about during those last pregnant days before plunging Europe into
an agony of tears and blood!--was pacing, alone, up and down a long
gallery within the palace.

His walk was agitated; there was a troubled frown upon his austere
countenance. Every now and then he paused in his walk, and withdrew
from his pocket a piece of paper, which he carefully read and
re-read, and as he did so, angry, muttered words broke from him,
and his hand flew instinctively to his sword hilt. Occasionally he
raised his eyes to the walls on either side of him, upon which hung
numerous portraits of his distinguished ancestors. He studied them
gravely, from Frederick I, Burgrave of Nuremburg, to that other
Frederick, his own father, and husband of the fair English princess
against whose country he was so shortly going to wage the most
horrible warfare that has ever been waged in the whole history of
the world!

Suddenly, from the other end of the long portrait gallery he
perceived coming towards him a shadowy female figure, dressed
entirely in white, and carrying a large bunch of keys in her hand.
She was not, this time, wearing the long flowing black veil in
which she had appeared to him a few weeks previously, but the
Emperor instantly recognized her, and the blood froze in his veins.
He stood rooted to the ground, unable to advance or to retreat,
paralysed with horror, the hair rising on his head, beads of
perspiration standing on his brow.

The figure continued to advance in his direction, slowly,
noiselessly, appearing rather to glide than to walk over the floor.
There was an expression of the deepest sadness upon her
countenance, and as she drew near to the stricken man watching her,
she held out her arms towards him, as if to enfold him. The
Emperor, his horror increasing, made a violent effort to move, but
in vain. He seemed indeed paralysed; his limbs, his muscles,
refused to obey him.

Then suddenly, just as the apparition came close up to him and he
felt, as on the former occasion when he had been visited by her,
that he was going to faint, she turned abruptly and moved away in
the direction of a small side door. This she opened with her
uncanny bunch of keys and without turning her head, disappeared.

At the exact moment of her disappearance t