ve had women at
their elbows. Madame de Pompadour was ill served; she had not found her
Gondremark; but what a mighty politician! Catherine de' Medici, too,
what justice of sight, what readiness of means, what elasticity against
defeat! But alas! madam, her Featherheads were her own children; and she
had that one touch of vulgarity, that one trait of the good-wife, that
she suffered family ties and affections to confine her liberty."

These singular views of history, strictly _ad usum Seraphinae_, did not
weave their usual soothing spell over the Princess. It was plain that
she had taken a momentary distaste to her own resolutions; for she
continued to oppose her counsellor, looking upon him out of half-closed
eyes and with the shadow of a sneer upon her lips. "What boys men are!"
she said; "what lovers of big words! Courage, indeed! If you had to
scour pans, Herr von Gondremark, you would call it, I suppose, Domestic
Courage?"

"I would, madam," said the Baron stoutly, "if I scoured them well. I
would put a good name upon a virtue; you will not overdo it; they are
not so enchanting in themselves."

"Well, but let me see," she said. "I wish to understand your courage.
Why we asked leave, like children! Our grannie in Berlin, our uncle in
Vienna, the whole family, have patted us on the head and sent us
forward. Courage? I wonder when I hear you!"

"My Princess is unlike herself," returned the Baron. "She has forgotten
where the peril lies. True, we have received encouragement on every
hand; but my Princess knows too well on what untenable conditions; and
she knows besides how, in the publicity of the diet, these whispered
conferences are forgotten and disowned. The danger is very real"--he
raged inwardly at having to blow the very coal he had been
quenching--"none the less real in that it is not precisely military, but
for that reason the easier to be faced. Had we to count upon your
troops, although I share your Highness's expectations of the conduct of
Alvenau, we cannot forget that he has not been proved in chief command.
But where negotiation is concerned, the conduct lies with us; and with
your help, I laugh at danger."

"It may be so," said Seraphina, sighing. "It is elsewhere that I see
danger. The people, these abominable people--suppose they should
instantly rebel? What a figure we should make in the eyes of Europe to
have undertaken an invasion while my own throne was tottering to its
fall!"

"Nay, mada