Down in the bottom of a bowl of forest, the lights of the little formal
town glittered in a pattern, street crossing street; away by itself on
the right, the palace was glowing like a factory.

Although he knew not Otto, one of the wood-merchants was a native of the
state. "There," said he, pointing to the palace with his whip, "there is
Jezebel's inn."

"What, do you call it that?" cried another, laughing.

"Ay that's what they call it," returned the Gruenewalder; and he broke
into a song, which the rest, as people well acquainted with the words
and air, instantly took up in chorus. Her Serene Highness Amalia
Seraphina, Princess of Gruenewald, was the heroine, Gondremark the hero
of this ballad. Shame hissed in Otto's ears. He reined up short and sat
stunned in the saddle; and the singers continued to descend the hill
without him.

The song went to a rough, swashing, popular air; and long after the
words became inaudible the swing of the music, rising and falling,
echoed insult in the Prince's brain. He fled the sounds. Hard by him on
his right a road struck towards the palace, and he followed it through
the thick shadows and branching alleys of the park. It was a busy place
on a fine summer's afternoon, when the court and burghers met and
saluted; but at that hour of the night in the early spring it was
deserted to the roosting birds. Hares rustled among the covert; here and
there a statue stood glimmering, with its eternal gesture; here and
there the echo of an imitation temple clattered ghostly to the trampling
of the mare. Ten minutes brought him to the upper end of his own home
garden, where the small stables opened, over a bridge, upon the park.
The yard clock was striking the hour of ten; so was the big bell in the
palace bell-tower; and, farther off, the belfries of the town. About the
stable all else was silent but the stamping of stalled horses and the
rattle of halters. Otto dismounted; and as he did so a memory came back
to him: a whisper of dishonest grooms and stolen corn, once heard, long
forgotten, and now recurring in the nick of opportunity. He crossed the
bridge, and, going up to a window, knocked six or seven heavy blows in a
particular cadence, and, as he did so, smiled. Presently a wicket was
opened in the gate, and a man's head appeared in the dim starlight.

"Nothing to-night," said a voice.

"Bring a lantern," said the Prince.

"Dear heart a' mercy!" cried the groom. "Who's that?"

"