"Your majesty!" he cried, "we are under a heavy fire, I conjure your majesty--"
Count Platen and General von Brandis also implored the king to withdraw from such imminent peril.
The king reined in his horse.
The whole escort stood still.
"Can my troops see me here?" asked George V.
"Certainly, your majesty," replied the adjutant-general, "your majesty's position is visible from the whole of the plain."
"Good," said the king, simply. And he quietly remained on the spot.
The shells flew hissing through the air, the bullets of the small arms whistled through the valley, and the frightened horses throwing up their heads snorted and trembled; the blind king, the Guelphic prince, who was ready to give his life for what his proud heart told him was the right, halted upon the brow of the hill, motionless as a marble statue, that his soldiers might see him.
With a maddening hurrah the Hanoverian columns greeted the king as they marched past him, and sank their waving banners low before their royal master, who returned their greeting calmly and quietly each time it was announced to him.
"If we stand here much longer," said Count Ingelheim to General Brandis, "a ball will sooner or later solve the Hanoverian question in a very simple manner."