"You did not remind wise Father Silvio, then," he asked, "that the Elector George William has, besides his son, two daughters? That there are two Electoral Princesses—Charlotte Louise and the young Sophie Hedwig?"

"No, father," replied Count Adolphus carelessly, "no, I did not. I deemed that superfluous, because in the Brandenburg Electoral house women have no right to the succession. The Salic law exists here, does it not?"

"As if laws could not be altered!" cried Count Adam. "As if the Emperor were not here to give new laws! My son, let us speak openly and candidly to one another, and answer me one question: On what terms are you with the Princess Charlotte Louise?"

The young man started, and for a moment a deep blush suffused his cheeks. "I do not understand you, father. What do you mean? On what terms should I be with the Princess?"

"John Adolphus, you understand me well enough, and know what I mean," returned Count Schwarzenberg smiling. "When I ask on what terms you are with the Princess Charlotte Louise, I mean by that, what progress have you made in her good graces?"

An almost imperceptible smile flitted across the young count's visage. "Well," he said, "the ladies of the Electoral house have ever been most condescending in their manner to me, Princess Charlotte Louise no less than her mother and sister, and, as I have done nothing to forfeit their favor, I hope that upon my return they will receive me as graciously as they dismissed me before I left home."

"My son," said Count Adam seriously, "you answer me evasively, and that is not well. We two are made to support each other, and to go hand in hand in the difficult path which lies before us. For you know as well as I do that our safety is imperiled when the Electoral Prince again makes his appearance at court, and we will henceforth find many stones of stumbling in our way."

"But my wise and puissant father will remove all such obstructions," cried the son, with a merry laugh. "Let the Electoral Prince throw ever so many stones in our way, we can pick them up, and your honor will find opportunity to hurl them back at the little Prince, the last scion of his house."

"I shall find opportunity, and, by heavens, I will make use of it."

"And if my gracious father can or will make use of me in picking up the stones, or maybe in throwing them, I am most heartily at his service. Your honor needs only to direct. I shall aim well, and hope to hit the mark."

"My son, verily, you are a great diplomatist," cried Schwarzenberg, "and many an one who esteems himself an old adept in this art might take lessons from you. How cleverly you managed to evade the question I put to you, and lead the conversation into a different channel! But I must recur to my question, and, since you will throw stones subject to my direction, then, my son, I tell you that your relations with the Princess Charlotte Louise may become a most effective missile against the Electoral Prince, which, if you aim it accurately, may inflict a deadly blow upon the Prince. Therefore, my fine son, answer my question honestly: On what terms are you with the Princess Charlotte Louise?"

A cloud of displeasure flitted across the young count's lofty and open brow, and his cheerful countenance became overshadowed with gloom.

"My God!" he said, "what on earth has the Princess to do with politics?"

"A great deal, my son. Let me remind you of Father Silvio's words, which you yourself reported to me. The father had me informed that in case of the Electoral Prince's dying without heirs, his Majesty would not recognize the claims of the other branches of the house of Brandenburg, but would consider the Electoral Mark as a vacant fief, which he might bestow elsewhere as matter of favor. The simplest and most natural thing will be, if there is no longer any son living, to pass the right of succession to the daughter, and for the Emperor to declare the eldest daughter of the Elector George William rightful successor, and to transmit the Electoral Mark Brandenburg to herself and her husband as an act of grace."

"Those are very great and very far-seeing plans," murmured the young man, with downcast eyes.

"But plans which may be realized," interposed his father hastily—"plans which you have very maturely weighed in your prudent brain, for—I shall answer my own question myself—for you are on very good terms with Princess Charlotte Louise. You have calculated very wisely and very correctly. The Princess loves you, and may bring you an electorship as a bridal gift."

"God forbid that I should play a criminal game with the Princess's heart!" cried Count Adolphus, in tones louder and more energetic than he had yet employed. "You accuse me falsely, most gracious sir. It has never come into my mind to speculate on such a bridal gift, or to make of love a calculation."

Count Adam gazed with an expression of painful astonishment upon the excited countenance of his son. "Unhappy boy, you love the Princess, then?" he asked.

"Yes," exclaimed the young man vehemently—"yes, I love her! I should love her were she a simple village maiden. I should seek to win her were she of obscure and humble parentage, if she could present me with nothing but her heart, her affectionate nature, her charming self. Learn now, father, on what terms I stand with the Princess: I love her, love her passionately!"

"Ah, my son, how well this enthusiasm becomes you!" said his father. "How happy the Princess would be if she could see you with those fiery glances flashing from your large bright eyes! My son, you will surpass me, for you have one great advantage over me, you have received from Nature a glorious endowment denied to me; you have a tender heart! You either feel glowing love or—maybe simulate, and act it to the life! We will not discuss this further; I only repeat it, you are destined to surpass me. You love the Princess Charlotte Louise! I thank you for this one confession, but add to it a second, Adolphus. Tell me whether the Princess returns your love?"

"I have not ventured to put this question to her," replied Count Adolphus, with downcast eyes. "The Princess is so high above me, is so pure and virtuous, that it would be a sin to tempt her innocence and virtue by the avowal of an unsanctioned love!"

"My son!" exclaimed the count, smiling, "you are a pattern of discretion and modesty. You amaze, you delight me. You have not ventured, and will not venture to declare your love to the Princess?"

"No, father, at least, not so long as it is an unsanctioned love—so long as I do not know whether it has your approval, and through you the Elector's."

"You would step surely, you would engage in no undertaking that does not promise good results! Ah, I understand now—I comprehend all now. I have an irresistible desire to embrace you, and I know you will pardon your father for this one ebullition of tenderness. Come to my heart, my great, my admirable son!"

He flung his arms around his son's neck and imprinted a warm kiss upon his lips.

"Count John Adolphus Schwarzenberg," he said then, "with this kiss I give you my consent to woo the Princess Charlotte Louise! With this kiss I promise so to work upon and bend the Elector's heart, that he will give you the Princess's hand, and agree to your union."

"My dear father, you open indeed to me the gate of paradise. But this gate has two wings, and if I would gain admittance, both wings must open to me."

"Oh, you mean the Electress? She will certainly be very much opposed to such a union, for she has a proud and willful heart, over which no one has any influence except the Electoral Prince, and he, indeed, will not use his influence in our behalf. Well, there is nothing for it but to oppose force to force, and to constrain the dear lady to give her consent. To employ such coercive measures is your affair, my son!"

"You empower me to do so, father? You will not refuse me your support? You will not disavow my acts?"

"I empower you to do everything you think needful, and you will find me a faithful ally, for I recognize joyfully in you my trusty coadjutor, and see that we may count upon each other."

"I shall ever esteem it a sacred and delightful duty to obey you, my much-loved father, and I shall joyfully hold myself ready to carry out your wishes."

"And you will do well in this, my son," said Count Adam Schwarzenberg, with a hearty pressure of the hand. "All that I do for myself is also done for you, all that I obtain is for your profit and advantage. You are my heir, to you will descend all my earthly possessions, my name, my renown, my dignities and offices, my money and estates."

"Cher pere" cried the young man, "let us not speak of such solemn things. I hope that it will be a long time yet ere I enter upon that great and sad inheritance."

"I hope so, too," said Count Adam, with animation of manner. "I would leave you all in perfect condition, and to effect this much labor is yet required. I have set myself a mighty task, and it is yet far from its accomplishment."

"And yet you have already conducted and executed matters so grandly, so admirably, father! You have no idea with what rapture they think of you and your performances at the imperial court. Emperor Ferdinand spoke of you as his most trusted and beloved servant, and Father Silvio called you a lamp of the faith and a faithful son of the Church, through whom many will yet be saved."

"Yes, many shall yet be brought within the ark of safety by my means!" cried Count Adam, in a lively manner. "I know what I purpose, I know the great aims after which I have striven for twenty years with intrepid spirit, with ardor never to be chilled. My son, with you I make no secret of my aims, and you must know them, that you may stand unflinching at my side. It is true, I am ambitious. I thirst for fame; it is true, I have labored for myself and forwarded my own personal interests as much as I could. My aims, however, are not restricted to these private interests, they are higher, nobler! I am the faithful servant and subject of my Emperor and lord; I am the believing and zealous son of our holy Church. To the Emperor and the Church belong the fruits of my striving and my energy, and to promote the greatness and consideration of both is the ultimate object of all my labors and all my schemes."

"And I, most gracious father, will take my station firmly at your side," said Count Adolphus fervently. "You will ever find in me an attentive pupil, eager to learn."

"We have both a great mission to fulfill," exclaimed Count Adam, "and it is well for us sometimes to place this clearly before our eyes, in order to be ever mindful of it, and never to forget it even in the pursuance of private ends. You, too, remember this, my son, and act accordingly. To the Emperor and the Church be all our services dedicated! To render the Emperor great and mighty, to strengthen his consideration throughout the German Empire, is and shall be my aim as a statesman. To extend continually the power and dominion of the Catholic religion is and shall be my task as a Christian, as a son of the Church, within whose pale alone is salvation. God himself has chosen me for his tool, else how would it have been possible that the bigoted, reformed Elector should have selected me for his first and mightiest minister? God wills that through me the influence of the Holy Roman See and the German Emperor be promoted and advanced; therefore has he caused me, the subject of the Emperor, an Austrian born, to become the servant of the Elector of Brandenburg. But the servant has become master, and the Catholic Austrian is Stadtholder in the Mark, the almighty minister in the land of the heretic. It is so, because through him this land is to be led back to the true faith and the Emperor, because through him is to be re-established the endangered supremacy of the Emperor of Germany! The Protestant Electors would have exalted themselves against the power of Emperor and empire; with the help of the Swedes they would have cut up the Holy Roman Empire into a number of free, independent States, great and small, where Protestants, Reformers, and Lutherans would have enjoyed as great consideration as the Catholics, and over which the Emperor would no longer have exercised control. The Protestant Elector of the Palatinate was to have been changed into a King, waving his scepter over Catholic Bohemia, and in place of the little Elector of Brandenburg was to have arisen a mighty Prince, who was to have broken the power of the German Emperor in the north, and become the chief and center of Protestant Germany! To that end were they leagued with the Swedes, to that end was King Gustavus Adolphus to have furnished help to his cousins and brothers-in-law. But the fates were against them! In the battle of the White Mountain the Count Palatine lost his Bohemian throne, in the battle of Luetzen the Swedish King his life, and in the peace of Prague the Swedes and other enemies of the Emperor a powerful ally in the Elector of Brandenburg! It was I who alienated the Elector from the Swedes, who made him again the obedient vassal of his Emperor and Sovereign. And it shall be I who will make the Mark Brandenburg imperialist again! For the limbs accommodate themselves to the head, and if the Prince acknowledges himself a professed Catholic, his subjects will soon follow suit."

"What! most gracious father, is it possible that the Elector George William—"

"Hush, hush, my son! who says anything about the Elector George William? Who thinks of the decaying tree, which can no longer bear fruit, when he beholds at its side a young, vigorous tree laden with blossoms, rich for future harvests? My son, I herewith give you my consent to woo the love of the Princess Charlotte Louise, but I make one condition which you must solemnly swear to respect: none but a Catholic becomes the wife of my son John Adolphus."

"None but a Catholic becomes my wife!" cried the young count. "I solemnly give you my oath to that effect, father."

"And you actually suppose that the Emperor will bestow upon me the same favor he has conferred upon Fuerstenberg, Lobkowitz, and Liechtenstein?"

"I am empowered to promise it prospectively, most gracious sir. The house of Austria is grateful, and forgets not that already your father before you rendered her important services, attending the Emperor with credit in his wars against the Turks; that you yourself have been through a whole lifetime true and unswerving in your fidelity to the Emperor's service; that the Stadtholder in the Mark, and the Grand Master of the Order of St. John has been ever mindful of his duty to the Emperor."

"I must and shall be ever called a good Imperialist," cried the count warmly, "and prefer the Emperor's to the Elector's service.[20] Bethlen Gabor, Prince of Hungary, has well said that the Elector and I are upon one ship, and that my fortune depends upon the Elector's fortune; but he shall be proved to have been in error, and we prefer making our voyage in our own little bark to take passage in the Electoral ship."

"Yes, father, that shall we!" cried the young count joyfully. "You sit at the helm and give management and direction to the boat. For my part, I shall so hoist and unfurl the sails that we catch the breeze and bound swiftly forward!"

"Do so, my son, and always heed the wind as it blows across from the apartments of the Electress and her princesses, as well as from the robber nests and dens of the squires and waylayers of the Mark, and from the fortresses and garrisons. We, too, my son, voyage together in the same boat; I am the pilot, you unfurl the sails, and upon our flag in mysterious and invisible colors is inscribed this device: Good Imperialists, good Catholics!"

"Yes, good Imperialists and good Catholics," replied the young count energetically. "But, dearest father, let us add besides, quite softly, good Schwarzenbergians!"

"Yes, my son, that will we. For, in addition to those great and holy interests, to keep one's own interests a little in view is manly and justifiable. My heavens! life would have been perfectly hateful and abominable in this dirty, cheerless Berlin if we had not seen above us a glittering star, to which we could look up when all was so dismal here below, which shone upon our path and cheered us when we feared to sink in the mud and mire. This star, my son, do you know its name?"

"Its name is Fame, its name is Love, cher pere."

"Well, for the sake of fame I will put up with love, foolish dreamer. You may bring it on board our boat as ballast. But if a storm should come and necessity impel, we shall throw our ballast overboard."

"Dear father, if you do that, you will throw overboard likewise my happiness and life!" exclaimed Count Adolphus warmly. "If you call love ballast, then forget not, father, that in this ballast your son's heart is included."

"Enamored fool, you really have a heart? Do you believe so?"

"I believe so, most noble father, because I feel it, because—"

A hasty knock, thrice repeated, at the door of the antechamber interrupted him, and in obedience to the Stadtholder's summons, the lackey Balthasar hurriedly entered.

"Most gracious sir," he said, "it is a courier from the Commandant von Rochow at Spandow, who desires to speak with your lordship on most urgent business."

"I am going, most gracious father, I am going," cried the young count, speedily rising. "I can no longer lay claim to the Stadtholder's precious time."

"And you have very important affairs of your own to attend to, have you not?" asked his father. "You have been long enough diplomatist and politician, and that curious thing, whose possession you boast, the heart, will now assert its rights?"

The young man laughed and pressed the count's extended hand tenderly to his lips. Then he nodded once more affectionately to his father, and bounded lightly through the room to the side door, through which he vanished. Count Adam Schwarzenberg looked thoughtfully after his son. "Strange!" he murmured. "Is he acting a comedy, or is it truth? Does he prudently pretend to have a heart, or has he one in reality? Well, never mind. The courier from Spandow!"

In answer to the count's loud call a huntsman in dirty, dusty uniform made his appearance from the antechamber, and, making a military salute, remained standing near the door.

"What news have you for me?" asked Count Schwarzenberg, striding toward him. "Where are your letters and dispatches?"

"I crave pardon, your excellency, but I have no letters or dispatches. The Commandant von Rochow sent me with a verbal message, and entreats forgiveness in that haste allowed him no time for writing. I have only to announce that, even at the instant of my departure, the Electoral Prince was making his solemn entry into Spandow. All ranks and conditions of people from the region round about had joined the Electoral Prince, and followed him, in carriages, on horseback, and on foot. The commandant was greatly amazed to witness so much pomp, and hastened to array himself in parade uniform in order to go and meet the Electoral Prince with his corps of officers."

"That is all you have to communicate to me?"

"All, your excellency."

"Then ride back again, and return to the commandant my warmest thanks for his welcome message."

"Yes," repeated the count, when the courier had taken leave, "yes, this is a welcome message and by ——! I shall derive profit from it."

"Ho, Balthasar, Balthasar! Is the commander of police in the antechamber?"

"Your highness, he has been there an hour already."

"Bid him come in. There you are, Master Brandt! Well, listen! Send all your secret friends and emissaries through the city, privately inform the citizens, the magistrates, the merchants, the whole inhabitants in a body, that the Electoral Prince will arrive here in from three to four hours, and that it would surely be a right great pleasure to the Elector and his wife if they would prepare him a public reception, and go a little way on the road to meet him. Say, moreover, that it would assuredly prepare a very great joy for the Electoral Prince if they would illuminate the city this evening, and if this were done voluntarily, and without suggestion, the Electoral Prince would be forced to admit how very glad the people of Berlin are to welcome him, and how much they hope for from his return. Excite the populace properly, that their houses be brightly illuminated, and that they may give great demonstrations of joy. Dispatch your agents everywhere, and show me to-day for once that you know how to execute my orders punctually, and are a worthy successor of my dear, recently deceased Dietrich, your predecessor in office."

"Your excellency, I shall do all that lies in my power, and I doubt not but that I shall succeed in deserving your honor's approbation. I only venture to remark, that many of the citizens will find it exceedingly difficult to procure the candles or lamps needed for the illumination, for the poverty and distress are very great, and it would perhaps be well to aid the people and furnish them with the candles for illuminating."

"Do so, Master Brandt," cried the count, smiling. "I fully empower you to purchase tallow candles for distribution, to the amount of a hundred dollars; only, take care that the people actually light and burn them up, and do not consume them as dainties these hard times. And one thing more, Brandt! It would be pleasant to me if you would excite a few people against me and his highness the Elector, while you tell them various bad things about me, and attribute it as a crime to the Elector that he is so devoted to me. You might then urge on to the palace such people as you have stirred up and goaded, so that, as soon as the Electoral Prince arrives, they might shout with loud distinct voices: 'Long live the Electoral Prince! Long live our savior and deliverer! Down with the Catholics. Away with Schwarzenberg!' You can at least persuade ten or fifteen to do this, and promise them that they shall have money to buy a good drink if they shout right loudly and clearly. Well, why do you smile so all of a sudden, man?"

"Pardon me, your highness, but when I entered upon my office, four weeks ago, your excellency urged it upon me as a stringent duty to report truly to your honor, not only what happens, but what is the mood of the people here. Does this command always have validity, your excellency?"

"It has validity for the whole term of your service, Master Brandt, or, rather, you will only remain chief of police so long as I am convinced that you always report to me the full truth in all things, without reserve. Speak! What would you say?"

"Your highness, I would only say that it is not necessary to stir up the people to give utterance to such infamous and disrespectful outcries against your excellency. They will do so of their own accord, and if I should not pick up the first who raised such a cry, have him arrested, and carried off, then immediately would twenty fellows be found, without any prompting from me, to shout exactly the words which your excellency would gladly hear."

"You mean the words: 'Away with the Catholics! Down with Schwarzenberg'?"

"I beg your honor's pardon, but those are the words I mean."

The count laughed clearly. "Well," he said, "so much the better! We will be spared then some trouble and expense, which is always a very pleasant thing. But hear, Sir Master of Police! If we let the fellows shout to-day, it does not follow that we shall not administer fitting punishment to-morrow. Mark the shouters very narrowly, and to-morrow, when the merriment is over, have them arrested and thrust into prison for a couple of weeks!"

The chief of police shrugged his shoulders. "I crave pardon, your excellency; that is no punishment for the rabble in these days. They are glad when they are put away at Oxenhead, or here in the castle prison, receiving food and lodgings free of cost, and many a one, who formerly lived in honor and affluence, would to-day be gladly found guilty of some fault, for the sake of being arrested and supported in prison at the expense of the state."

"Well, then we will not gratify the shouting mob by punishing them with imprisonment, but cause the jailer to administer a sound cudgeling to each one of them, and then let the fellows go again. Make good speed now, Brandt, for I expect the Electoral Prince here in a few hours, and if the people are not properly notified, he will make his entry before they have taken off their rags and donned their holiday attire. Make haste, and let us have this evening a right brilliant illumination. Farewell, Master Brandt!"

The chief of police departed, and by a loud whistle Schwarzenberg called the lackey to him.

"One of the grooms must take horse," was his command.

"He must ride out on the road to Spandow about a quarter of a mile. There he is to halt, and wait until the Electoral Prince arrives with his attendants. As soon as he has seen him, he is to come back at full speed and make the announcement to me."

"All necessary preliminaries are arranged," said Schwarzenberg, when he found himself again alone. "Now let the Electoral Prince come on, we are ready to receive him. There will be a hard struggle, but I have been victorious over all my enemies for twenty years, and shall probably conquer the little Electoral Prince too! Now a hurried toilet, and then to the Elector, to open the skirmish in his neighborhood! Ah, we shall see, my young Prince! For you shouts the rabble of Berlin, for me speaks the Elector! We shall see which of us two has built upon the sand!"



III.—THE HOME-COMING.

"May I be so bold as to come in, most noble sir?" asked Count Schwarzenberg, as he opened the door leading into the Electoral cabinet and thrust in his head, encircled by a hundred beautifully arranged curls.

"Behold, there is Adam Schwarzenberg!" cried Elector George William, wheeling his chair from the writing table. "Why do you ask, count, since you know that you are always privileged to enter unannounced? Come closer, and be heartily welcome!"

And the Elector leaned both his arms upon the wooden aims of his chair, making an effort to rise. But the count was at his side in a moment, gently forcing him back into his seat, while at the same time he half bent one knee and imprinted a kiss upon the Elector's right hand.

"If your grace treats me with such formality, and rises on my account, then I must believe that you love me no longer," he said, with soft, insinuating voice. "But you well know, beloved master, that I could not live without your love, and that existence itself would seem gloomy and dark to me if the star of your favor and love should cease to shine upon it."

"Live, my Adam, live merrily, then, and joyously, for you well know that I love you," replied George William, nodding to the count in most friendly manner. "And how could it be otherwise, when I know that I can depend upon your love, and that you are the only one truly interested in my not being called away yet awhile, and in having me tarry a little longer upon earth. Come, my friend, sit down. Draw up your armchair close to my side—no, opposite to me, that I may look at you. I love dearly to behold your handsome, noble face, and then console myself with the thought that, after all, the Elector of Brandenburg can not be such a pitiful little Prince, since such a proud, distinguished lord as Count Schwarzenberg is his minister."

"Say his servant, his slave, his humble subject, most gracious sir! Yes, look at me, my much-loved master, and read in my countenance that I am devoted to you with my whole heart and soul. Ah! who knows how much longer you will read that in my face, and how soon it may come to pass that poor Adam Schwarzenberg will be thrust aside and no longer find a place in your heart! Oh, dearest sir, when I think of that, I feel perfectly wretched and inconsolable, and I would rather hide my head and weep and mourn, than go smilingly to meet the joyful countenance of him who will come to supplant me in your affections!"

"Nobody shall do that, Adam, and I know not, indeed, who could be bold enough even to attempt it."

"Most gracious sir, the Electoral Prince will attempt it! He who, when a mere little child, was my opponent. He, who has been brought up by his mother and other relatives to mistrust me. He will grudge me the smallest place in his father's heart, and will do everything to contest it with me!"

"But he will not succeed, be assured of that, my Adam, he will not succeed in it. I only know too well that in you I have a faithful, devoted servant, in the Electoral Prince a rebellious and refractory son; that with you all is bound up in my life; with him all in my death!"

"Oh, no, your highness, no, it is impossible that the Electoral Prince could be so heartless and degenerate as to wish for his father's death. No, I must take the part of the Electoral Prince against you. You accuse him falsely, most gracious sir; he surely loves you, and it is only his ambition and youthful arrogance that sometimes lead him to do what is not right, and what surely he would not do if he only reflected better. Out of youthful presumption he undertook, despite your commands to the contrary, to remain longer at The Hague, and even to send back the Chamberlain von Schlieben, whom you had dispatched to him with strict orders to bring him home. And only his stormy, boundless ambition is at fault now in inducing him to appear here in rather an unbecoming manner. But you must not be angry with him for it, dear sir, and on that very account have I come to you to-day, to beg and implore you most earnestly not to admit any feelings of resentment into your mind this day, which is to restore to you the Electoral Prince."

"He is coming, then, at last?" cried the Elector, breathing again. "He has finally had the goodness to heed our oft-repeated commands, and condescended to return home? But this return is, as I feel, likely enough to prepare renewed vexation for me, and in your magnanimity you come to me only to sweeten a little the pill which my son gives me to swallow. Speak out openly, Adam, and keep back nothing! What is it? What has the Electoral Prince done?"

"Oh, your highness, I am convinced that he means nothing bad, and has no design of vexing you. He naturally rejoices greatly on his return to his future dominions, and consequently enjoys the congratulations of his future subjects, and gladly allows them to receive him with demonstrations of delight."

"Do they so, his future subjects?" inquired the Elector, and his hands, swollen by gout, grasped convulsively the arms of his easychair. "Do they welcome him with rejoicings as their future sovereign?"

"Yes, most gracious sir, it is plainly to be seen how closely the people cling to the electoral house of Hohenzollern, and how they sympathize in every fortunate event occurring in that family. From the moment that the Electoral Prince crossed the boundaries of the Mark, the inhabitants of every village and town have joyfully poured forth to meet him; his journey is a genuine triumphal procession, and the reigning Sovereign of the country could not be received with more honor and delight than is the young Electoral Prince!"

"Me, their reigning Sovereign, me, they did not receive with rejoicings," exclaimed the Elector, whose face grew crimson with excitement and passion. "My journey was anything but a triumphal procession, resembling much more a funeral, so quiet and still was everything on my way. Nowhere did I hear a joyful welcome, nowhere did the people come forth to meet me, and as at Koenigsberg they permitted me to depart without greeting or acclamation, so here at Berlin they allowed me to enter without a sign of welcome or congratulation. I will now confess to you alone that I was much mortified by this, although I did not complain of it. I comforted myself by reflecting that the times were bad and depressing, and that in their afflictions the people could not even present a glad, cheerful countenance to the father of their country. But now it falls to my lot to hear that they can make merry and rejoice, and that they have only saved up the joy in their hearts to bestow it upon the return home of my son and heir."

"Pardon, your highness, but I believe that we accuse the poor people wrongfully if we imagine that they are now acting thus of their own free motion, when they were so quiet on the arrival of their beloved Sovereign. No, the poor, unhappy people would have been equally silent at this time if they had not been stirred up to make noisy demonstrations of joy, if they had not been paid for it. It is otherwise wholly incredible and not to be thought of that the populace should have prepared such a triumph for the young home-returning lord. It is plainly to be seen that all has been settled and arranged beforehand. For it is not merely the offscourings of the streets, but burghers, magistrates, and officials, who have extended a welcome to the Electoral Prince. At Spandow, for example, all the citizens, with the magistracy at their head, issued from the town to pay their respects to him—yes, even Commandant von Rochow has found it necessary to join in the universal rejoicings, and has ridden out with his officers in their dress uniforms to do honor to the Prince's arrival. Here at Berlin, too, your own residence, all is uproar and excitement. They are putting on their holiday suits, and making ready to meet the Electoral Prince. That proves quite clearly that his speedy approach to the city has been already announced to the citizens, and communicated to the magistrates even before any tidings of the sort had reached your highness or myself, the Stadtholder in the Mark. For as soon as I obtained this intimation from Colonel von Rochow, I hastened hither to bring to your highness the glad news of your son's return home, and on the way I was stopped by whole crowds of festive men and women hastening to the suburb Spandow, to plant themselves near the Pomegranate Bridge and along the meadow dike.[21] Indeed, it strikes me that I even saw some gentlemen of municipal authority going the same way in full official dress."

"And you suffered this?" asked the Elector angrily. "You allowed them to prepare such an insult and affront as to do for the son what they have not found needful to do for the father? But I will not bear it; I shall not be humiliated by my own son. You are the Stadtholder in the Mark, you must provide against their offering me any cause of vexation. Send out your officers, Sir Stadtholder, to clear the streets of this gaping multitude, send the magistrates home, and order the people to remain quietly within their houses, to do their work and not to lounge about the streets."

"My much-loved lord and Elector, I sue for a favor in behalf of your most faithful servant, your poor Adam. I beg you out of consideration for me to retract these stringent orders, for I should be ruined if I were to execute them. Throughout the whole Mark, yea, throughout all Germany, they would raise the cry of murder against me, would everywhere blazon it, that Count Schwarzenberg is so inimically disposed toward the Electoral Prince that he would not even grant him an honorable reception on his return home after an absence of three years. Oh, most gracious sir, you will not increase yet more the number of my enemies and opposers, you will not excite public opinion yet more against me, and render it more favorably disposed to the Electoral Prince! If we now forcibly restrain these testimonials of pleasure on the part of the people, then will it be said that I misuse my power and am jealous of the Electoral Prince; that I am seeking to thrust him aside from his exalted position. If, on the other hand, it is seen how joyfully I acquiesce in the Electoral Prince's reception with acclamations everywhere, then will they be forced to acknowledge that it is not I who meet the young Prince with hatred, but that I willingly concede to him all honors and triumphs."

"It is true," muttered the Elector, "they would surely suspect and accuse you, and it would not mend matters to say that I myself gave orders that the Electoral Prince be allowed to come home quietly."

"God forbid that such a thing should be said!" cried Schwarzenberg. "No, rather let the whole world censure and condemn me—rather let it be said that I have acted as the spiteful and unworthy enemy of the Electoral Prince—than that they should dare even to cast one shadow upon my beloved master's heart. What matters it that they calumniate me, if they only venture not to attack and suspect your highness?"

"They shall not slander and suspect you, my Adam," said the Elector, offering him his hand. "For your sake let us suffer the Electoral Prince to come hither in triumph. But we will remember it against him, and our love for him will not be thereby increased."

"Yet I entreat your highness to receive your son kindly and graciously," pleaded Schwarzenberg with insinuating voice. "It is better, your highness, to try to chain him to you by goodness and love than by strictness and severity to repel him yet more, and force him to join the party of your opponents. It is a great and powerful party, and I well know that it is their plan to place the Electoral Prince at their head, and through him to attain their ends."

"And what are their ends?" asked the Elector, with lowering brow.

The count bent over closer to his ear, as if he feared letting even the walls hear what he had to say.

"Their ends are a transference of the government, and when this is effected a revolt from Emperor and empire, and a league with the Swedes and all Protestant German princes against Emperor and empire."

"The transference of the government? That means an insurrection, a revolution. They would hurl me from my throne and ensconce my son there?"

"They hope that in your distress you will do, gracious sir, what your blessed father did."

"Abdicate!" cried the Elector angrily. "Abdicate in favor of my son?"

"In favor of the Electoral Prince, who has grown up in Holland to become a promising Prince, a general of the future, a brilliant leader of the Protestant Church, and of whom his followers say that he will be a second Gustavus Adolphus!"

"A second plague—a second source of danger to myself!" screamed the Elector, striking with his clinched fist upon the arm of his chair. "It was not enough that my brother-in-law Gustavus Adolphus brought me into trouble and distress, and caused the Emperor's wrath to flame forth against me, so that I was really afraid that I would share the fate of my cousin the Margrave of Jaegerndorf, whom the Emperor put under his ban, declaring that he had forfeited his margraviate, and giving it over as a feudal tenure to Prince Liechstenstein! I was only saved then from a like terrible fate by your intercession and fidelity! It was you who, by your address and eloquence, softened the Emperor's resentment against me, induced him to pardon me, and afterward brought about the peace of Prague, which reconciled the Emperor to me. Yet it was not enough to have gone through those times of anxiety and distress, they must be now renewed through my only son! In him am I to find a second Gustavus Adolphus, to plunge me into new perils and bring down upon me the Emperor's avenging wrath? But it shall not be—I solemnly swear, it shall not be! I will not involve my land in new dangers and calamities of war. I will not depart from my neutrality. I will have peace—peace with the Emperor, peace for my poor people, and for their unhappy Prince! But I shall not act as my father did, and prepare a pleasure for my son by resigning sovereignty and rule in my lifetime and becoming the servant and subject of my own son! Before me shall he bow—me shall he acknowledge to be his lord so long as I live, and never while I breathe shall I cease to lay to his charge these hours of pain and vexation. I am Elector and ruler, and he is nothing further than my son and subject, my successor when I die, but not my coregent while I live! Count Adam Schwarzenberg, I charge you to stand courageously at my side, to remain zealous in my service, and to direct your attention especially to unraveling all the arts and wiles, the plots and schemes of my son and his abettors; to give me always information on these points, to keep nothing in the background, and not to conceal anything from me merely to save me from vexation. Will you promise and swear so to manage and act, my Adam?"

"I swear and promise it, and in affirmation will my Prince allow me to give him my hand upon it?" asked Schwarzenberg, laying his own right hand in the outstretched one of the Elector. "You will find in me a true servant and guardian of your sacred person and your throne, and he who would supplant or harm you must first step over the corpse of Count Schwarzenberg! But now, most gracious sir, I beseech you not to be overpowered by your feelings of indignation, and to be amiable and condescending toward the home-coming Electoral Prince; for it is sometimes very necessary to wear a mask and assume an appearance of harmlessness and unconcern in order the better to fathom the designs of one's enemies, and to make them feel secure, that they may the more easily betray themselves."

"Yes, I will do so," said George William, sighing. "I will swallow down my rage, although it would be a relief to me to vent it a little, and to show my son that I know him and am not deceived by him. But what noise is that without, and who is knocking so violently at the door?"

This door was now impetuously torn open, and the Electress Sophy Elizabeth entered, with beaming eyes and features lighted up by joy, while on high she held an open letter in her hand.

"George!" she exclaimed—"George, our son is coming! Our dear Frederick William is coming!"

"Well, I rather think he ought to have been here a half year ago," growled the Elector, "and we have been expecting him several months already."

"But he is here now, my husband, he is actually here now. Only see what a good, affectionate son he is! He has halted at the inn of the Spandow suburb, merely to forewarn us of his arrival. It was not enough for him that he had sent us a messenger with a verbal communication, no, he must send us a written salutation, and such kind, cordial words as he has written. There, read, my husband, just read!"

She handed the paper to the Elector, but he did not take it.

"Is the letter directed to me?" he asked.

"No, to me, to his mother he wrote, because he knew how happy it would make me, and how heartily I love him. Read, George!"

"I never read letters that are not directed to myself," said the Elector, turning away.

"Well, then, I will read it to you!" cried the Electress, who in the fullness of her joy heeded as little the ill humor of the Elector as she did the presence of Count Schwarzenberg, who upon her entrance had modestly withdrawn to one of the deep window recesses. "Yes, I will read it to you," she repeated, "for you must hear what our son writes."

And with a voice trembling from joy and agitation she read:

"My gracious, revered Mother: Before I enter my dear birthplace and return home to my beloved parents and sisters, I would announce my arrival to your highnesses, that you may not be alarmed by my unexpected coming, and that I may not come inopportunely to his grace, my father. I enjoy greatly getting home, and all the testimonials of love and sympathy which I have received ever since I set foot within my father's territories, and they will remain indelibly graven on my heart. I beg your grace to present my most submissive respects to my gracious father and Elector, and to speak a good word for me to him, that his grace may no longer cherish resentment against me on account of my long stay abroad, and that he may favorably incline toward and receive me, and be convinced that I am and shall ever remain the grateful and obedient son of my venerated parents.

"FREDERICK WILLIAM."

"Well" asked the Electress, "are not those affectionate, glorious words, and does not your fatherly heart rejoice in them? But just hear, hear, how they shout and hurrah! It is the good people of Berlin! They are coming to the palace to see our son!"

Again was the door through which the Electress had entered violently thrown open, and two young ladies entered. Their lovely and blooming faces beamed with happiness and their eyes glistened with joy.

"He comes! Our brother is coming!" they cried, rushing forward toward their parents. "Just come to the window, that we may see him, for he is riding around the corner into the pleasure garden"

"Are you all, then, wholly beside yourselves, and gone stark mad?" cried the Elector passionately, while he rose from his armchair and proudly drew himself up. "Who gives these two young ladies the privilege of entering my cabinet thus, unannounced and without ceremony? Just answer me one thing, Miss Charlotte Louise, did I permit you to come here?"

"No, dearest father," said the Princess timidly, casting down her large, dark eyes, "no, your grace has not indeed permitted us to do so, but we did not think of that in the joy of our hearts, and because from here is the best lookout upon the pleasure grounds, we—"

"We thought," interrupted the younger sister, who had hardly attained her fifteenth year—"we thought our dear papa, his Electoral Grace, would forgive us and look out with us to catch a sight of our beloved brother. And were we not right, dear papa, were we mistaken in thinking so, and will your grace not allow your little Sophie Hedwig to lead you to the great corner window, that with mamma you may have a view of dear Frederick William?"

The Princess had approached her father, and, tenderly and coaxingly stroking his cheeks with her little white hand, looked up at him with such a gentle, pleading glance in her blue eyes as George William had never hitherto been known to resist. But this time the eyes of his favorite had no power over the Elector's heart, and indignantly he repelled her encircling arms.

"Let me alone with your 'dear Frederick William,' you saucy piece!" cried he passionately. "You should at all events have waited until I had given you leave to appear here. If, in your childish giddiness, you knew no better, yet your sister Charlotte Louise, at the more mature age of twenty, ought to have arrived at years of discretion, and known what was proper."

"No one knows better what is becoming than the fair young Princess Charlotte Louise, most gracious sir," said Count Adam Schwarzenberg, issuing from the window recess and greeting the Princess with a reverential bow. "In the whole country the Electoral Princess is honored as a brilliant model of fine manners and noble demeanor, and every one feels himself blessed and honored who is permitted to approach her. And is not the young lady right even now, dear sir, in coming here with her young sister? It is surely proper and well for the united Electoral family to be seen by the nation as they look upon the dear son and brother, whose return gladdens their hearts?"

"Well, for aught I care, she may be right," muttered the Elector, "and I will grant my wife and daughters leave to look out of the corner window. But, meanwhile, where is the Electress?"

"Her grace is standing there before the corner window and gazing down so earnestly upon the square that I have not yet been so fortunate as to be allowed to pay my respects to her highness."

"For if the whole world had been assembled together she would have seen nothing but the Electoral Prince," called out the Elector, shrugging his shoulders. "Go to her, Adam, and present my compliments to her. Tell her that I resign my cabinet to her and my daughters, and will withdraw into my sleeping apartment until this uproar has subsided."

"Oh, do not do so, most honored father," cried the younger Princess. "Stay here, and look out of the window with us."

"Do so, your Electoral Highness," pleaded the count, softly and quickly. "Grant the people the light of your countenance."

"Well, so be it, then," sighed George William. "Call the servants, Charlotte Louise, that they may roll me to the window."

"As if I could not have the privilege of acting as servant to your highness, and as if my arm were not strong enough to guide your highness's chair. Permit me, gracious sir, to roll you to the window."

"And permit me to help your excellency," said Princess Charlotte Louise, smiling, while she seized one of the arms of the fauteuil.

"Now truly this is a very lofty equipage," cried George William, as the fauteuil rolled along through the spacious apartment. "The Stadtholder in the Mark and a Princess of the blood drawing my equipage."

"But what a man sits in it!" said Count Schwarzenberg. "A duke of Prussia, of Pomerania, of Cleves, an Elector of Brandenburg, and—"

"Hurrah, hurrah!" sounded up from below in a chorus of hundreds of voices. "Hurrah! long live the Electoral Prince!"

"He comes! Oh, my son, my son!" cried the Electress. "He comes! George, our son—"

She had turned round and her eye met the count's gaze, who immediately bowed low and reverentially before her. The Electress only thanked him with a slight nod of her head, and herself sprang forward to push the fauteuil into the window niche. Then, with trembling hands, she opened both window shutters and beckoned her daughters to her side.

"He must see us all, all" she said. "With one glance he must take in father, mother, and sisters."

"And my most faithful and best-beloved servant, the Stadtholder in the Mark!" cried the Elector. "Come, Adam, place yourself close beside me, that the picture may be complete, and my son may see us all at once."

Boundless public rejoicings seemed to be in progress below; a loud, long-sustained, ever-renewed cheering rolled over the square like the roar of the sea.

"My son, my beloved son!" cried the Electress, leaning far out of the window and stretching out both arms toward the young man, who had just emerged from the shrubbery, on horseback and followed by a brilliant train.

"Brother, dear brother!" called out the two Princesses, leaning out of the other side of the window, and waving their handkerchiefs in token of welcome. Behind them sat the Elector in his great armchair, quite forgotten and quite hidden from view by his wife and daughters, not at all visible to either the people or his son.

"I shall remember this hour, oh! to be sure, I shall remember it," he said, with trembling lips; "my son shall atone to me for this hour of shame and mortification. I—"

The huzzaing and shouting below drowned his words; they came pouring in at the open window like the pealing tones of an organ, like the roar of the sea, like claps of thunder.

The Elector could no longer bear it. He looked up with glances of entreaty at the count, who, drawn up to his full height, stood proud and commanding at the side of his chair, his sharp eyes piercing down into the court over the ladies' heads.

"Ah, Adam," sighed George William, "you, too, have forgotten me, and are only looking upon him who is coming!"

But, however softly these words had been spoken, the count heard them, and tenderly he leaned over the Elector, and seized his hand to kiss it.

"I am looking at the newcomer," he whispered, "but I never forget you, and my heart can never be unmindful of the love and fidelity it owes you."

"Hurrah! Long live the Electoral Prince!" was borne up in tumultuous uproar from the pleasure garden. "Long live the Electoral Prince! Long live the Elector! Hurrah for the Elector George William!"

"They are calling for you, my husband, they call for you!" said the Electress. "Will you not show yourself to our dear people?"

"I ought, indeed, to be thankful to the dear people," returned her husband. "The dear people have at least reminded the Electress that I still exist, although she had crowded me back and rendered me entirely invisible behind her. Yes, I will show myself to the people, as they still think of me in the midst of their merriment. Step back from the window, ladies, make room for your Elector and lord! And you, Count Schwarzenberg, come and give me your arm; I would lean upon you!"

The count willingly offered the Elector his arm. Powerfully drawn up by him, the Elector rose from his seat, and, leaning upon his favorite, stepped close up to the window. The shouts of joy were for a moment hushed; perhaps because the Electoral Prince had just ridden into the palace yard, perhaps because the ladies' retreat from the window was considered by the people a sign that the Elector was about to appear. And now, within the window frame, was seen the clumsy, broad figure of the Elector; now was seen his large head, sparsely covered with gray hairs, his pale, swollen face, prematurely old, with its melancholy blue eyes and thin, colorless lips, round which played not the slightest smile. In the handsome, powerful, and youthful Electoral Prince the people had just joyfully greeted Brandenburg's future, and now from the window of that gray, gloomy, wretched old palace looked out upon them the hopelessness of Brandenburg's present. Like gazing upon embodied care and joyless resignation it was, to behold the Elector's grave, forbidding aspect, and before it the joyous cry upon the people's lips was silenced. They stared up at the window in dumb horror, and only here and there sounded cries from compassionate or bribed mouths: "Long live the Elector! Long live George William!" And like a dying echo came back the answer on this side and on that, feebly and slowly: "Long live the Elector! Long live George William!"

But now the people caught sight of the tall, stately form, in gold embroidered velvet suit, with the star of brilliants glittering on its breast, which stood beside the Elector; now they recognized that haughty countenance with its glance of sovereign contempt, its smile of lofty condescension upon the thin, scornful lips, and a disturbance was perceptible among the multitudes, as when a sudden gust of wind agitates the waves of the sea and lashes them up into fury and rage. All at once there came thundering up to the window, shrieked, howled, and hissed by the crowd: "Down with the Catholics! Down with Schwarzenberg! Down with the Imperialist!"

A deep flush overspread the Elector's face. He hastily stepped back from the window, and looked almost timidly up at the count, whose countenance meanwhile had not for a moment lost its proud, smiling serenity. He seemed not to have heard the screams of the mob.

"They would vex me to death, therefore do they scream so!" cried the Elector; "they know my regard for Schwarzenberg, and therefore are they so set against him and insult him, in order to insult me through him!"

"My parents, my beloved parents!" cried a clear, rich voice, and a young man tore open the doors of the Electoral cabinet, revealing a tall, slender figure and a noble face, with sparkling eyes and smiling lips. The Electress uttered one scream of rapture, and hastened to meet her son with outstretched arms. He threw himself upon her breast, greeting her with phrases of fond endearment, and when he lifted himself from his mother's heart there were the two sisters to embrace their dear and only brother, to greet him with affectionate words of love, and to hold him long, long in their encircling arms. The Elector had again sunk back into his armchair. His "faithful servant," Count Schwarzenberg, had again rolled him back into the middle of the apartment and stationed himself immediately in the rear.

With unpropitious frowns had the Elector witnessed the first tender greeting exchanged between the Electress and her son. Now, when his sisters in their turn engrossed him and the mother stood looking on in transport, now the Elector turned round to Schwarzenberg, and an expression of deep bitterness spoke in every feature.

"My son seems not to know that I am yet in the world," he said, with quick, complaining tone of voice. "Had you not better remind him of it for decency's sake, Adam?"

But at this moment the Electoral Prince freed himself from his sisters' arms, perceived the Elector, and sprang forward to him with open arms to throw himself on his heart. But, when he got a nearer view of his father's dark countenance, he let his arms drop, bent his knee before the Elector, and grasped one hand to imprint upon it a reverential kiss.

"My dear father, my most gracious Sovereign and Elector!" cried he in tones full of tenderness, "I beg your pardon that my first word, my first salutation was not given to you. You see, I was always a foolish boy, whom my mother spoils, and who delights in being spoiled."

"I beg your pardon, my husband," said the Electress, approaching her husband; "I alone was to blame that our son did not come first to you, as was his duty, and pay his first respects to his father and Sovereign. I stopped him, and you must not impute as a fault to the son what was occasioned by a mother's tenderness."

The Elector made no reply, but looked down with moody resentment upon the Electoral Prince, who still knelt before him.

"My much-loved, gracious father," cried the Prince, "I once more beg your pardon, and pray you kindly to forget if I have hitherto often given you ground for annoyance, and have not appeared here immediately on your first command. I see my error, and I promise, my dear, kind father, that I have returned home as a penitent, affectionate son, as an obedient subject, whose earnest endeavor shall be to deserve the forgiveness and good opinion of his lord and father, and to live wholly and solely in subjection to his will. Only bid me welcome, too, my most revered sir; bestow upon your son one word of welcome and fatherly love."

The Prince glanced so tenderly at his father, there lay so much feeling in his handsome, expressive countenance, that the Elector could not resist him, but, in spite of himself, felt his heart stirred by tenderness and emotion. He bowed down to him, a rare smile lit up his face, and he was just opening his lips to greet his son with words of friendliness and love, when the shrieking and shouting down in the pleasure garden, which had ceased for some time (probably because their exhausted throats required rest), burst forth again with redoubled violence.

"Away with the Catholics! Down with Schwarzenberg! Long live the Electoral Prince. Down with Schwarzenberg!" came up with thundering impetuosity.

The friendly words died upon the Elector's lips, and the short sunshine of his smile vanished under a cloud of displeasure.

"It seems, sir," he said, "as if your arrival were a real jubilee for the low rabble, who have assembled down there in the pleasure grounds, and as if your arrival were to be the cause of much vexation to me. What seditious, scandalous words are those shouted by those wretches?"

"I do not know, I did not hear them," said the Electoral Prince quickly.

"My whole attention was concentrated upon y father's lips, waiting to hear one gracious word of welcome!"

"The mob saved me that trouble!" cried the Elector. They cut me off from speech with their 'Long live the electoral Prince!' What need is there for a further welcome from your old father?"

"I need it much," replied the Electoral Prince, with low, melancholy voice. "I need a kind, gracious word from my father, on returning home after so long an absence; and it would seem to me as if my whole future, my whole life were under a cloud if I lacked the blessing of your love, the sunshine of your favor."

"My son knows how to arrange his words prettily," said the Elector, shrugging his shoulders; "it is very observable that he has become quite a fine, elegant gentleman; who will find but little to his taste among us, and who will suit us just as little! But what are those people forever shouting?" said the Elector, interrupting himself, while he rose impulsively from his armchair, thus obliging the Prince to rise from his knees. "What infamous hubbub and howling is this, and what do you villains want of us?"

"Nothing further, most noble Elector," replied Count Schwarzenberg, to whom the Elector had turned with his query—"nothing further than that your honor drive me away, nothing further than that you dismiss the hated minister, whom they abhor, simply because he is a Catholic and not a Reformer, and because he is named Schwarzenberg and not Rochow or Quitzow, nor blessed with some country bumpkin's title."

"I will rout this pack of vagabonds!" cried the Elector. "Let them dare just once more to let such an opprobrious, insulting shout be heard!"

And, quite forgetting his weakness and his limb so painfully swollen with gout, the Elector went rapidly to the still open corner window, and, leaning far out of it, lifted up his hand, commanding quiet. The people took this inclination of the body, this movement of the hand, for a token of grace, for a kind salutation on the part of their Sovereign, perhaps even for a granting of their demand. They roared aloud with delight, waved aloft their hats and caps, their arms and handkerchiefs, and cried and whooped and hurrahed: "Long live the Elector! Long live George William! Long live the Electoral Prince!"

The Elector stepped back and shut the window so violently that the little panes of glass, framed in lead, fairly rattled.

"Frantic populace!" he growled, "they mix up a wretched salad of cheers and curses, mingle weeds with their herbs, and fancy that we will find this devilish compound pleasing to our palates! We shall remember them for it, and—"

"Most gracious sir!" cried Count Schwarzenberg, with radiant countenance, approaching the Elector—"most gracious sir, in this blessed hour of our beloved Electoral Prince's return, I have a favor to ask of your highness. His grace has just greeted me so amiably, so condescendingly, that he has caused my heart to overflow with joy, and I feel the strongest desire to give expression to this joy. The return of the Electoral Prince is just as propitious an event for me as, for the Electoral family, and for all your subjects it is a festive occasion which can not be sufficiently honored, and therefore I entreat your highness to permit me to celebrate it at my house also, and to gratify me by being present yourself at this fete, with all the other members of your exalted family."

The Elector looked upon his minister with an expression of joyful tenderness, and then turned his glance upon the Electoral Prince, who stood silent, and with lowered eyelids, beside his mother and sisters.

"Well, what say you to it, sir?" asked George William. "Do you accept the invitation to the feast?"

"I, Electoral Lord?" asked the Prince, astonished. "It is not for me to accept, or to say anything. I only await the decision of your highness, and now allow myself to remark that I shall ever feel honored by an invitation from the Stadtholder in the Mark, and that no one can have a higher appreciation of his services and a greater respect for his statesman-like experience and wisdom than myself."

"He knows how to speak, does he not, count?" asked the Elector, indicating his son by a quick nod of the head.

"Well, since it depends on my decision, I shall gladly extend to you my leave to celebrate the Electoral Prince's return by a little merrymaking, were it only that the good-for-nothing people of Berlin may see that we and our family are devoted to Count Schwarzenberg now as before, and that their pitiful howls have had no influence upon us and our determinations. Yes, we will come to your party, Adam, we accept your invitation cordially and affectionately."

"I thank my most gracious lord for this act of favor and condescension," cried the count, pressing the Elector's proffered hand to his lips. "Will your highness extend your favor by appointing the day on which so distinguished an honor is to befall my house?"

"Well, that you may not have time to make too great preparations, and put us to shame by the splendor of your fete, we will allow you but a short respite. To-day is Wednesday, the eighteenth of June, we therefore appoint Sunday, the twenty-second of June, for your festival."

"Be it then on Sunday, a sunny day truly for me and for my house," cried Count Schwarzenberg. "My son, too, will do himself the honor to participate in the joys of the fete, which your highness will do me the favor to give in my house, for he has returned from his journey, and will this very day petition for leave to present himself."

A fugitive glance from the count strayed across to the ladies, while he bowed low before them, but, however cursory this glance, it gave him full opportunity for perceiving Princess Charlotte Louise's deep blush, and the joyful flashing of her eyes.

"She loves him," he said softly to himself, "yes, she loves him, and my son will be Elector of Brandenburg."

"We shall be pleased to see again your son, Count John Adolphus," said George William kindly. "He is a very elegant and accomplished gentleman, besides being a very submissive and obedient son, in whom your father's heart may well rejoice. My son would do well to follow his example, and I shall be delighted for him to form a friendship with the count."

"I shall diligently strive to gain the friendship of the son as well as of the father," replied the Electoral Prince, smiling, "and it shall not be my fault, indeed, if I do not obtain it."

"Most honored sir, you can gain no more than you already possess," exclaimed Schwarzenberg, bowing low. "Will the Electress now permit me to address a question to her highness?"

"Ask your question quickly," cried the Electress, "that I may hear the request it is to introduce, for I am really curious to know what the rich and powerful Count Schwarzenberg can have to desire of the poor, uninfluential Electress."

"First, then, my question, most gracious lady: At what hour does your highness command my fete to begin?"

"Will you leave the decision to me, my husband?" asked the Electress, smiling.

The Elector nodded assent.

"As you have invited my daughters," said the Electress, "I presume that there will certainly be dancing, and evening hours suit best for that. Let the fete commence at six o'clock."

The Elector's brow darkened, for he did not at all relish gay, noisy evening parties, and a solemn dinner at the regular hour would have been far more welcome to him.

"Your grace has prescribed the hour for the opening of the ball," said Count Schwarzenberg reverentially. "But I now also entreat further that you name a dinner hour, for I hope your highness will favor me by dining with me on that day."

"Yes, that honor shall be shown you," cried the Elector cheerfully. "We shall come, surely we shall come. And I will myself appoint the hour for the mid-day meal. Let it be at two o'clock. Then we shall have some pleasant hours at table before the dancing comes off and the music puts our heads in a whirl."

"Two o'clock, then, most gracious sir."

"And now, Sir Count," cried the Electress, "now for your request. Say quickly what it is. What can you have to ask of me?"

"Most gracious Electress, I hardly venture to express it, and yet, by granting my request, you would do me a very great pleasure and honor. Some splendid silk stuffs have been sent me from France by my cousin, who is Austrian ambassador there. I had given him such a commission, as I thought of making a present to my aunt, the Countess Schwarzenberg at Vienna. My cousin bought these stuffs for me, and writes me, moreover, that they are the newest fabrics from the looms of Lyons, and that he has just sent three such dresses to the Empress and the two archduchesses at Vienna. Now, it did not seem to me becoming or appropriate that the Countess Schwarzenberg should wear robes such as the Empress and archduchesses wear, and I think gold and silver brocade suited to none but ladies of princely blood."

"And you would give them to us, Sir Count?" cried the young Princess Sophie Hedwig, with heightened color in her cheeks and sparkling eyes.

The Electress and older Princess laughed aloud at this naive and hasty question, and even the Elector laughed a little.

A slight blush suffused the Electoral Prince's face; he withdrew to the window and looked out. Count Schwarzenberg, however, looked smilingly upon the young Princess, whose girlish impatience had come so opportunely to his rescue.

"I would venture," he said, "most humbly to ask her highness's permission to lay the brocade stuffs at her feet."

"Mamma, do so," coaxed Sophie Hedwig; "take the pretty dress patterns from the good Stadtholder."

"Well, then, I shall do so," said the Electress. "I accept your present for myself and the young ladies, and I thank you."

She extended her hand to the count, which he kissed.

"And you will give orders, Electress, that the dresses be made up in time for Count Schwarzenberg's fete!" cried the Elector cheerfully. "You must at least honor him by displaying his present first at his own house."

"There are a few plates accompanying it," remarked Schwarzenberg—"a few plates on which are painted the newest styles of ladies' dresses now fashionable in Paris. The robes of the Empress and the archduchesses were made by them."

"So shall our dresses be too!" cried Sophie Hedwig, joyfully clapping her hands. "Shall they not, dearest mamma—shall not our dresses be made by the fashion plates?"

Just at this moment the Electoral Prince again emerged from the window recess, and approached his father.

"I beg your highness's gracious permission to withdraw," he said. "I should like to retire to my own apartments a little while, in order to lay aside my dusty traveling suit."

"Do so, my son," replied the Elector, with a friendly nod of the head. "Go to your rooms, which have been prepared for you a whole half year, and await your return. Dress yourself and rejoin us at dinner. For the rest, I bid you heartily welcome, and may your return be productive of good, not evil, to yourself and us all."

"God grant that I may merit my father's favor, and ever show myself worthy of it!" exclaimed the Electoral Prince, with deep seriousness. "I have now the honor of taking my leave!"

He bowed low before the Elector, and with a like salutation bade farewell to the Electress and the Princesses. After greeting the count with a smile and a wave of his hand, he hurried with light elastic step through the apartment to the door.



IV.—THE DONATION.

When the Electoral Prince left his father's cabinet he found without the officers and servants of the household arranged in solemn order. They received him with a thrice-repeated cheer that was loud enough to penetrate through the door into the Electoral apartment, and to reach the Elector's ears in a manner by no means pleasant.

Affectionately and smilingly Frederick William thanked them. He could call each one of them by name, and charmed them all by recalling little incidents of his earlier days in which they had borne a part.

"I hope we shall always remain good friends," he said, when he had reached the door of the long entrance hall, "and once more I thank you for your friendly greeting."

Old Jock, who stood next to the door, and who looked quite grand in his artfully patched livery of state—old Jock had already just opened his mouth for another thundering hurrah, when the Electoral Prince laid his hand gently upon his shoulder.

"Hush, Jock, hush! do not shout," he said, loud enough to be heard by everybody. "It is enough that I read my welcome in your eyes, and not necessary for your lips to pronounce the words aloud. Our much-loved and gracious father is sick and suffering, and we must not therefore allow his rest to be disturbed by loud noises. Be quiet and silent, therefore, and only believe me when I say that I know I am welcome to you all!"

He gave them one more friendly nod, and stepped out upon the long corridor, on the other side of which lay his own apartments. Quickly he went on, opened the door of the antechamber with a vigorous pressure of his hand, and entered. The trunks and other baggage lay in wild disorder, heaped up in the outer hall, and old Dietrich, with a few other servants and lackeys, was busied in untying parcels and unpacking. The Electoral Prince went hurriedly past, and entered his sleeping room. Here, too, he found all in confusion; the dust lay thick upon the unwieldy old furniture, whose cushions were covered with faded and even here and there ragged tapestry. From the walls, hung with discolored papering, a few old ancestral portraits looked gravely and gloomily down upon him, and their melancholy eyes seemed to ask him what he wanted here, and why he had come to awaken them from their repose, and disturb the dust which had been collecting for years. It seemed to the Prince as if he heard this inhospitable question quite clearly uttered by the lips of his ancestor Albert Achilles, before whose picture he was just passing, and whose large, glittering eyes seemed to look out in defiance. Frederick William stopped and looked at his forefather with a sad smile. "I have come much against my will, Elector Albert Achilles," he said. "I assure you, very much against my will, and if I did not think of the future, I would go away again and never come back. But for the sake of the future the present must be endured; therefore forgive me, my great, valiant ancestor, and believe me I will do you honor!"

He nodded to the picture and strode on, advancing into the next room, which was to be his study. Here everything was still exactly as he had left it almost four years ago. The old furniture stood unmoved in its familiar places; there was still the brown varnished writing table at which he had formerly applied himself to his studies, in company with his tutor Leuchtmar von Kalkhun; beside it stood the simple, rude book shelves, and on them, covered with dust and cobwebs, the old leather-bound volumes from which he had drunk in knowledge and wisdom. Before both windows hung, just as then, the dark red silken curtains, only that the sun had partially deprived them of their original coloring and interwoven sickly streaks of yellow. The old sofa, too, was yet in existence with its sleek brown leather covering, and by its side stood the two leather armchairs, with their high, straight backs and awkwardly turned feet. No one had taken the trouble to repair these inroads of dilapidation, and, long as they had been expecting the Electoral Prince, no preparations whatever had been made for his reception. Four years had passed over these chambers without leaving any further trace of their presence than dust and cobwebs, and faded stripes on cushion and curtain. Sighing, the Electoral Prince threw himself into one of the two armchairs. The old piece of furniture creaked under him, as if by this sound it would greet him and remind him of the past. He leaned his head against the back, whose leather cooled his temples as if a cold hand had been laid upon the brow of him who had just come home. Slowly his glance swept through the room, and it seemed to him as if he saw the four last years glide by like phantom shapes through the lonely, dreary, and dusty chamber. They looked at him with wan smiles and lusterless eyes, and hovered past shadowlike, leaving behind for him nothing but dust, nothing but a hardly cicatrized wound. Hardly cicatrized!

Sometimes it bled yet, this wound of his past. Sometimes he thought that there was no healing for it, that it would never close, and that its pain would never cease.

Just so thought he as the shadows of the four years floated by him through that gloomy, dusty room. Just so thought he, when the youngest of these phantoms paused beside him, threw back her gray veil of mist, and under it disclosed to him a beautiful, rosy female face, with flaming eyes, pouting lips, and lovely smile, when she raised her hand and beckoned to him, whispering: "Leave all behind and come to me! I am waiting for you! I love you! Oh, come to me!"

How sweetly enticing were these whispered sounds, how burning was the pain in the wound but barely healed! Again it began to bleed, again tears rose to his eyes. He was not ashamed of them, and yet, as he felt them flow burning down his cheeks, he stretched out his hands deprecatingly to the phantom with the rosy cheeks and fascinating smile, to the shadow of the last year, and murmured: "Away from me! Come not near me, to tempt my heart! I may not follow you—I may not, and I will not."

"And I will not!" he repeated quite aloud, and jumped up from his easychair, shaking his head defiantly and proudly, like a roused lion.

"What will you not?" asked a soft voice behind him, and when he turned round he saw at his back Baron von Leuchtmar, who had just entered, and whose mild, gentle glances rested upon him with tender expression.

"Leuchtmar!" cried the Prince, hastening to meet him with both hands outstretched. "God be praised, that you are here, that you come to me at this moment! Ah! would that you had not left me at Spandow, but had remained at my side!"

"No, my Prince! It was proper that the eyes of the people should have greeted you alone, and that the boy, whom they had seen go off at the side of his tutor, should now appear to them again as a bold and independent young man, who relies upon his own powers only, and has no longer any tutor at his side, but his own sense of duty and his conscience. But why so sad, Prince Frederick William? Your journey was verily a triumphal procession; like a Roman imperator you entered your father's city, and now do I find you here, solitary, with troubled countenance, with tears upon your cheeks?"

"With tears upon my cheeks?" repeated the Prince; "with imprecations, with wrath, and sorrow in my heart. Oh, friend, why were you not with me? You would have saved me perhaps from the bitterness of the last hour. You would have stood by me, would have encouraged me!"

"My God, what has happened then?"

"It has happened that I was received as if I were some criminal returning after a course of sin!" cried Frederick William, with indignant pain. "It has happened that they have treated me as if I were a rioter and inciter of rebellion, who had come hither with criminal designs, at the head of a mob, and as a captain of robbers, who had attacked his Sovereign in his stronghold. It has happened that they allowed me to sue for pardon upon my knees without lifting me up—that they have treated me like an abandoned villain, from whom they expected each hour to witness some new out-break."

"But consider, my Prince, that you had reason to expect that your reception would be ungracious, and that it was your father from whom these trials would come to you."

"No, not from my father, but from him—that evil spirit who, with his cold smile and mocking composure, stood at my father's side! He has poisoned my father's heart with jealousy and hate, he has filled it with mistrust toward his only son, and sowed discord, that he may himself reap a harvest from the hatred! And he was witness of my humiliation, and I saw how he looked down upon me with scornful superiority as I knelt before my father and pleaded in vain for one word of love from his lips! But he had withered this word upon his lips, and only for him were words of tenderness and veneration there! Only for him acknowledgments, confidence, and love! As he stood there with cold and haughty face at the side of my poor father, who, stooping and insignificant, cowered below him—oh, so far below him in his easychair—I felt it in every nerve of my heart, in every fiber of my brain, that he and he alone is ruling lord here, the commander and Sovereign; and that he who will not bow and cringe before him, will by him be hurled into the dust and trodden upon! They all bow before him—all! He is like a magician, who by the magnetic glances of his eyes subjects to his will all who approach him, and makes the stoutest hearts soft and pliant, so that like wax they allow themselves to be molded by his forming hands. Even my mother, who is his enemy, who has been battling against him for twenty years, even she is conquered by him, and he has become her master and forces her to his will. She knows not at all that she has fallen within the circle of his magic, yet is, like all the rest, a mere tool in his hands. But she feels it not, and fancies herself free, while she lies bound, and has no will of her own in his presence. I have seen it, I have felt it, and it has filled my heart with unutterable woe, with raging anger. She felt not at all the shame and humiliation under which I almost expired; she came not to my aid, for the magician was there, and in his presence my mother forgot her son so recently come back to her, and he was the center around which all turned, he was master of the situation, and before him all shrank into wretched nothingness. He charmed the hearts which had remained cold at my reception, charmed them with the prospect of a fete, which, as he said, he was to give in my honor, and they believed the mockery, and allowed themselves to be touched by that noble condescension, and felt not the cruel boasting with which he solemnizes the return of him who is a thorn in his flesh, a thorn which he is firmly determined to pluck out, and tread under foot! I came here humble, poor, and empty-handed, and he solemnizes my return by offering presents to my mother and my sisters! And they accept them, feel not at all the degradation, and will appear at the fete in clothes with which my enemy, my adversary, my murderer has presented them!"

"Prince, you go too far. Your hatred carries you away."

"No, I do not go too far!" cried the Prince, beside himself. His countenance was deadly pale, his eyes flashed, and his whole being seemed pervaded by the fire of wrath and hatred. "No, I do not go too far, and my hatred does not carry me away! He is the evil demon of my house—of my country! He is to blame for all the disasters of the last twenty years, for all the humiliation and shame by which my family has been visited. The Mark is to be ruined—that is his end, that is his aim; the Electoral house of Brandenburg must die out—that is his hope; and he will leave untried no means whereby this hope may become reality. He has already tried once to murder me,[22] and he will try it again. A dagger's point lurks in each glance that he fixes upon me, a drop of poison in each word that he directs to me. If I stood alone with him upon the summit of a tower, he would hurl me down, and then afterward follow my coffin with a thousand tears! And my father would lean upon him, and thank God that only his son had been snatched from him, not his friend, his favorite; and my mother would weep for me, and yet go about in mourning which he had presented to her, and she would esteem it a peculiar act of amiability if he should exert himself to divert her mind and raise her spirits. No voice would be raised against him, and no one would venture to accuse him, for my father himself would protect him, and the grace and favor of the Emperor would speak him clear of any suspicion. He is my master, my lord—that is what fills me with rage and indignation; and I will surely die of this if the count does not succeed in dispatching me first, and putting me out of the way."

"He will not venture to attempt that, for he knows public opinion would accuse and denounce him as the murderer."

"What cares he for public opinion, what asks he about it—he who has power to repress it, he who stands so secure that it can not touch him?"

"Nobody stands so high, Prince, that public opinion can not reach him and dash him into the depths below, for public opinion is the voice of the nation, and the voice of the nation is the voice of God! And believe me, Prince, this voice will one day accuse and sentence him."

"Yes, one day perhaps, when he has thrust me out of the way and murdered me, when my father has gone to his last home, when the Emperor has pronounced the Mark of Brandenburg an unincumbered fief, and bestowed it as an act of grace upon Count Schwarzenberg or his son. Oh, I know all his plans, and I know that no moment of my life is henceforth secure—know that I am a victim of death if prudence and cunning do not save me! I thought of all this during my long journey to this place. I have weighed all, pondered all, and my whole future lay before me like a white sheet of paper. I saw a hand unroll it, and with bloody letters inscribe the word 'Death'; but I saw this word blotted out by a cautious finger, and, ere it was written to the end, replaced by the word 'Life' in characters small and hardly visible. Yes, I will live, will reign, will have fame, honor, and influence, will make a name for myself! Leuchtmar, I have left behind in Holland my youth, my hopes, my dreams, my heart! I come here as a man, despite my eighteen years, as a man who from the wreck of his youth will save only this: the future and fame! A man, who has suffered so much, that he can say of himself: I defy pain, and it has no longer any power over me! I defy life, and will conquer it! Yes, Leuchtmar, I will conquer it; and although I no longer love it, I do not mean to allow it to be snatched away from me. Hear me, friend, for to-day is the last time for a long while that I may speak openly and candidly to you. I entreat you, guide of my youth, to preserve for me your friendship and your faith. I beseech you never to lose confidence in me, and, if ever a doubt should intrude itself with regard to me, to remember this hour, in which I have laid bare to you my heart, and in which you have been a witness to my indignation and grief, my excitement and hatred! You are familiar with my countenance, friend; impress it upon your memory, in order that you may never forget it, even if you should not see it for a long time again. Look once more in my eyes, and read in my glances my love and reverence for you!"

"I do look into your eyes, son of my heart," said Leuchtmar, deeply moved. "I look through your eyes into your soul, into your heart, and read therein great determination and heroic aims. Strive after them, my favorite, and when the present seems to you dark and gloomy, then lift your eye to the glittering star, which hovers over you and is your future. To endure evil, and still to remain joyful and valiant, therein lies true heroism. To turn from the dust of earthly needs, to step over it with head held heavenward, thereby is true faith proved. God bless you, my son! Be brave, be wise, be true! Trust in yourself, your friends, your people, and your God; then is the future yours, and you will overcome all your foes, and will triumph over the proud man who now thinks that he triumphs over you. I said to you, be brave, be wise, be true. I forgot one thing, though, which I shall now add—be circumspect! Remember that oftentimes it is not the sword which carries off the victory, but cunning; remember Brutus, who freed Rome."

"Oh, my friend, you have spoken truth," exclaimed the Prince; "you have read to the bottom of my soul, and understood my inmost thoughts. Now am I glad and full of confidence, for my friend and teacher will never doubt me. And hear one thing more, my Leuchtmar. You must accept a memento of this hour, a memento which I prepared even before my departure from The Hague, and which shall be to you a proof of my gratitude. I am poor and powerless, and as I build all my hopes upon the future, so must I do with my presents as well. You must accept from me a gift of my future, friend. I know full well that what you have done for me can not be recompensed, but I would so gladly testify my gratitude to you, and therefore I give you this paper!"