that like wax they allow themselves to be molded by his forming hands.  Even my mother, who is his enemy, who has been battling against him for twenty years, even she is conquered by him, and he has become her master and forces her to his will.  She knows not at all that she has fallen within the circle of his magic, yet is, like all the rest, a mere tool in his hands.  But she feels it not, and fancies herself free, while she lies bound, and has no will of her own in his presence.  I have seen it, I have felt it, and it has filled my heart with unutterable woe, with raging anger.  She felt not at all the shame and humiliation under which I almost expired; she came not to my aid, for the magician was there, and in his presence my mother forgot her son so recently come back to her, and he was the center around which all turned, he was master of the situation, and before him all shrank into wretched nothingness.  He charmed the hearts which had remained cold at my reception, charmed them with the prospect of a fete, which, as he said, he was to give in my honor, and they believed the mockery, and allowed themselves to be touched by that noble condescension, and felt not the cruel boasting with which he solemnizes the return of him who is a thorn in his flesh, a thorn which he is firmly determined to pluck out, and tread under foot!  I came here humble, poor, and empty-handed, and he solemnizes my return by offering presents to my mother and my sisters!  And they accept them, feel not at all the degradation, and will appear at the fete in clothes with which my enemy, my adversary, my murderer has presented them!”

“Prince, you go too far.  Your hatred carries you away.”

“No, I do not go too far!” cried the Prince, beside himself.  His countenance was deadly pale, his eyes flashed, and his whole being seemed pervaded by the fire of wrath and hatred.  “No, I do not go too far, and my hatred does not carry me away!  He is the evil demon of my house—­of my country!  He is to blame for all the disasters of the last twenty years, for all the humiliation and shame by which my family has been visited.  The Mark is to be ruined—­that is his end, that is his aim; the Electoral house of Brandenburg must die out—­that is his hope; and he will leave untried no means whereby this hope may become reality.  He has already tried once to murder me,[22] and he will try it again.  A dagger’s point lurks in each glance that he fixes upon me, a drop of poison in each word that he directs to me.  If I stood alone with him upon the summit of a tower, he would hurl me down, and then afterward follow my coffin with a thousand tears!  And my father would lean upon him, and thank God that only his son had been snatched from him, not his friend, his favorite; and my mother would weep for me, and yet go about in mourning which he had presented to her, and she would esteem it a peculiar act of amiability if he should exert himself to divert her mind and raise her spirits.  No voice would be raised against him, and no one would venture to accuse him, for my father himself would protect him, and the grace and favor of the Emperor would speak him clear of any suspicion.  He is my master, my lord—­that is what fills me with rage and indignation; and I will surely die of this if the count does not succeed in dispatching me first, and putting me out of the way.”