KING. "'Oh, you could not miss us even by grope. That big hollow that goes from Burg, and even from Potschappel,--it would have poured like a water-spout [or fire-spout] over us. You see, I am not so brave as you think.'
"The Kaiser had set out for his Interview [First Interview, and indeed it is now more than half done, a good six weeks of it gone]
with the Czarina of Russia. That Interview the King did not like [no wonder]:--and, to undo the good it had done us, he directly, and very unskilfully, sent the Prince Royal to Petersburg [who had not the least success there, loutish fellow, and was openly snubbed by a Czarina gone into new courses]. His Majesty already doubted that the Court of Russia was about to escape him:--and I was dying of fear lest, in the middle of all his kindnesses, he should remember that I was an Austrian. 'What,' said I to myself, 'not a single epigram on us, or on our Master? What a change!'
"One day, at dinner, babbling Pinto said to the person sitting next him, 'This Kaiser is a great traveller; there never was one who went so far.' 'I ask your pardon, Monsieur,' said the King;'Charles Fifth went to Africa; he gained the Battle of Oran.'
And, turning towards me,--who couldn't guess whether it was banter or only history,--'This time,' said he, 'the Kaiser is more fortunate than Charles Twelfth; like Charles, he entered Russia by Mohilow; but it appears to me he will arrive at Moscow.'
"The same Pinto, one day, understanding the King was at a loss whom to send as Foreign Minister some-whither, said to him: 'Why does not your Majesty think of sending Lucchesini, who is a man of much brilliancy (HOMME D'ESPRIT)?' 'It is for that very reason,'
answered the King, 'that I want to keep him. I had rather send you than him, or a dull fellow like Monsieur--' I forget whom, but believe it is one whom he did appoint Minister somewhere.
"M. de Lucchesini, by the charm of his conversation, brought out that of the King's. He knew what topics were agreeable to the King;and then, he knew how to listen; which is not so easy as one thinks, and which no stupid man was ever capable of. He was as agreeable to everybody as to his Majesty, by his seductive manners and by the graces of his mind. Pinto, who had nothing to risk, permitted himself everything. Says he: 'Ask the Austrian General, Sire, all he saw me do when in the service of the Kaiser.'
EGO. "'A fire-work at my Wedding, was n't that it, my dear Pinto?'
KING (interrupting). "'Do me the honor to say whether it was successful?'
EGO. "'No, Sire; it even alarmed all my relations, who thought it a bad omen. Monsieur the Major here had struck out the idea of joining Two flaming Hearts, a very novel image of a married couple.
But the groove they were to slide on, and meet, gave way: my Wife's heart went, and mine remained.'
KING. "'You see, Pinto, you were not good for much to those people, any more than to me.'
EGO. "'Oh, Sire, your Majesty, since then, owes him some compensation for the sabre-cuts he had on his head.'
KING. "'He gets but too much compensation. Pinto, did n't I send you yesterday some of my good Preussen honey?'
PINTO. "'Oh, surely;--it was to make the thing known. If your Majesty could bring that into vogue, and sell it all, you would be the greatest King in the world. For your Kingdom produces only that; but of that there is plenty.'
"'Do you know,' said the King, one day, to me,--'Do you know that the first soldiering I did was for the House of Austria? MON DIEU, how the time passes!'--He had a way of slowly bringing his hands together, in ejaculating these MON-DIEUS, which gave him quite a good-natured and extremely mild air.--(Do you know that I saw the glittering of the last rays of Prince Eugen's genius?'
EGO. "'Perhaps it was at these rays that your Majesty's genius lit itself.'
KING. "'EH, MON DIEU! who could equal the Prince Eugen?'
EGO. "'He who excels him;--for instance, he who could win Twelve Battles!'--He put on his modest air. I have always said, it is easy to be modest, if you are in funds. He seemed as though he had not understood me, and said:--KING. "'When the cabal which, during forty years, the Prince had always had to struggle with in his Army, were plotting mischief on him, they used to take advantage of the evening time, when his spirits, brisk enough in the morning, were jaded by the fatigues of the day. It was thus they persuaded him to undertake his bad March on Mainz' [March not known to me].
EGO. "'Regarding yourself, Sire, and the Rhine Campaign, you teach me nothing. I know everything your Majesty did, and even what you said. I could relate to you your Journeys to Strasburg, to Holland, and what passed in a certain Boat. Apropos of this Rhine Campaign, one of our old Generals, whom I often set talking, as one reads an old Manuscript, has told me how astonished he was to see a young Prussian Officer, whom he did not know, answering a General of the late King, who had given out the order, Not to go a-foraging:
"And I, Sir, I order you to go; our Army needs it; in short, I will have it so (JE LE VEUX)!--"'
KING. "'You look at me too much from the favorable side! Ask these Gentlemen about my humors and my caprices; they will tell you fine things of me.'
"We got talking of some Anecdotes which are consigned to, or concealed in, certain obscure Books. 'I have been much amused, said I to the King, (with the big cargo of Books, true or false, written by French Refugees, which perhaps are unknown in France itself.'
[Discourses a little on this subject.]
KING. "'Where did you pick up all these fine old Pieces?
These would amuse me on an evening; better than the conversation of my Doctor of the Sorbonne [one Peyrau, a wandering creature, not otherwise of the least interest to us], [Nicolai, <italic>
Anekdoten, <end italic> ii. 133 n.] whom I have here, and whom I am trying to convert.'
EGO. "'I found them all in a Bohemian Library, where I sat diverting myself for two Winters.'
KING. "'How, then? Two Winters in Bohemia? What the devil were you doing there! Is it long since?'