In each town and village the procession was greeted with commanded cheers and with triumphant arches decorated by her Excellency's instructions. The peasants' faces were sombre while they cheered, sometimes a suppressed snarl of hatred mingled with the acclamations. As the travellers proceeded on their journey, however, this hostility abated, giving place to peering curiosity, and at every halt the villagers crowded round asking which of the ladies was the Landhofmeisterin, and commenting on her appearance.
At Kehl on the Rhine there was an official reception by the burgomaster and chief citizens. From Kehl to Strassburg, a distance of several miles, peasants and townsfolk bordered the road, watching the entry of the magnificent Duke of Wirtemberg. The town of Strassburg, in those days only French by a recent treaty, received the German prince with vociferous delight. The Regent d'Orléans, wishful to show courtesy to the new Duke of Montbéliard, had commanded the garrison to render military honours to the travelling prince, and Serenissimus was greeted in Strassburg by some of the finest of France's troops, and by thundering cannon salutes. Then there were white-robed maidens strewing flowers before his horse's hoofs, and from the town-gate to the stately old Cathedral Square the concourse of men and women was so vast as to make the progress slow and difficult; bands played and flags flew, and the Grävenitz was delighted. Eberhard Ludwig was feasted and honoured, and ever beside him was the tall figure of the Landhofmeisterin. In the evening the Duke received the chief burghers at a state banquet, and the Grävenitz sat to his Highness's right.
In Schlettstadt and Belfort, where he entered the Mömpelgard territory, the reception was enthusiastic; and, contrary to all expectations, the citizens of Mömpelgard itself received their new ruler with expressions of ecstatic loyalty, and even the Landhofmeisterin was loudly cheered. Here again the cannon roared a welcome, children and maidens strewed roses, choirs of youths chanted pæans of homage and rejoicing, and the Mömpelgard regiments, which but a few months before had been employed by the bastards to oppose the rightful heir, now greeted their Duke with respect. Banners waved from every house, arches of fresh flowers adorned the streets, the windows were spread with silken hangings, and the church bells rang peal upon peal. It was a scene of rejoicing, of enthusiasm, of pomp and magnificence, and it was the culminating point of the triumph of Wilhelmine von Grävenitz, but her heart was heavy with foreboding.
Serenissimus also, though he played his part in the fine pageant with seeming pleasure, was filled with profound sadness. The Erbprincessin had been brought to bed of a daughter only since the loss of her first child. The Erbprinz was more ailing than ever; true, he fought gallantly against his weakness, seeking to fortify himself and please his father by outdoor exercises; but, though he rode magnificently, with skill and intrepidity, he had fallen fainting from his horse several times of late. The doctors shook their heads, and the cognizance forced itself upon Eberhard Ludwig that he himself would be the last Duke of the direct line.
After spending three weeks of feasting at Mömpelgard, his Highness set out for Stuttgart. The Mömpelgarders bade him adieu with many expressions of loyal devotion. They found their new Duke and his handsome, decorous mistress, who played so finely the rôle of legal Duchess, an agreeable change after Leopold Eberhard's 'Persian Court' and its absurdities, and they would fain have induced Serenissimus to tarry in Mömpelgard; but the King of Prussia had intimated his intention of visiting Ludwigsburg in September, and Eberhard Ludwig hurried back to receive his royal guest. But on arriving in Ludwigsburg his Highness fell ill, and Friedrich Wilhelm's visit was postponed till the following spring.
The winter passed with little incident at Ludwigsburg. His Highness recovered rapidly from his actual illness, yet he did not regain his accustomed health and spirits, and thus the court festivities were both fewer and less brilliant than heretofore. The Landhofmeisterin's forebodings seemed to be infectious; a cloud hung over Ludwigsburg, and the people murmured ominously: 'His Highness wearies of her, and she has ill-wished him; he will die, and she will disappear with all the jewels and gold.'
Doubtless, the Landhofmeisterin's actions lent colour to these wild reports. She had studied various theories of medicine—quaint, old, forgotten herb lore, absurd mediæval magic. At first it had diverted her, then she grew credulous, and in the despair of knowing Eberhard Ludwig's love to be waning and his health broken, she resorted to the pitiful puerilities of love potions, life essences, and elixirs. Of course, for the brewing of these concoctions she required some extraordinary ingredients, and it was in the procuring of these that the gossip concerning her witch practices was revived and flourished. This prescription required the blood of a still-born male child; one old black-letter book recommended the heart of a yellow hen; another ordered the life-warm entrails of a black fighting-cock; a fourth prescription commanded the admixture of hairs from a dead man's beard! These ingredients mixed with herbs plucked in churchyards at midnight, or spices brought directly from the East, and with seven times distilled water, and suchlike, made a life elixir, or an infallible love potion, or again a cure for this or that disease. Among the many absurdities of ignorance some of the accumulated wisdom of experience may have crept into the old recipes: a real cure for a fever, or the application of a gold ring to an inflamed eyelid. Superstition said that the ring was the marvel-worker; possibly it was some quality in the gold, some even-as-yet-undiscovered power of certain metals upon the human body, and which experience may have taught the old village woman and the wandering quack. But for the most part the Grävenitz's potions were harmless absurdities, yet she believed, and so did others, in their efficacy.
During the winter the Erbprinz's fainting fits were more frequent than ever, and the Erbprincessin sank into a deep and brooding melancholy, which was varied by attacks of painful excitement and sudden bursts of causeless anger. It was whispered at Ludwigsburg that she was surely going mad.
It was as though some fearful blight had fallen upon Eberhard Ludwig and his family, and the Pietists preached that the avenging hand of God was hovering over the sinner's court. The Secret Service reported these sermons to the Landhofmeisterin, and the preachers were fined or imprisoned, but the stream of denunciation continued nevertheless.
The Grävenitz was very lonely now. His Highness had changed to her, she could no longer blind herself to the fact. Madame de Ruth was dead; Zollern, old and sad, was rarely at Ludwigsburg. Friedrich Grävenitz was covertly hostile to her. In the autumn a serious quarrel had taken place; the brother demanding as free gift the property of Welzheim, which the Landhofmeisterin had lent him. This Wilhelmine refused; she did not relish her brother's way of asking, and she bitterly resented the pompous, self-righteous, disapproving manner which he had adopted towards her of late. After all, he owed her everything, she told herself. Her sister, Sittmann, was a useless parasite. The Landhofmeisterin accounted her as one who would desert her immediately did misfortune come. The Sittmann sons, young men who owed their high position entirely to their aunt's power, not to their own merit or capability, were colourless, insipid youths. Sittmann himself, Schütz and the rest, she knew to be fair-weather friends; evidently they descried the clouds gathering over their patroness's head, and they were quietly drawing back from her. Only Maria, the maid, remained faithful and admiring, and tended her adored mistress with unfailing patience and devotion. In the early spring the preparations began for the King of Prussia's visit, but Serenissimus himself took the lead in settling the arrangements, and the Landhofmeisterin was constantly met with the answer: 'His Highness has ordered that otherwise, your Excellency,' or, 'that point has been settled by the Duke.' For twenty years she had directed and ruled, and now all things seemed to crumble at her touch.
