is large light
eyes from his plate for a moment, and with a mouth still filled with
a leg and wing of a capercailzie, enquired--

"What do you think of Alexander the Great, madam?"

This was too much. Even her rage disappeared, and she burst into a
loud laugh at the serious face of the querist.

"I never think of Alexander the Great at all," she said. "I only
recollect, that when I was reading his history, I could hardly make
out whether he was most of a fool or a madman."

Ericson swallowed the leg and the wing of the capercailzie without any
further mastication, and launched out in a torrent of admiration of
the most prodigious courage the world had ever seen.

"If he had been as prodigiously wise," replied Christina, "as he was
prodigiously courageous, he would have learned to govern himself
before he attempted to govern the world."

Ericson blushed from chin to forehead with vexation, and answered in
an offended tone--

"How can a woman enter into the fever of noble thoughts that impels a
brave man to rush into the midst of dangers, and leads him to despise
life and all its petty enjoyments to gain undying fame?"

"No, indeed," she replied, "I have no fever, and have no sympathy with
destroyers. Oh, if I wished for fame, I should try to gain it by
gathering round me the blessings of all who saw me! Yes, father," she
went on, paying no regard to the signs and winks of the agonized Count
Gyllenborg, "I would rather that countless thousands should live to
bless me, than that they should die in heaping curses on my name!
Men-killers--though you dignify them with the name of heroes--are
atrocious. Let us speak of them, my lord, no more, unless to pray
heaven to rid the earth of such monsters."

A feather of the smallest of birds would have knocked down the Prime
Minister of Sweden; and Count Ericson appeared, from his stupefied
look, to have gone through the process already--the difficulty was to
lift him up again.

"Come, Count," cried the Minister, filling up Ericson's glass with
champagne, "to Alexander's glory!"

"With all my heart," cried Ericson, moistening his rage with the
delicious sparkler. "Come, fair savage," he added, addressing
Christina, and touching her glass with such force that it fell in a
thousand pieces on the table--"to Alexander's glory!"

"I have no wish to drink to such a toast," replied Christina, more
offended than ever; "I can't endure those scourges of human kind who
hide the