212 IN THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-XVIII 



known as the &quot; Great Gold Medal for Art and Science, &quot; 

 saying that he did this at the request of his advisers in 

 those fields, and adding assurances of his own which 

 greatly increased the value of the gift. Later in the day 

 came a superb vase from the royal manufactory of porce 

 lain, bearing his portrait and cipher, as a token of per 

 sonal good will. 



On the same evening was the American Thanksgiv 

 ing dinner, with farewells to and from the American col 

 ony, and during the following days farewell gatherings 

 at the houses of the dean of the ambassadors, the secretary 

 of state for foreign affairs, and the chancellor of the em 

 pire; finally, on the evening of December 5, with hearty 

 good-byes at the station from a great concourse of my dip 

 lomatic colleagues and other old friends, we left Berlin. 



Our first settlement was at a pretty villa at Alassio, 

 on the Italian Kiviera; and here, in March, 1903, looking 

 over my garden, a mass of bloom, shaded by palms and 

 orange-trees in full bearing, and upon the Mediterranean 

 beyond, I settled down to record these recollections of 

 my life making excursions now and then into interest 

 ing parts of Italy. 



As to these later journeys, one, being out of the beaten 

 track, may be worth mentioning. It was an excursion in 

 the islands of Elba and Corsica. Though anything but 

 a devotee of Napoleon, I could not but be interested in 

 that little empire of his on the Italian coast, and espe 

 cially in the town house, country-seat, and garden where 

 he planned the return to Europe which led to the final 

 catastrophe. 



More interesting still was the visit to Corsica and, es 

 pecially, to Ajaccio. There the traveler stands before 

 the altar where Napoleon s father and mother were mar 

 ried, at the font where he was baptized, in the rooms 

 where he was born, played with his brothers during his 

 boyhood, and developed various scoundrelisms during his 

 young manhood : the furniture and surroundings being as 

 they were when he knew them. 



