"Dear Frau Argelander, dear Birthday Child!" cried the Queen, and slipped on the lady's plump arm a bracelet containing the hair of the two Princes.
Then did the Queen begin the festivities, part of the fun being the reading of a poem on each present, written at the command of the Queen by a Memel poet.
Marianne was standing near the table on which were the presents when Franz, who was well, now turned towards her smiling.
"Mariechen," he said in German, for after a talk or two with Ludwig Brandt he no longer spoke the fashionable French, but always his own language, "do you remember what Schlegel wrote about our Queen?"
Marianne shook her head.
"I have never heard it."
Franz, in low tones, repeated the words:
"She would be a Queen if she lived in a cottage,
The Queen of every heart."
Marianne's eyes danced.
"Oh, Franz," she cried, "oh, brother, how, how lovely!"