thing unmanly in the cruelty that replied to her supplication in
favour of her country, by trifling allusions to the last fashions of
Paris, and the costumes of the Boulevard; and when she accepted the
moss-rose from his hand, and tremblingly uttered the words--"Sire, avec
Magde-bourg?"--a more suitable rejection of her suit might have been
found, than the abrupt "Non!" of Napoleon, as he turned his back and
left her. There was something prophetic in her speech, when relating the
anecdote herself to Hardenberg, she added--

"That man is too pitiless to misfortune, ever to support it himself,
should it be his lot!"

But what mean all these reflections, Arthur? These be matters of
history, which the world knows as well, or better than thyself. "Que
diable allez-vous faire dans cette galere?" Alas! this comes of
supping in the Speiss Saal of the "Kaiser," and chatting with the great
round-faced Prussian in uniform, at the head of the table; he was a
lieutenant of the guard at Tilsit, and also at Erfurt with despatches
in 1808; he had a hundred pleasant stories of the fetes, and the droll
mistakes the body-guard of the Czar used to fall into, by ignorance of
the habits and customs of civilized life, They were Bashkirs, and always
bivouacked in the open street before the Emperor's quarters, and spent
the whole night through chanting a wild and savage song, which some
took up, as others slept, and when day broke, the whole concluded with a
dance, which, from the description I had of it, must have been something
of the most uncouth and fearful that could be conceived.

Napoleon admired those fellows greatly, and more than one among them
left Erfurt with the cross of the Legion at his breast.

Tired and weary, as I was, I sat up long past midnight, listening to
the Prussian, who rolled out his reminiscences between huge volumes of
smoke, in the most amusing fashion. And when I did retire to rest,
it was to fall into a fearful dream about Bashkirs and bastions;
half-moons, hot shot, and bomb-proofs, that never left me till morning
broke.

"The Rittmeister von Otterstadt presents his compliments," said the
waiter, awakening me from a heavy sleep--"presents his compliments---"

"Who?" cried I, with a shudder.

"The Rittmeister von Otterstadt, who promised to show you the fortress."

"I'm ill,--seriously ill," said I, "I should not be surprised if it were
a fever."

"Probably so," echoed the immovable German, and went on