“Enough now, my friend, enough!” cried Frederick William, shaking his head so violently that his brown locks fluttered in wild disorder.  “Thus I shake off an unworthy love and all vain lamentations.  Now, Leuchtmar, I am the man, the Elector.  A very young man, you will say, but one who has stood the brunt of battle and fire, who in days has lived through years, and consequently is old, for my twenty years count double.  Baron von Leuchtmar, I have much to discuss with you, and I summoned you here for important consultations, but stay—­a man is without whom I can keep waiting no longer, for his time is valuable, and he who makes a workman wait robs him of his capital.  I beg you, Leuchtmar, to open the door and call the jeweler Dusnack.”

Leuchtmar hastened to obey this order.  As he turned toward the door Frederick William once more passed his hand rapidly over his face, and for a moment pressed it to his eyes.  As he drew it away he felt a drop fall burning upon his hand, and it shone there like a bright diamond, but—­his eyes were now dry and glittered with the fire of resolution.

“Well, Master Dusnack,” exclaimed Frederick William to the approaching jeweler, “have you brought us, as directed, a few seal rings, from which to make our selection?”

“Here they are, your Electoral Highness,” replied the jeweler, holding out a little box and handing it open to the Elector.  Frederick William examined with interest the bright and sparkling rings, which were in separate compartments, and nodded kindly to the jeweler.

“You are a skillful workman, and your rings please me well,” he said.  “These things are tastefully designed and prettily executed.  You must have very good workmen, and it pleases me that such things are made in our country.  For I suppose, of course, these beautiful rings emanate from your own workshop.”

“Most gracious sir, I would that it were so, and it is not my fault, indeed, that it is otherwise.  I have been long in foreign lands and studied and worked in the first jewelry establishments of Paris.  But I find no apprentices here capable of executing such artistic and delicate work, and can only have ordinary gold and silver ware made here, such as forks, spoons, mourning rings, and articles of that kind; but for my finer ornaments and such costly rings as these I must send to Paris and Lyons, where the goldsmith’s art flourishes, while it is frightfully depressed here, both for the want of purchasers and artisans.”

“Then we must see to it,” said Frederick William, “that such times are ushered in, that men shall feel free to purchase golden trinkets, and that clever workers in gold be attracted here, in order that we may dispense with foreign manufactures.  As soon as the times become somewhat more tranquil, we, too, will have need of goods of that sort, for not long since all the jewels of our house were stolen.[34] But I tell you, Master Dusnack, we shall only buy such things as have been designed and executed at home.  Therefore exert yourself, and procure good workmen.  For this time I must needs content myself with foreign wares and select a seal ring.  I therefore take this one with the ruby, and you must engrave our country’s coat of arms upon it without delay.”