Yesterday afternoon we took our leave of Mr. Verski at the Russian border and once again entered the province of East Prussia. We travelled along the north-east coast and at seven o'clock reached Königsberg [Kaliningrad] Station. We arrived at Kreuz Station [now Krzyż in Poland] early in the morning, at half past two. Vice-Ambassador Kido changed trains here and headed for Berlin via the province of Posen [now Poznań in Poland] on his way back to Japan. The main party of the mission travelled along the Baltic coast, through Pomerania and Mecklenburg, to Hamburg, in order to make the arrangements for our passage to Denmark. During the night, while the train was stopped [at Kreuz], we hurriedly said our farewells and then the train started again in a moment. The route we followed today has been described in the account of our outward journey, so I shall omit any mention of it here. Our travels took us onwards, out of the territory of Prussia and into that of northern Germany.

April 16th, 1873. Fine.

Through the train windows we could see that day had already broken, and when we turned our heads we could see that the plains stretched away endlessly without so much as a hill in any direction. Only the occasional village could be seen, and the view from the train was dispiriting. This area is part of the province of Pomerania (also called Pommern), and it borders the Baltic.