Memorials and Other Papers — Complete

by Thomas De Quincey

Great was his consternation upon finding in a room, which presented no outlet, not a living creature except the elderly seneschal, who lay quietly sleeping in his arm-chair. The first impulse of the prince was to awaken him roughly, that he might summon aid and cooperate in the search. One glance at a paper upon the table arrested his hand. He saw a name written there, interesting to his fears beyond all others in the world. His eye was riveted as by fascination to the paper. He read one instant. That satisfied him that the old seneschal must be overcome by no counterfeit slumbers, when he could thus surrender a secret of capital importance to the gaze of that eye from which, above all others, he must desire to screen it. One moment he deliberated with himself; the old man stirred, and muttered in his dreams; the Landgrave seized the paper, and stood irresolute for an instant whether to await his wakening, and authoritatively to claim what so nearly concerned his own interest, or to retreat with it from the room before the old man should be aware of the prince's visit, or his own loss.

But the seneschal, wearied perhaps with some unusual exertion, had but moved in his chair; again he composed himself to deep slumber, made deeper by the warmth of a hot fire. The raving of the wind, as it whistled round this angle of the schloss, drowned all sounds that could have disturbed him. The Landgrave secreted the paper; nor did any sense of his rank and character interpose to check him in an act so unworthy of an honorable cavalier. Whatever crimes he had hitherto committed or authorized, this was, perhaps, the first instance in which he had offended by an instance of petty knavery. He retired with the stealthy pace of a robber, anxious to evade detection, and stole back to his own apartments with an overpowering interest in the discovery he had made so accidentally, and with an anxiety to investigate it further, which absorbed for the time all other cares, and banished from his thoughts even The Masque himself, whose sudden appearance and retreat had, in fact, thrown into his hands the secret which now so exclusively disturbed him.

CHAPTER XII.

Meantime, The Masque continued to harass the Landgrave, to baffle many of his wiles, and to neutralize his most politic schemes. In one of the many placards which he affixed to the castle gates, he described the Landgrave as ruling in Klosterheim by day, and himself by night. Sarcasms such as these, together with the practical insults which The Masque continually offered to the Landgrave, by foiling his avowed designs, embittered the prince's existence. The injury done to his political schemes of ambition at this particular crisis was irreparable. One after one, all the agents and tools by whom he could hope to work upon the counsels of the Klosterheim authorities had been removed. Losing their influence, he had lost every prop of his own. Nor was this all; he was reproached by the general voice of the city as the original cause of a calamity which he had since shown himself impotent to redress. He it was, and his cause, which had drawn upon the people so fatally trepanned the hostility of the mysterious Masque. But for his highness, all the burgomasters, captains, city- officers, &c., would now be sleeping in their beds; whereas, the best late which could be surmised for the most of them was, that they were sleeping in dungeons; some, perhaps, in their graves. And thus the Landgrave's cause not merely lost its most efficient partisans, but, through their loss, determined the wavering against him, alienated the few who remained of his own faction, and gave strength and encouragement to the general dissatisfaction which had so long prevailed.

Thus it happened that the conspirators, or suspected conspirators, could not be brought to trial, or to punishment without a trial. Any spark of fresh irritation falling upon the present combustible temper of the populace, would not fail to produce an explosion. Fresh conspirators, and real ones, were thus encouraged to arise. The university, the city, teemed with plots. The government of the prince was exhausted with the growing labor of tracing and counteracting them. And, by little and little, matters came into such a condition, that the control of the city, though still continuing in the Landgrave's hands, was maintained by mere martial force, and at the very point of the sword. And, in no long time, it was feared, that with so general a principle of hatred to combine the populace, and so large a body of military students to head them, the balance of power, already approaching to an equipoise, would be turned against the Landgrave's government. And, in the best event, his highness could now look for nothing from their love. All might be reckoned for lost that could not be extorted by force.

This state of things had been brought about by the dreadful Masque, seconded, no doubt, by those whom he had emboldened and aroused within; and, as the climax and crowning injury of the whole, every day unfolded more and more the vast importance which Klosterheim would soon possess as the centre and key of the movements to be anticipated in the coming campaign. An electoral cap would perhaps reward the services of the Landgrave in the general pacification, if he could present himself at the German Diet as the possessor de facto of Klosterheim and her territorial dependences, and with some imperfect possession de jure; still more, if he could plead the merit of having brought over this state, so important from local situation, as a willing ally to the Swedish interest. But to this a free vote of the city was an essential preliminary; and from that, through the machinations of The Masque, he was now further than ever.

The temper of the prince began to give way under these accumulated provocations. An enemy forever aiming his blows with the deadliest effect; forever stabbing in the dark, yet charmed and consecrated from all retaliation; always met with, never to be found! The Landgrave ground his teeth, clenched his fists, with spasms of fury. lie quarrelled with his ministers; swore at the officers; cursed the sentinels; and the story went through Klosterheim that he had kicked Adorni.

Certain it was, under whatever stimulus, that Adorni put forth much more zeal at last for the apprehension of The Masque. Come what would, he publicly avowed that six days more should not elapse without the arrest of this "ruler of Klosterheim by night." He had a scheme for the purpose, a plot baited for snaring him; and he pledged his reputation as a minister and an intriguer upon its entire success.

On the following day, invitations were issued by Adorni, in his highness' name, to a masqued ball on that day week. The fashion of masqued entertainments had been recently introduced from Italy into this sequestered nook of Germany; and here, as there, it had been abused to purposes of criminal intrigue.

Spite of the extreme unpopularity of the Landgrave with the low and middle classes of the city, among the highest his little court still continued to furnish a central resort to the rank and high blood converged in such unusual proportion within the walls of Klosterheim. The schloss was still looked to as the standard and final court of appeal in all matters of taste, elegance, and high breeding. Hence it naturally happened that everybody with any claims to such an honor was anxious to receive a ticket of admission;—it became the test for ascertaining a person's pretensions to mix in the first circles of society; and with this extraordinary zeal for obtaining an admission naturally increased the minister's rigor and fastidiousness in pressing the usual investigation of the claimant's qualifications. Much offence was given on both sides, and many sneers hazarded at the minister himself, whose pretensions were supposed to be of the lowest description. But the result was, that exactly twelve hundred cards were issued; these were regularly numbered, and below the device, engraved upon the card, was impressed a seal, bearing the arms and motto of the Landgraves of X.