It was while the children were in charge of Marianne that something very important happened at the town of Tilsit, on the river Niemen.

On that twenty-fifth day of June, in the dreadful year of 1807, all the people of the place were gathered on the river banks in high excitement. Actually their faces looked joyful, a thing which had not happened since Napoleon had entered Prussia.

"Now we shall have peace. Congratulations!" they exclaimed one to the other, gazing at a raft gay with flags, anchored midway between the shores of the river.

"They have bought every bright rag in Tilsit," said a fat, jolly-faced merchant, nodding in congratulation.

"Ach ja," returned a friend, "God be praised! It is many a day since there has been selling in Prussia."

Then, "Look! look! Napoleon! Napoleon!" as a man, heavy now to fatness, stepped into a boat most gorgeously decorated.

"The monster! the upstart!" muttered the people. But that was of no concern to the conqueror, whose eyes wandered restlessly from shore to shore and whose mouth pressed its lips to cruel firmness. Behind him followed marshals and generals, gay in scarlet, gold, and white, and blue.

A boat decorated with the colours of France awaited their coming.

"The Czar!" cried the people, as a second cavalcade approached. "Our ally, Alexander!"

There was no handsomer man in Europe. Tall, majestic in appearance, in every way a contrast to Napoleon, the ruler of Russia approached a second boat, opposite Napoleon's, and brilliant with yellow and black. The monarch was followed by his brother, Grand Duke Constantine, by his generals and many Russian lords.

At a signal and amid the cries of the people, off pushed the boats.

The first to arrive was Napoleon, who sprang to the raft, and with his own hands opened the door of the pavilion and turned to welcome his guest.

Cannon announced the arrival of the Czar, and the two monarchs stood hand in hand in full view of the allied and French armies, lined up on both banks, and of the people of Tilsit, who stared at each other in surprise.

"Where is our King?" they asked. "Is he to have no voice in the making of peace?" And their eyes searched everywhere.

Alone, on his horse, his face troubled and anxious, they saw the one they sought. There was no boat to bear him to the raft. Prussia's colours appeared nowhere. The two emperors were to settle the affairs of Europe. The King of Prussia was conquered and not wanted. Joy faded from the East Prussian faces.

"Our King is a good man," they said. "We do not find it good that he is so neglected."

The King himself looked neither to the left nor the right. He rode forward, his splendid figure outlined now against the sky, now hid by the soldiers. At a certain point he turned. Back he rode, and then turned again.

"Our poor King!" said the people, and while cannon roared and soldiers cheered, their hearts began to beat fiercely against both Alexander and Bonaparte.

For an hour the two emperors conferred, the generals waiting in their boats, Frederick William pacing back and forth on his horse.

Then presently it began to rain, at first lightly, and then suddenly in torrents, as if Heaven itself was weeping over blood-stained Europe.

The King of Prussia rode to and fro, not minding the downfall, but thinking only of the cruelty of the man who had shut him out of the conference.

Everything was against him; he had lost his kingdom, his friend the Czar was deserting him, and yet, as his wife the Queen wrote her father, he was "the best man in the world," a King who lived only to help his subjects; a King who loved right and hated wrong, who believed in good and tried to do it.

But, like the Queen, he trusted in God, and even as he rode up and down, shut out in the rain from the conference, he knew that Napoleon and wrong could not always have their day, that right and justice always conquer. But Frederick William, good as he was, had a foe worse even than Napoleon. At no time in his life could he decide a thing quickly, or at just the right moment. He must think things over, he must look at both sides, and while he wavered in came the enemy and took the prize.

When an hour had passed there came a change. Napoleon summoned all the generals and counsellors, who, drenched and dripping, entered the door of the pavilion.

For two hours more they talked, the King still riding in the rain.

Surely, he thought, the peace which they were making must be favourable to poor Prussia. His friend, the Czar, must see to it. He himself had stood by Alexander; now let Alexander be true to him.

Had they not sworn an eternal friendship; was not his little daughter named Alexandrina, and was not the Czar also the friend of the Queen and the old Countess, to whom he had promised many things?

When Alexander of Russia entered the pavilion in the Niemen he had at heart the welfare of Prussia only. In one hour Napoleon did much. Always he studied citadels, or men, and discovered what we call the weak point. On it he turned his battery.

"We all know," he said to Alexander, "that no monarch in Europe has such thoughts as your Majesty for the welfare of mankind."

Alexander's face softened. He was truly a philanthropist.

After a few moments' talk along this line Napoleon mentioned the word "England."

The Czar's eyes flashed.

Napoleon abused that country with vigour.

Alexander drew nearer.

"I dislike the English as much as you do," he said, "and am ready to second you in all your enterprises against them."

"In that case," said Napoleon, taking note of Alexander's fine head and the weak lines in his handsome face, and remembering how, when he had been First Consul, the Emperor of Russia had been his most ardent admirer, "everything will be easily arranged, and peace already is made. You and I," he added, with an emphasis very flattering, "understand each other. It will be better if we do without our ministers, who often deceive us, or misunderstand us. We shall do more in an hour than our negotiators would in several days."

Then he talked as if the Czar and he were Atlases of the world and that all the earth rested upon their shoulders.

Alexander, listening, began to think that after all his allies had been no good. Prussia had dragged him to defeat; England had done nothing to help either of them. Surely a monarch must consider his own welfare.

When at last the conference ended and the two mighty emperors came forth into the sight of the people of Tilsit and their waiting soldiers, their faces were glowing. Waving their hands again and again, each was rowed to his own bank of the Niemen. They had formed a friendship—Russia and France, Alexander and Napoleon—and the whole world was to profit.

When Napoleon stepped on shore the people of Tilsit were deafened by the cheers of his soldiers.

As for Alexander, he gazed up into the gloomy face of the King of Prussia and a cloud passed over the sun of his joy.

"The Emperor desires to meet your Majesty to-morrow," said he, and his eyes fell. "We can go together," he added, and then hastily deserting the subject, he proposed that they arrange about lodgings, as for the time they must remain in Tilsit.

"Very well," said Frederick William, and his heart sank.

Next day the King of Prussia was admitted to a second and very different conference, and his noble dignity under his misfortune so struck Napoleon that he spoke of it.

"I have nothing to reproach myself with," said the King very simply.

Napoleon's eyes fell, but only for a moment.

He answered with a shrug.

"Nor have I."

The King was silent.

"I warned you," Napoleon looked entirely innocent, "against England. It is she who has caused your troubles. But France," his tones became most grandiloquent, "can afford to be generous. In a few days all will be arranged."

Never was any man treated more cruelly than poor, good, unhappy King Frederick William. Yet there has never been a King who behaved better in time of trouble. In peace he had been irresolute and sluggish. In trouble his figure stands out against a background of woe in outlines of dignity and nobility.

Napoleon made him feel absolutely alone, taking away his friend as he had taken away his kingdom. Though he asked him to dinner, when the last morsel was eaten, the last wine drunk, he bore off the Czar to his private apartment, excusing both to Frederick William. When they were abroad the French soldiers called "Vive Napoleon!" "Vive Alexandre!" but never a cry from the Imperial Guard for the King of Prussia.

"It is better for me to be friendly with Napoleon," said the Czar in excuse. The King was silent.

As for Napoleon, he utterly refused to have the King near him, unless absolutely necessary.

"I can't stand his gloomy face," he told Alexander.

The Czar and Napoleon embraced in public. The French and Russian soldiers became like brothers, leaving the Prussians to humiliation and solitude. The King, who had always suffered from shyness, felt more and more uncomfortable, being made always an unwelcome third. He had no opinion of himself, the Queen was not there to cheer him, and each day he grew more gloomy and sad.

One day the people of Tilsit saw the three monarchs riding together, the Czar and Napoleon entirely ignoring the King, who let his horse drop behind and rode alone.

"Has not our good King been true to the Czar?" they cried, and in their hearts the fire against Napoleon and Alexander burned fiercer. "In January," they said to each other, "we could have made peace if our King had promised to desert Russia. And now the Czar deserts our King."

But in spite of his friendship with Napoleon, the Czar truly loved his friend and wished to help him. His brother Constantine forced him to many things, threatening him with the fate of his father, who had been assassinated, if he did not save Russia at the cost of Prussia.

In the midst of all the great worry an idea entered his head and at once pleased him.

Of all living women he most admired Queen Louisa, not only for her wonderful beauty and lovely ways, but for her goodness and her love for her husband and her people.

"Send to Memel for the Queen," he proposed to Frederick William, for he knew things which were to come to pass that the King did not. "Napoleon now is very anxious to see her. Who can tell what good she may do for Prussia? One so beautiful, so spiritual, so unhappy, may soften his heart and awaken his noblest feelings."

For a moment or two Frederick William did not answer. Above all things on earth he loved Queen Louisa. Napoleon had mistreated her. She was very delicate, like a flower, "the beautiful rose of the King," a poet called her, and was it right that he ask her to beg favours of her foe? Of the man who hated her?

"Do, Majesty, do." General Kalreuth pressed near and gazed pleadingly at the King.

"Perhaps," suggested the Czar, "the Queen may bend the iron will of Napoleon, may she not?" And he looked flatteringly at her husband.

Frederick William sought pen and ink and wrote Queen Louisa a hasty letter.

"I will go to Memel, also," proposed General Kalreuth, as the King delivered the letter to a messenger.

Frederick William nodded.

"Act as escort to the Queen," he commanded, having not a doubt of his wife's answer.