The next evening there was given, at the Imperial Palace, a ball and supper, to which none but la haute noblesse were invited. The dancing began with a brilliant Polonaise, which, headed by the Empress-Queen and her husband, passed through the rooms in stately procession, in singular and picturesque contrast and harmony with another faded and more solemn procession and array of figures in antique armour and dainty ruffs and doublets, and gold chains and princely mantles, the ancestral portraits who watched the After the Polonaise came the supper, which was somewhat prolonged. The supper over, a minuet was danced, and afterward, the company being now happy and cheerful, and being, moreover, of sufficiently high and similar rank to dispense with somewhat of the rigid court etiquette, began to wander through the rooms in an informal manner, and to arrange contre-danses among themselves. In those days the contre-danse had not hardened itself into the quadrille. It was danced, not in fours, but in sets of varying numbers, and of characters and figures mostly undefined. In one of the great halls, recently erected by the Emperor-architect, Charles VI., It is difficult to conceive a more magnificent or fascinating sight, reflected and multiplied as it was by the mirrors on the walls. The Princess von Isenberg-Wertheim was dancing with a young noble, a prince of the House of Colleredo, a very handsome, but gay and reckless, young man. The dance was drawing to a close, the musicians, playing one of the last figures, La Pastorelle, to a very delicate and fine movement, to which the dancers were devoting their utmost, closest attention and skill. As the Princess was standing by her partner, awaiting their turn to go down the dance, a slight movement caused her to turn her head, and she found the Count, her friend, standing close to her. "I am sorry to interrupt, Princess," he said, in a low voice, "but I fear something serious has happened to the Prince. He cannot be found." The Princess turned very pale. She caught her breath for a moment, then she said, in the same tone, "Where is Karl, the Jager?" "I do not know," replied the Count. "I never thought of him." "Then he is not here," said the Princess, with a relieved air. "If Karl is with him the Prince is safe." The Count made a very slight movement "We will finish the figure, Monseigneur," she said graciously; "then, perhaps, you will excuse me." "Nothing has happened to the Prince, believe me," said the young man kindly, as they moved down the room. "He has doubtless gone on some private expedition with his servant. He probably forgot to leave a message, and will return to-morrow." The Princess was so reassured, apparently, by these reflections that she remained for the final figure of the dance. Then she left the palace, and, declining the Count's company, drove to her HÔtel alone. She was more strangely moved than she could have explained to herself. She was, indeed, frightened and perplexed by Returning, as she did, at an unexpected hour, her women were not in waiting for her, and, leaving the servants who had accompanied her from the palace in the hall of the HÔtel, she wandered up the great staircase alone. The corridors and rooms were dimly lighted, and a perfect stillness reigned through the house. The Princess ascended slowly towards her own apartment, where she expected to find some, at least, of her dressers, and in so doing, in a dimly-lighted corridor, she passed the rooms allotted to her children. The thought of them was not, indeed, in her mind when, as she passed a door, she In the bedchamber beyond the antechamber she found the children, both sitting up in one bed, clasped in each other's arms, and crying quietly. The little boy had evidently come for shelter and comfort to his sister's bed. "What is the matter, children?" said the Princess, in a tone which seemed to the little ones strangely soft and kind. "Why are you not asleep?" The children had ceased crying, and were looking at her wonderingly as she stood in her jewels and ball-dress, a brilliant scarf of Indian work hanging from her arm, the lamp in her hand. They hardly knew whether it was their mother, whom they saw so seldom, or some serene ethereal visitant, who resembled her in face and form. The little Princess, however, with the self-possession of her class, apparently left this point undecided, and began in her quiet, stately little way to explain. "It was dark," she said, "and we were asleep, Fritz and I, and we both dreamed the same dream. We thought that we were walking in a beautiful garden, where there were trees, and flowers, and butterflies, and wide cascades of water, in which As the little Princess ceased some servants came in, with whispered explanations and apologies. The Princess went to her own room. She had not known what to say to the child; indeed, she hardly knew what had passed. She allowed herself to be undressed, and lay down. But, in the deep silence of the hours that preceded the dawn, an overpowering restlessness took possession of her. A sense of strange forces and influences, to which she was utterly unaccustomed, seemed present to her spirit: a crowd of fair and heavenly existences, which seemed to follow on the steps of that singular boy who had first attracted her wearied fancy, With the streaks of dawn that stole into the chamber she was conscious of an irrepressible desire that took possession of her to rise and go forth. An irresistible power seemed to draw her to follow: she rose, and, dressing herself in such clothes as were at hand, she went out. The house itself was quite still, but faintly in the distance might be heard the sound of a bell. In so religious a Court as that of Vienna there were private chapels attached to most of the houses of the nobility, and there was one attached to a neighbouring palace, to which there was a private communication with the HÔtel taken by the Prince. Following the sound of the bell the Princess traversed several passages, and reached at last a staircase, down which she turned. As she reached the first landing two women came out from an open door. They started at the sight of the Princess. They were the Princess Isoline and Faustina. "Is it you, Princess?" said the former. "What has called you up so early?" "Are you going to the chapel, Isoline?" said the Princess. "May I come with you?" The three ladies entered the chapel by a private door, which led them to a pew behind the stalls. Upon the original Gothic stone-work and tracery of the chapel, which was very old, had been introduced rococo work in mahogany and brass, angels and trumpets and scrolls. The stalls and organs were covered with filigree work of this description, the windows filled with paintings in the same florid and incongruous taste. There were few persons in the chapel, most of them being ladies from the adjoining palaces, together with a few musicians, for the musical part of the service was carefully Two of the ladies were Protestant, the third, Faustina, a Catholic of a very undeveloped type; but the music of the Mass spoke a mysterious language, recognisable to hearts of every creed. Before the altar, laden with gilded plate and lighted with candles in silver sconces, the priest said Mass. Above him, in the window, painted in a lovely Italian landscape full of figures, with towns and castles and mountain ranges and market-people with horses and cattle, were represented, in careful and minute painting, the three Marys before the empty tomb. "The City of the Sunlight," sang the choir, in an elaborate anthem, with an allegro movement of the tenors that spoke * * * * * On her return from the chapel a note from the Prince was put into the Princess's hand. It merely stated that he was gone to Hernhuth to the Count Zinzendorf. It In course of time (posts were slow in those days) the Princess received a long letter from her husband, giving an account of Hernhuth, and of his conversations with the Count, and concluding with these words:— "From all this you will, doubtless, conclude THE END. Printed by R. & R. Clark, Edinburgh. |