The Youth of the Great Elector

by L. Mühlbach

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 Königsberg 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 Jägerndorf, 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 fête, 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 fête, 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 fête, 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 fête 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 fête 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 naïve 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 fête!" 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.