ction of the
history of his imperial inheritance: an emperor of Liparia murdered
centuries ago by one of his favourites at a court festival. Revolutions
in other countries of Europe, the French revolution, flickered up with a
blood-red reflection; the strikes in the quick-silver mines of the
eastern provinces grinned at him out of them, out of the clouds, the
world of clouds storming through his thoughts.... And so many more, so
many more, all so rapid, with the rapidity of their lightning-flashes;
he could not grasp them, the ruddy lightning-flashes; it all just
flickered through him and then away: it flickered away, far away!... And
it seemed strange to him that he was sitting there, in his mother's
drawing-room, with the stately park swarming behind the plate-glass
windows, with tints of old, medieval gold-leather, now, in the lowered
gleam of the sun-rays; with his mother opposite him, so sweet, so
daintily gentle in the intimacy of this short, uninterrupted meeting:
his cousin talking and his sister replying and the little
lady-in-waiting listening with a smile.... How strange to sit like this,
so easily, so peacefully, so serenely, in the seclusion of their palace,
as though Liparia were not shaking like an old, crazy tower!... Yes,
they were talking about the crisis, Herman and Thera, but what did
talking amount to? Words, nothing but words! Why this endless stringing
together of words, beautiful, empty words, which a sovereign is obliged
to string together and then utter to his subjects, now on this occasion,
now on that? No, no, they were not in his province, speeches! For what,
after all, were they supposed to express, this or that? What was right,
what was just, what was right and just for their empire, this or that?
How could one know, how could one be certain, how could one avoid
hesitating, seeking, groping, blind-folded? Even if he had a thousand
eyes all over the empire, would he be able to see everything that might
happen? And, if he were omniscient, would he always be able to know what
would be right? The constitution: was it good for a country to have a
constitution or not? In Russia: was it good in Russia? A republic: would
a republic be better? And who was right? Was his father right in wanting
to reign as an absolute monarch, with his hereditary house of peers, in
which he, Othomar, now recalled his admission, as Duke of Xara, at his
eighteenth year, with the ducal crown and the robes and chain of th