Louisa of Prussia and Her Times Part 66

"I dare not censure the queen, but merely to defend and maintain etiquette, as my duty and official position require me to do. But a queen who takes lessons must descend from her throne so long as her teacher is with her; must renounce her exalted position, and obey instead of commanding. In such a case, therefore, etiquette is altogether out of the question."

"You are right," said Louisa, merrily. "Mr. Himmel, the concert-master, at least, entirely coincides with you, and he takes no notice whatever of etiquette. Shall I confess to you, my dear countess, why Mr. Himmel has run away to-day half an hour before the regular time?"

"Run away?" asked the mistress of ceremonies, in dismay. "He has dared to run away in the presence of your majesty?"

"Yes, he has dared to do so, but previously he has dared to do something a great deal worse. He has--but, dear countess, sit down; you might turn giddy."

"Oh no, your majesty, permit me to stand. Your majesty was going to communicate graciously to me what Mr. Himmel--this teacher of a queen is not even a n.o.bleman--has dared to do in the presence of your majesty."

"Well, listen to me," said the queen, smiling; and bending down closely to the ear of the countess, she whispered: "He has kissed my shoulder!"

The mistress of ceremonies uttered a piercing cry and tottered back in dismay.

"Kissed!" she faltered.

"Yes, kissed," sighed the queen; "I really believe it is still to be seen."

She walked with light, swinging steps to the large looking-gla.s.s, and looked at her shoulder with a charming, child-like smile.

"Yes, that small red spot there is Mr. Himmel's crime!" she said. "Tell me what punishment he has deserved, countess."

"That is a question for the courts alone to decide," said the mistress of ceremonies, solemnly; "for we shall bring the occurrence, of course, at once to their notice. Orders should be issued immediately to arrest him, and his punishment should be as unparalleled as was his offence.

Your majesty will permit me to repair at once to the king in order--".

"No, my dear mistress of ceremonies," said the queen, who was still standing in front of the looking gla.s.s and contemplating her own form, not with the contented looks of a conceited woman, but with the calm, stern eyes of a critic examining a work of art--"no, my dear mistress of ceremonies, we shall take good care not to raise a hue and cry about it.

And Mr. Himmel is not so culpable, after all, as he seems to be."

"What! Your majesty intends to defend him?"

"Not to defend, but to excuse him, my dear countess. He was at my side as my dear old teacher, and I was to him not a queen, but a pupil; and, moreover, a pupil with very beautiful shoulders. My dear countess, I am really more culpable than poor Himmel, for, if the queen becomes a pupil, she must remember that her teacher is a man, and she must not treat him merely as an automaton instructing her. The only judge who is able to decide this matter is my husband, the king. He shall p.r.o.nounce judgment on it, and if he permits Mr. Himmel to come back, I shall go on with my singing-lessons. However," added the queen, smiling, and blus.h.i.+ng delicately, "in future I shall wrap a shawl around my shoulders. And now, my dear countess, pray let us not mention this little affair to anybody. I shall submit it to the king and ask him to decide it."

"I shall be silent because your majesty orders me to keep the occurrence secret," sighed the countess. "But it is unheard-of, it is dreadful.

It is rank treason, and the offended royal majesty will forgive without punis.h.i.+ng."

"Oh, yes, I will!" exclaimed the queen, joyfully. "Forgiving without punis.h.i.+ng, is not that the most sacred and sublime power of a queen; is it not the most brilliant gem in our crown? How miserable and deplorable would monarchs be if G.o.d had not conferred the right of mercy upon them!

We stand ourselves so much in need of mercy and forbearance, for we commit errors and faults like other mortals, and yet we judge and punish like G.o.ds. Let us be merciful, therefore, that we may be judged mercifully."

The door of the anteroom opened at this moment, and the chamberlain-in-waiting entered.

"Your majesty," he said, "Prince Louis Ferdinand and Minister von Hardenberg beg leave to wait on your majesty."

"I expected these gentlemen at this hour," said the queen, glancing at the clock; "let them come in, therefore. And you, my dear countess, farewell."

"Your majesty orders me to withdraw?" asked the mistress of ceremonies, hesitatingly, "Etiquette requires that the queen should give her audiences only in the presence of her mistress of ceremonies, or of one of her ladies of honor."

"My dear countess," said the queen, with a slight tinge of impatience, "I am not going to give any audience, but merely to receive a friendly visit from my royal cousin and his friend; as I know it is their intention to communicate to me matters which no one except myself can hear, I shall receive them alone. Hence be so kind as to withdraw."

"His royal highness Prince Louis Ferdinand and his excellency Minister von Hardenberg!" shouted the footman, opening the folding-doors.

The queen nodded a parting greeting to the mistress of ceremonies, and advanced a few steps to meet the visitors, while the countess, heaving mournful sighs, disappeared through the side-door.

CHAPTER XLV.

THE CONFERENCE.

Prince Louis Ferdinand, a nephew of Frederick the Great, and Minister von Hardenberg, were at that time the most popular men in Prussia, because they were known to be the leaders of the party which at the court of Berlin considered the accession of Prussia to the coalition of Russia, England, and Austria, as the only means to save the country, while Minister von Haugwitz, Lombard, the first secretary of foreign affairs, and General k.o.c.keritz, constantly renewed their efforts to win the king to an alliance with France.

Prince Ferdinand, a fine looking young man, scarcely thirty years of age, in his brilliant uniform, in which his tall and n.o.ble form presented a very imposing appearance, and in which he looked like the incarnation of an heroic warrior, was consequently the special favorite of the soldiers, who told the most astonis.h.i.+ng and incredible stories about his intrepidity and hardihood. He was, besides, the favorite of the ladies, who called him the best-looking and most amiable man in the whole monarchy; and, with amiable indulgence, attributed his many adventures and acts of inconstancy, his wild and dissipated life, his extravagance and numerous debts, to the genius of the prince. He was, indeed, an extraordinary man, one of those on whose brow Providence has imprinted the stamp of genius,--not to their own good, but to their misfortune, and who either miserably perish by their genius, or constantly inflict with it the most painful wounds upon others.

Minister von Hardenberg, who now, after a long struggle, had succeeded in overcoming the influence of Minister von Haugwitz, and, with him, that of the French party, was one of those rare and extraordinary statesmen who have made diplomacy not a business, but the task of their whole life, and who have devoted to it all the strength, all the thoughts and feelings of their soul. A native of Hanover, and receiving rapid promotion at the hands of the government of that country, he had, nevertheless, soon entered the service of the Duke of Brunswick, who had charged him, after the death of Frederick the Great, to take the king's will, which had been deposited in the ducal archives at Brunswick, to Berlin. [Footnote: "Memoires d'un Homme d'Etat," vol. i., p. 202.] King Frederick William the Second, who was so sagacious as to perceive and appreciate the diplomatic talents of the young amba.s.sador, had induced him to enter his service, and intrusted to him the difficult mission of negotiating the annexation of Baireuth to Prussia, of settling the claims of the margrave, of paying the crus.h.i.+ng burden of the debts of Baireuth as speedily as possible, and of restoring the country, which had suffered so much, to its former prosperity and content. Afterward he had been appointed minister of state and war in Prussia, and since that time he had always displayed the greatest activity and zeal in serving Prussia according to the dictates of his honest conviction, but at the same time also to guard the interests of the great fatherland, the interests of Germany. The influence of France, above all, seemed to him to endanger these interests; hence he believed it to be specially inc.u.mbent upon him to preserve at least Prussia from this noxious influence and to push her over to the other side, to the side of the coalition, than to allow her to be devoured, like a poor little bird, by the French basilisk. These endeavors, which kept up a continual conflict between him and the special favorites and confidants of the king, Haugwitz and k.o.c.keritz, had gained him the love and esteem of all Prussian patriots, and secured him an extraordinary popularity. These two favorites of the Prussian people now entered the queen's cabinet.

Louisa replied to the familiar and friendly--rather than respectful--greeting of the prince with a smile and a nod, and received the respectful bow of the minister with the calm and proud dignity of a queen.

"Well, my merry and reckless cousin," she said, turning to the prince, "are there again some sins to be confessed, some neglects of discipline to be hushed up, some tears to be dried, and the mercy of the king to be implored for the extravagant freaks of our genius? And is it for that reason that you have brought along so eloquent an advocate and attorney?"

"No, your majesty," said the prince, heaving a sigh, "this time, unfortunately, I have to confess to you no merry freaks and agreeable sins, and I am afraid I am about to become a steady man, and to turn my back on all extravagant pranks. Hence, the minister has not accompanied me this time in order to defend me and to implore the gracious intercession of my royal cousin, but we have come for the purpose of repeating to your majesty Prussia's cry of anguish and distress, and of beseeching you to a.s.sist us in saving her from the ruin on the verge of which she is tottering at the present time!"

The queen looked alternately at the prince and at the minister with grave, wondering eyes. "It is a political conference, then, you wish to hold with me?" she asked; and when the two gentlemen made no reply, she continued more rapidly and in a slightly agitated voice--"in that case, gentlemen, I must request you to leave me, for I am no politician, and I do not aspire to the role of a political intriguer. I am the wife of the reigning king, but not a reigning queen; my sole endeavor is to render the king a happy husband at home, and to cause him to forget at my side politics and the vexations of his official position."

"I am afraid, your majesty," said Minister von Hardenberg, solemnly--"I am afraid the time for such an idol on the throne is past; and instead of causing the king to forget the vexations of his position, it will now be the great task of your majesty to bear them with him."

"And we have come to beg my n.o.ble and magnanimous cousin to do so,"

exclaimed the prince, enthusiastically. "We have come to implore your a.s.sistance and cooperation in the name of Prussia, in the name of all German patriots, and in the name of your children!"

"In the name of my children?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the queen, turning pale.

"Speak! speak! what has happened? what calamity threatens my children?

I decline listening to you as a queen, but I will do so as a mother, who anxiously desires to secure the happiness of her children. What evils, what calamities do you refer to?"

"The independence, nay, perhaps the whole existence of Prussia, is menaced," said Minister von Hardenberg, solemnly. "We have to choose whether Prussia is to be an isolated state, shunned by everybody, and despised by everybody--a state which France will be able to devour with impunity and amid the jeers of the whole world, as she has devoured Italy, Holland, and the left bank of the Rhine--or whether Prussia will preserve her power, her independence, and her honor, by not staving off a division any longer, but meeting her friends as well as her enemies with open visor, and by a.s.suming at length an active and resolute att.i.tude instead of the vacillating and hesitating course she has so long pursued!"

"We ought to oppose the Emperor of France in a manly manner," exclaimed the prince, energetically. "If we do not interfere with his proceedings, he will soon be our master as he is of all those who call themselves his allies, and who are really nothing but his slaves. My heart kindles with rage when I now see all Germany trembling with fear before this son of a Corsican lawyer, this tyrant who a.s.sa.s.sinated the n.o.ble and innocent Duke d'Enghien, and who, not contenting himself with chaining France, would like to catch the whole world in his imperial mantle so as to fatten its golden bees on it. And he will succeed in doing so, unless we resist him, for his word is now already the law of half the world, and this emperor carries out whatever he wants to do. Truly, if he should feel some day a hankering for a dish of princes' ears, I should no longer deem my own ears safe, nor those of your young princes either!"

[Footnote: Prince Louis Ferdinand said this to the queen.--Vide "Rahel and her Friends," vol. i.]

The queen did not smile at this jest which the prince had uttered in an angry voice, but she turned once more with a grave and anxious air to the minister.

"Tell me, has any thing occurred?" she asked. "Has there been a change in the political situation?"

"Yes, your majesty," replied the minister, "there has been a change in the political situation; the Emperor Napoleon has dared to violate our neutrality, and if Prussia should not now demand satisfaction she either loses her honor, or she places herself before the whole world as the ally of France, and defies thereby the open hostility of Austria, Russia, and England."

"You dare to say that Prussia's honor has been attacked, and to doubt that the king will hold the offender responsible for such an outrage?"

exclaimed the queen, with flas.h.i.+ng eyes. "The king, who is the incarnation of honor, will not permit even the shadow of a stain to fall on Prussia's honor; in generous anger he will hurl back the insolent hand that will dare to shake the palladium of our honor."

"Oh, if you think and speak thus," said the prince, enthusiastically, "I have no longer any fears, but consider Prussia as saved already from the dangers now menacing her. As I see your majesty now, in your wondrous beauty, with those eyes reflecting your inward heaven, with this face so radiant with enthusiasm, you seem to be the genius whom Providence has sent to Prussia to guard and protect her, and to guide her on the right path and to the right goal. O, queen! fulfil the mission which Providence has intrusted to you; follow your n.o.ble and sacred vocation; be the genius of Prussia; and impart to the vacillating and timid, firm, manly courage and energetic resolution! Queen, I implore you, on my knees, have pity on Prussia, have pity on your children: be the genius of Prussia!"

And quite beside himself, his eyes filled with tears, his lips quivering with emotion, the prince knelt down before the queen and raised his folded hands imploringly to her.