Part 42 (1/2)

No quarter give, but strike the fatal blow, Dear let your life-blood be; Ask not for mercy, and to none bestow, For death makes all men free.

This whole scene is based on facts, for which I am indebted to personal communications from the Countess Ahlefeldt. Theodore Korner fell in the first year of the war of liberation, before the decisive battle of Leipsic, on the 26th of August, 1813, in a skirmish which the corps of Major von Lutzow had with the French near Gadebusch.

Only an hour prior to his death, while lying in ambush, he wrote his immortal ”Song of the Sword” in his note-book. The statement of Mr.

Alison, the historian, that he was killed in the battle of Dresden, is erroneous.

Leonora Prohaska fell in an engagement on the Gorde, the 16th of September, 1813. A bullet pierced her breast. When she felt that she was dying, she revealed to her comrades that she was a woman, and that her name was Leonora Prohaska, and not Charles Renz.

Caroline Peters was more fortunate. She partic.i.p.ated in the campaigns of 1813 and 1814, was decorated with the order of the Iron Cross on account of her bravery, and honorably discharged at the end of the war. She was then married to the captain of an English vessel whom she accompanied on his travels, and with whom she visited her relatives at Stettin in 1844.--L. M.]

CHAPTER XXVIII.

THE GENERAL-IN-CHIEF OF THE SILESIAN ARMY.

General Blucher was more morose and dejected than he had been for a long time. From the day he heard of the king's arrival at Breslau, and immediately left his farm of Kunzendorf to repair to that city, a perpetual suns.h.i.+ne lit up his face, and a new spring bloomed in his heart. But now the old clouds of Kunzendorf were again lowering on his brow, and a frost seemed to have blighted all the blossoms of his hope.

He sat on the sofa, closely wrapped in his dressing-gown, drumming with his hand a quickstep on the table in front of him, while he was blowing clouds of smoke from his long pipe. Very gloomy thoughts appeared to fill Blucher's soul, for his bushy eyebrows contracted, the quickstep was more rapid, and the smoke arose in denser ma.s.ses.

In the violence of his inward trouble, he grimly shook his head without thinking of the fragile friend in his mouth. Its delicate form struck against the corner of the table and broke into pieces.

”So,” muttered Blucher to himself, ”that was just wanting to my afflictions. It is the second pipe broken to-day. Well, there will be a day when Bonaparte shall pay me these pipes that he has already cost me. That day must come, or there is no justice in Heaven.

Christian! O Christian!”

The door opened. Christian Hennemann appeared on the threshold, awaiting the orders of the general.

”Another wounded pipe, Christian,” said Blucher, pointing at the pieces on the floor. ”Pick them up, and see if there is not a short pipe among them.”

”No, your excellency,” said Christian, approaching and carefully picking up the pieces, ”that is no wounded pipe, but a dead one.

Shall I fetch another to your excellency?”

He was about to turn away, but Blucher seized the lap of his hussar- jacket. ”Show me the broken pipe,” he said, anxiously; ”let me see if it really will not do any more.”

”Well, look at it, your excellency,” said the pipe-master, in a dignified tone, holding up the bowl with a very small part of the tube. ”It is impossible for you to use it again. If I should fill the bowl with tobacco and light it, your excellency, it would a.s.suredly burn your nose.”

”That is true,” said Blucher, mournfully; ”I believe you are right.

I might burn my nose, and that would be altogether unnecessary now.

I burn it here at Breslau every day.”

”How did you do it?” asked Christian, in dismay. ”Your excellency has not yet smoked short pipes.”

”Because I am myself like a short pipe,” cried Blucher, with a grim smile, ”or because the miserable, sneaking vermin at court--well, what does it concern you? Why do you stand and stare at me? Go, Christian, and fetch me a new Pipe.”

”What, a new pipe!” asked a voice by his side. ”Why, Blucher, you are still in your dressing-gown!”

It was his wife who had just entered the room by the side-door and approached her husband without being noticed. She was in full toilet, her head adorned with plumes, her delicate form wrapped in a heavy dark satin dress, trimmed with costly silver lace. Her neck and ears were ornamented with jewelry in which large diamonds shone; in her hand, radiant with valuable rings, she held a huge fan, inlaid with pearls and precious stones.

”Yes, Amelia, I am still in my dressing-gown,” said Blucher, gloomily gazing at his wife. ”Why, you are splendidly dressed to- day! What is it for?--and whither do you design to go?”

”Whither!” exclaimed the lady, in surprise. ”But, husband, do you forget, then, the festival to take place to-night?”