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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.
His personal likings are for bear-shooting, deer-stalking, and yachting, but he also wields the lawn-tennis racket and the rapier with fair skill. The names of several of his hunting lodges -Rominten, Springe, Hubertusstock, and so on are familiar to many people in all countries. Rominten preserve is in East Prussia, and embraces about four square miles, with little lakes and some rising ground.
October and November are devoted to shooting at Rominten or some other imperial hunting lodge, or with some large landowner or industrial magnate. The whole of December is usually spent at Potsdam, save for an annual visit to his friend Prince Fürstenberg at Donaueschingen.
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.
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.
On one occasion the consistory of the Lutheran Church of the Province of East Prussia, in which the imperial game preserves of Rominten are situated, passed a unanimous vote of censure upon the kaiser for having desecrated the Sabbath, and violated the secular laws with regard to its observance, by giving a big hunting-party on Sunday at Rominten.
It was understood at the time that the consistory would have abstained from taking this extreme step had it not been for the comment excited throughout Germany by the somewhat malicious juxtaposition in most of the newspapers of two articles, one of which gave an elaborate description of the Sunday shooting-party of the emperor at Rominten, while in a parallel column was a proclamation just issued by the civil governor of the province of Westphalia, calling attention to the lax observance of the Sunday laws, and reiterating the pains and penalties that are prescribed by statute for those who shoot, sing, dance, play skittles or indulge in any recreation, whether in public or in private, that is inconsistent with repose on Sunday.
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.
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.
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