raining; if that continues the Elbe may be played out in
a week or two, and then. * * * Still no news whatever about the Landtag.
Most cordial greetings and assurances of my love to your parents, and
the former--the latter, too, if you like--to all your cousins, women
friends, etc. What have you done with Aennchen?[7] My forgetting the
Versin letters disturbs me; I did not mean to make such a bad job of it.
Have they been found Farewell, my treasure, my heart, consolation of my
eyes.

Your faithful BISMARCK.

Another picture, a description of a storm in the Alps, which catches
my eye as I turn over the pages of the book, and pleases me much:

"The sky is changed, and such a change! O night,
And storm, and darkness, ye are wondrous strong,
Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light
Of a dark eye in woman! Far along
From peak to peak, the rattling crags among,
Leaps the live thunder; not from one lone cloud,
But every mountain now has found a tongue,
And Jura answers through her misty shroud--
Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud.

And this is in the night:--most glorious night!
Thou wert not sent for slumber! let me be
A sharer in thy fierce and fair delight--
A portion of the tempest and of thee!
How the lit lake shines, a phosphoric sea,
And the big rain comes dancing to the earth!
And now again 'tis black, and now the glee
Of the loud hills shakes with its mountain-mirth,
As if they did rejoice o'er a young earthquake's birth."

On such a night the suggestion comes uncommonly near to me that I wish
to be _a sharer in the delight, a portion of tempest, of night_;[8]
mounted on a runaway horse, to dash down the cliffs into the falls of
the Rhine, or something similar. A pleasure of that kind,
unfortunately, one can enjoy but once in this life. There is something
intoxicating in nocturnal storms. Your nights, dearest, I hope you
regard, however, as _sent for slumber, not for writing_.[9] I see with
regret that I write English still more illegibly than German. Once
more, farewell, my heart. Tomorrow noon I am invited to be the guest
of Frau Brauchitsch, presumably so that I may be duly and thoroughly
questioned about you and yours. I'll tell them as much as I please.
_Je t'embrasse mille fois._

Your own

B.

Schoenhausen, February 7, '47.

_My Heart_,--Just returned through a wild, drifting snow-storm from an
appointment (which unfortunately was occasio