of Prussia."

"And now, marquis," said the king, "we will visit my library, and then
we will repose ourselves that we may enjoy our meal. In the evening I
invite you to the concert. My musicians are coming from Berlin, and we
will see if my lips, which have been accustomed so long to rough words
of discipline, are capable of producing a few sweet notes from my
flute."

Thus speaking, the king took the arm of the marquis, and they passed
slowly through the room, whose desolate silence made them both sad.

"The world is nothing more than a great, gaping grave, on the brink of
which we walk with wild courage," said the king, softly. "There is no
moment that some one does not stumble at our side and fall into the
abyss, and we have the courage to continue in the path until our
strength fails and we sink, making room for another. Almost all of those
who formerly occupied these rooms have vanished. How long will it be ere
I shall follow them?"

"May that wretched moment be very distant!" exclaimed D'Argens, with a
trembling voice. "Your majesty is still so young and full of life--you
have nothing to do with death."

"No," said the king; "I am very old, for I have become indifferent to
the world. Things which would have deeply distressed me formerly, now
pass unheeded over my soul. I assure you, marquis, I have made great
progress in practical philosophy. I am old; I stand at the limits of
life, and my soul is freeing itself from this world, which, it is to be
hoped, I will soon leave."

"Ah, sire," said D'Argens, smiling, "you are ten years younger than I
am, and each time that you speak of your rapidly advancing age, I ask
myself how it is possible that a man so much younger than I should
complain of old age. Only wait, sire; here, in the quiet of Sans-Souci,
in a few months you will feel ten and I fifteen years younger. In the
happiness and comforts of our existence, you will live to the age of
Abraham and I to that of Jacob."

"But I am much older than you, marquis. During the last seven years, I
have had nothing but destroyed hopes, undeserved misfortunes, in short,
all that the caprice of Fortune could discover to distress me. After
such experiences it is allowable, when one is fifty years old, to say
that he is old, that he will no longer be the play-thing of Fortune,
that he renounces ambition and all those follies which are merely the
illusions of inexperienced youth. But no more of these sad thoughts,
for he