"

wished to the speculations of the censorious.-Nay, Baroness," said the Empress, taking her hand, as she saw the tears gathering in her eyes, "I would not distress or agitate you, but you are young, and I would guard you."

"Alas, Madam! that scene has lowered me in your Majesty's opinion; yet was it forced upon me, and no effort of mine could have rescued me from it."

"Will you answer me to one point, - Baroness: when Wolfstein compelled you to the performance of that scene, was it the first hour of agitation that ever passed between you?-and did you not, at no distant period, smile on the chevalier?Come, Baroness, your silence is ingenuous I will not urge you to speak-but all this strengthens my hope, that you are destined to make Wolfstein good, and he is destined to make you happy."

That their union was written on the page of destiny the Lady of Marchfeldt implicitly believed; but her presages

were less bright than those of her august mistress: she had had sorrowful experience of his talent for dissembling: she had no direct cause to suppose that she was the object of his present manœuvre, for he kept modestly aloof, and it was only through the medium of a timid bow that he attempted to remind her of his presence; yet was she possessed with an internal conviction that he was, spiderlike, spinning at a distance from his victim that web, in the centre whereof she would ultimately find herself entangled.

CHAPTER II.

"Ego, et Rex meus."

WITHIN the stipulated time arrived Lindau's commission, and as the army was already in motion, an order to take the immediate command of his regiment came with it. Indeed, so general was the infection of military ardour, that all the young courtiers, to the very pages of the Emperor, entreated to exchange their peaceful service for one in which peril and glory were united. All things were in preparation for a tremendous struggle, and the Duke of Friedland loudly declared that the eventful moment was at hand which must decide whether Gustavus or he should command the world. The very first steps of this great man on his resumption of power revived the hopes of the Emperor, and checked the advances

of the enemy: the Swedish hero no longer found his campaign a mere rapid, unobstructed march; he must now wrestle hard for every inch of ground: yet Ferdinand could not, while he exulted in the happy change in his affairs, help reflecting with mortification on the extravagant price at which he had bought his haughty general's return to service.-The entire and unconditional command, not only of the imperial troops, but of the Spanish allies; the levying contributions and sub

*

* Waldstein had learned by experience the difficulty of maintaining such an elevation as that to which he was about to be raised, and adopted every expedient to prevent a second dismission. Amidst all his eagerness for command he affected an indifference and reluctance which enabled him to enhance his terms, and impose more effectual shackles on his sovereign. Notwithstanding the invitation of the Emperor, he refused to repair to court, but advanced to Znaim, in Moravia, with a view to facilitate his arrangements. He indignantly rejected the proposal to command under the Archduke Ferdinand, with the impious declaration, that he would not serve under God himself.-Coxe's Hist. of the House of Austria, vol. i. part 2. chap. liv. page 869.

sidies at his own free and unquestioned discretion; and when the Emperor proposed that the Archduke, his eldest son, might have the nominal command, the brief and impious reply of this most presumptuous man was, "I will not serve even under God." The Duke of Friedland's mind had undergone a wonderful change during the period of his short retirement; he looked on the temporary disgrace as a mere necessary link in the chain of his destiny, yet he resented it deeply, bitterly, and eternally.-From the hour when he disbanded his army all faith and trust in his fellow creatures was renounced, and he adopted, and pertinaciously maintained, the idea, that mankind could only be securely bound by awe and apprehension :-from the highest to the lowest of his dependants, from the sovereign who courted his aid to the centinel who kept watch at his door, this stern and melancholy theory invariably governed his practice. Fer