rds or attendants. Three of the conspirators approached the
castle at five in the evening. They were armed with carbines, and,
having placed themselves in ambush near the King's apartment on the
ground-floor, were awaiting an opportunity to kill their sovereign.
Gustavus coming in from a long walk, went in his dressing-gown to sit
in the library, the windows of which opened like doors into the garden.
He fell asleep in his armchair. Whether they were alarmed by the sound
of footsteps, or whether the contrast between the slumber of the
unsuspicious King and the death poising above his head awakened {38}
some remorse, the assassins once more abandoned their meditated crime.

Weary of the attempts they had been planning for six months, and which
never came to anything, the conspirators might possibly have given them
up altogether if a circumstance which they considered providential had
not come to rekindle their regicidal zeal. The last masked ball of the
season was to be given in the Opera-house on the night of March 16-17,
and it was known that Gustavus would be present. To strike the monarch
in the midst of the festival, in order to chastise him for his love of
pleasure, was an idea which charmed the assassins. Moreover, the mask
alone could embolden them; they thought that if the august victim were
enveloped in a domino they need no longer dread that royal prestige
which had more than once caused them to recoil.

Gustavus was counselled to be on his guard. The young Count Louis de
Bouille, who was then at Stockholm, and who had been informed by a
letter from Germany that the King was about to be assassinated, begged
him to profit by the warnings reaching him from every quarter.
Gustavus replied that he would rather go blindly to meet his fate than
torment himself with the numberless precautions which such suspicions
would demand. "If I listened," added he, "to all the advice I receive,
I could not even drink a glass of water; besides, I am far from
believing in the execution of such a plot. {39} My subjects, although
very brave in war, are extremely timid in politics. The successes I
expect to gain in France, the trophies of which I shall bring back to
Stockholm, will speedily augment my power by the confidence and general
respect which will be their result."

Meantime the fatal hour was approaching. The masked ball of March 16
was about to open. Before going there, Gustavus took supper with a few
of the