It may have been a difficult matter for some of the teachers to act as if they were unconscious that this particular pupil was the heir of the Hohenzollerns, but men who were at the school at the time assure me they did so, with only one exception. This solitary flunkey, knowing that William was more backward in his Greek than most of his class, sought to curry favour with the Prince by warning him that the morrow’s examination was to be, let us say, upon a certain chapter of Xenophon. The boy William received this hint in silence, but early the next morning went down to the classroom and wrote upon the blackboard in big letters the information he had received, so that he might have no advantage over his fellows. This struck me when I heard it as a curious illustration of the boy’s character. There seems to have been no excited indignation at the meanness of the tutor--but only the manifestation of a towering personal and family pride, which would not allow him to win a prize through profiting by knowledge withhold from the others.
During his three years at Cassel William was very democratic in his intercourse with the other boys. He may have been helped to this by the fact that he was one of the worst-dressed boys in the school--in accordance with an ancient family rule which makes the Hohenzollern children wear out their old clothes in a way that would astonish the average grocer’s progeny. He was only an ordinary scholar so far as his studies went. At that time his brother Henry, who went to a different school, was conspicuously the brighter pupil of the two. Those who were at Cassel with the future Emperor have the idea that he was contented there, but he himself, upon reflection, is convinced that he did not like it. At all events, he gathered there a very intimate knowledge of the gymnasium system which, as will be seen later on, he now greatly disapproves.
At the age of eighteen William left Cassel and entered upon his university course at Bonn. Here his tutor, Hinzpeter, who had been his daily companion and mentor from childhood, parted company with him, and the young Prince passed into the hands of soldiers and men of the world. The change marks an important epoch in the formation of his character.