The Youth of the Great Elector Part 27

"But he is here now, my husband, he is actually here now. Only see what a good, affectionate son he is! He has halted at the inn of the Spandow suburb, merely to forewarn us of his arrival. It was not enough for him that he had sent us a messenger with a verbal communication, no, he must send us a written salutation, and such kind, cordial words as he has written. There, read, my husband, just read!"

She handed the paper to the Elector, but he did not take it.

"Is the letter directed to me?" he asked.

"No, to me, to his mother he wrote, because he knew how happy it would make me, and how heartily I love him. Read, George!"

"I never read letters that are not directed to myself," said the Elector, turning away.

"Well, then, I will read it to you!" cried the Electress, who in the fullness of her joy heeded as little the ill humor of the Elector as she did the presence of Count Schwarzenberg, who upon her entrance had modestly withdrawn to one of the deep window recesses. "Yes, I will read it to you," she repeated, "for you must hear what our son writes."

And with a voice trembling from joy and agitation she read:

"My gracious, revered Mother: Before I enter my dear birthplace and return home to my beloved parents and sisters, I would announce my arrival to your highnesses, that you may not be alarmed by my unexpected coming, and that I may not come inopportunely to his grace, my father. I enjoy greatly getting home, and all the testimonials of love and sympathy which I have received ever since I set foot within my father's territories, and they will remain indelibly graven on my heart. I beg your grace to present my most submissive respects to my gracious father and Elector, and to speak a good word for me to him, that his grace may no longer cherish resentment against me on account of my long stay abroad, and that he may favorably incline toward and receive me, and be convinced that I am and shall ever remain the grateful and obedient son of my venerated parents.

"FREDERICK WILLIAM."

"Well" asked the Electress, "are not those affectionate, glorious words, and does not your fatherly heart rejoice in them? But just hear, hear, how they shout and hurrah! It is the good people of Berlin! They are coming to the palace to see our son!"

Again was the door through which the Electress had entered violently thrown open, and two young ladies entered. Their lovely and blooming faces beamed with happiness and their eyes glistened with joy.

"He comes! Our brother is coming!" they cried, rus.h.i.+ng forward toward their parents. "Just come to the window, that we may see him, for he is riding around the corner into the pleasure garden"

"Are you all, then, wholly beside yourselves, and gone stark mad?" cried the Elector pa.s.sionately, while he rose from his armchair and proudly drew himself up. "Who gives these two young ladies the privilege of entering my cabinet thus, unannounced and without ceremony? Just answer me one thing, Miss Charlotte Louise, did I permit you to come here?"

"No, dearest father," said the Princess timidly, casting down her large, dark eyes, "no, your grace has not indeed permitted us to do so, but we did not think of that in the joy of our hearts, and because from here is the best lookout upon the pleasure grounds, we--"

"We thought," interrupted the younger sister, who had hardly attained her fifteenth year--"we thought our dear papa, his Electoral Grace, would forgive us and look out with us to catch a sight of our beloved brother.

And were we not right, dear papa, were we mistaken in thinking so, and will your grace not allow your little Sophie Hedwig to lead you to the great corner window, that with mamma you may have a view of dear Frederick William?"

The Princess had approached her father, and, tenderly and coaxingly stroking his cheeks with her little white hand, looked up at him with such a gentle, pleading glance in her blue eyes as George William had never hitherto been known to resist. But this time the eyes of his favorite had no power over the Elector's heart, and indignantly he repelled her encircling arms.

"Let me alone with your 'dear Frederick William,' you saucy piece!" cried he pa.s.sionately. "You should at all events have waited until I had given you leave to appear here. If, in your childish giddiness, you knew no better, yet your sister Charlotte Louise, at the more mature age of twenty, ought to have arrived at years of discretion, and known what was proper."

"No one knows better what is becoming than the fair young Princess Charlotte Louise, most gracious sir," said Count Adam Schwarzenberg, issuing from the window recess and greeting the Princess with a reverential bow. "In the whole country the Electoral Princess is honored as a brilliant model of fine manners and n.o.ble demeanor, and every one feels himself blessed and honored who is permitted to approach her. And is not the young lady right even now, dear sir, in coming here with her young sister? It is surely proper and well for the united Electoral family to be seen by the nation as they look upon the dear son and brother, whose return gladdens their hearts?"

"Well, for aught I care, she may be right," muttered the Elector, "and I will grant my wife and daughters leave to look out of the corner window.

But, meanwhile, where is the Electress?"

"Her grace is standing there before the corner window and gazing down so earnestly upon the square that I have not yet been so fortunate as to be allowed to pay my respects to her highness."

"For if the whole world had been a.s.sembled together she would have seen nothing but the Electoral Prince," called out the Elector, shrugging his shoulders. "Go to her, Adam, and present my compliments to her. Tell her that I resign my cabinet to her and my daughters, and will withdraw into my sleeping apartment until this uproar has subsided."

"Oh, do not do so, most honored father," cried the younger Princess. "Stay here, and look out of the window with us."

"Do so, your Electoral Highness," pleaded the count, softly and quickly.

"Grant the people the light of your countenance."

"Well, so be it, then," sighed George William. "Call the servants, Charlotte Louise, that they may roll me to the window."

"As if I could not have the privilege of acting as servant to your highness, and as if my arm were not strong enough to guide your highness's chair. Permit me, gracious sir, to roll you to the window."

"And permit me to help your excellency," said Princess Charlotte Louise, smiling, while she seized one of the arms of the fauteuil.

"Now truly this is a very lofty equipage," cried George William, as the fauteuil rolled along through the s.p.a.cious apartment. "The Stadtholder in the Mark and a Princess of the blood drawing my equipage."

"But what a man sits in it!" said Count Schwarzenberg. "A duke of Prussia, of Pomerania, of Cleves, an Elector of Brandenburg, and--"

"Hurrah, hurrah!" sounded up from below in a chorus of hundreds of voices.

"Hurrah! long live the Electoral Prince!"

"He comes! Oh, my son, my son!" cried the Electress. "He comes! George, our son--"

She had turned round and her eye met the count's gaze, who immediately bowed low and reverentially before her. The Electress only thanked him with a slight nod of her head, and herself sprang forward to push the fauteuil into the window niche. Then, with trembling hands, she opened both window shutters and beckoned her daughters to her side.

"He must see us all, _all_" she said. "With one glance he must take in father, mother, and sisters."

"And my most faithful and best-beloved servant, the Stadtholder in the Mark!" cried the Elector. "Come, Adam, place yourself close beside me, that the picture may be complete, and my son may see us all at once."

Boundless public rejoicings seemed to be in progress below; a loud, long-sustained, ever-renewed cheering rolled over the square like the roar of the sea.

"My son, my beloved son!" cried the Electress, leaning far out of the window and stretching out both arms toward the young man, who had just emerged from the shrubbery, on horseback and followed by a brilliant train.

"Brother, dear brother!" called out the two Princesses, leaning out of the other side of the window, and waving their handkerchiefs in token of welcome. Behind them sat the Elector in his great armchair, quite forgotten and quite hidden from view by his wife and daughters, not at all visible to either the people or his son.

"I shall remember this hour, oh! to be sure, I shall remember it," he said, with trembling lips; "my son shall atone to me for this hour of shame and mortification. I--"

The huzzaing and shouting below drowned his words; they came pouring in at the open window like the pealing tones of an organ, like the roar of the sea, like claps of thunder.

The Elector could no longer bear it. He looked up with glances of entreaty at the count, who, drawn up to his full height, stood proud and commanding at the side of his chair, his sharp eyes piercing down into the court over the ladies' heads.

"Ah, Adam," sighed George William, "you, too, have forgotten me, and are only looking upon him who is coming!"

But, however softly these words had been spoken, the count heard them, and tenderly he leaned over the Elector, and seized his hand to kiss it.

"I am looking at the newcomer," he whispered, "but I never forget you, and my heart can never be unmindful of the love and fidelity it owes you."

"Hurrah! Long live the Electoral Prince!" was borne up in tumultuous uproar from the pleasure garden. "Long live the Electoral Prince! Long live the Elector! Hurrah for the Elector George William!"

"They are calling for you, my husband, they call for you!" said the Electress. "Will you not show yourself to our dear people?"

"I ought, indeed, to be thankful to the dear people," returned her husband. "The dear people have at least reminded the Electress that I still exist, although she had crowded me back and rendered me entirely invisible behind her. Yes, I will show myself to the people, as they still think of me in the midst of their merriment. Step back from the window, ladies, make room for your Elector and lord! And you, Count Schwarzenberg, come and give me your arm; I would lean upon you!"

The count willingly offered the Elector his arm. Powerfully drawn up by him, the Elector rose from his seat, and, leaning upon his favorite, stepped close up to the window. The shouts of joy were for a moment hushed; perhaps because the Electoral Prince had just ridden into the palace yard, perhaps because the ladies' retreat from the window was considered by the people a sign that the Elector was about to appear. And now, within the window frame, was seen the clumsy, broad figure of the Elector; now was seen his large head, spa.r.s.ely covered with gray hairs, his pale, swollen face, prematurely old, with its melancholy blue eyes and thin, colorless lips, round which played not the slightest smile. In the handsome, powerful, and youthful Electoral Prince the people had just joyfully greeted Brandenburg's future, and now from the window of that gray, gloomy, wretched old palace looked out upon them the hopelessness of Brandenburg's present. Like gazing upon embodied care and joyless resignation it was, to behold the Elector's grave, forbidding aspect, and before it the joyous cry upon the people's lips was silenced. They stared up at the window in dumb horror, and only here and there sounded cries from compa.s.sionate or bribed mouths: "Long live the Elector! Long live George William!" And like a dying echo came back the answer on this side and on that, feebly and slowly: "Long live the Elector! Long live George William!"

But now the people caught sight of the tall, stately form, in gold embroidered velvet suit, with the star of brilliants glittering on its breast, which stood beside the Elector; now they recognized that haughty countenance with its glance of sovereign contempt, its smile of lofty condescension upon the thin, scornful lips, and a disturbance was perceptible among the mult.i.tudes, as when a sudden gust of wind agitates the waves of the sea and lashes them up into fury and rage. All at once there came thundering up to the window, shrieked, howled, and hissed by the crowd: "Down with the Catholics! Down with Schwarzenberg! Down with the Imperialist!"

A deep flush overspread the Elector's face. He hastily stepped back from the window, and looked almost timidly up at the count, whose countenance meanwhile had not for a moment lost its proud, smiling serenity. He seemed not to have heard the screams of the mob.