeping in to see whether there were any prospect of the chaplain drawing to a close, and when the English trooped out they encountered a wave of Kellner rushing in with knives, forks, table-linen, dishes, hastening to dress the tables for Mittagessen, whilst the German lodgers in the hotel paced before the windows, growling like bears at the English chaplain for giving so long-winded an address, for which nobody cared a straw, whilst the wolves within themselves were ravening for sausage, raw ham, Schnitzel and marinirte Häring, let alone bottles of Rhein and Mosel wines.
My father took me occasionally to the gaming-tables, but they presented to neither him nor myself the smallest interest. On the contrary they repelled me, and, little urchin as I then was, I vowed that I never would play for money, and I never have, save once at Tavistock, when I won sixpence. The expression of the countenances of the players filled me with repulsion.
The Landgrave of Hesse-Homburg then reigning, and in residence at the Schloss, was Philip, a very remarkable man, grave of countenance, and with an expression of sadness on it that was never dispelled. The occasion of this was as follows. He had served in the army during the European wars since he was a boy of eighteen. In the summer of 1803, the Prince received orders, at the head of a division of his regiment, to execute a sentence of death decreed by court martial upon a young Hessian private who had thrice deserted. Prince Philip interceded in vain with the Colonel on behalf of the soldier who was, so to speak, his compatriot. On the morning when the youth was to be shot, Prince Philip received a summons from the commanding officer, Johann von Darwich, who informed him that the life of the man would be spared, on condition that the Pardon was not
