"Hear him, Franz," cried Maria Theresa to the emperor, who, unobserved by his son, had entered the room. "Hear our own child! love in his heart will be a sentiment as holy, as faithful, and as profound as it has been with us for many happy years! Will you have the angel for your wife, Joseph?"
The archduke raised his expressive eyes to the face of his mother. "If I will have her!" murmured he, sadly. "Dear mother, would she deign to look upon me? Will she not rather turn away from him to whom the whole world is indifferent?"
"My precious child, she will love and honor you, as the world will do, when it comes to know your noble heart." And once more the empress bent over her son and imprinted a kiss upon his pale brow. "It is settled then, my son, that you shall offer your hand to this beautiful girl. In one week you will have attained your nineteenth birthday, and you shall give a good example to your sisters. Do you like the prospect?"
"Yes, dear mother, I am perfectly satisfied."
"And you do not ask her name or rank?"
"You have chosen her for me; and I take her from your hand without name or rank."
"Well," cried the delighted empress, "Count Bathiany, you have ever been the favorite preceptor of the archduke. Upon you, then, shall this honorable mission devolve. To-morrow, as ambassador extraordinary from our court, you shall go in state to ask of Don Philip of Parma the hand of his daughter Isabella for his imperial highness, the crown prince of Austria."
CHAPTER XII.
AN ITALIAN NIGHT.
The moon is up, but she is hidden behind heavy masses of clouds —welcome clouds that shelter lovers' secrets. The fountains, whose silvery showers keep such sweet time to the murmurings of love, plash gently on, hushing the sound of lovers' voices; on the bosom of yonder marble-tinctured lake, two snow-white swans are floating silently; and, far amid groves of myrtle and olive, the nightingale warbles her notes of love. Not a step echoes through the long avenues of the ducal park, not a light glimmers from the windows of the ducal palace. 'Tis the hour of midnight, and gentle sleep hath come to all.