knows this very well, and on this account dreads and hates the Electoral Prince; he has therefore removed him from his father’s court in order to take away all influence from him, and he would esteem himself happy if some lucky accident or criminal hand should free him from this inconvenient successor to the throne.  But heretofore accident has not favored him; nor has he yet dared to press the murderous hand into his service; and he has therefore been compelled to devise some other method for securing his future, and so enchaining the Electoral Prince that he, too, may remain the Emperor’s obedient vassal.  As the best means for attaining this object it has occurred to them to bind the Electoral Prince to the German imperial house by marriage, and to receive him into the Hapsburg family.  The Archduke Leopold, the future Emperor, has a very pretty daughter.  She is intellectual, ardent, a strict Catholic, and has at heart the greatness of the Hapsburg house and the German Emperor.  This princess, or rather archduchess, has been selected for the Electoral Prince of Brandenburg, and on that account the Electoral Prince is now to return home, for the Elector and his Minister Schwarzenberg are much bent upon the imperial alliance, and have already promised that the Electoral Prince shall make a visit to the imperial court.  But, excuse me, I am misusing your indulgence, Princess.  I am holding forth to you a long-winded political harangue, forgetting entirely how you hate politics, what a heinous crime I am committing, and that I weary you.”

“You do not weary me at all,” replied Ludovicka quickly.  “On the contrary, you interest me greatly.  Only go on.  I am listening attentively.  You said that the Electoral Prince was to return home in order to make a visit to the imperial court, and to marry an archduchess of Austria?”

“Pardon me, your highness.  I only said this was the new plan of the imperial court, and consequently of the Minister Schwarzenberg and his Elector.  And, indeed, the plan is good, for the son-in-law of the Emperor would be wholly dependent upon Austria, and if then the three pending crowns should settle upon his brow, it would be the same as if Austria herself wore them.  Then they would cause the young married couple to make an agreement respecting claims of inheritance, in accordance with which the survivor should become heir to the first deceased.  Then, some day, the Electoral Prince, or the young Elector, would have the misfortune to fall from his horse, or be pierced while hunting by some missent bullet, or fall a victim to a sudden problematical sickness; in short, he would die, and his wife would be his heiress, and through her the Electoral Mark Brandenburg, the duchies of Prussia, Pomerania, and Cleves, accrue to the imperial house.  This would be then to put an end to the long, fearful war, to make peace with Sweden by relinquishing Pomerania to her, and, in order to see this war finally ended, which has desolated the whole of Germany, the other German powers would acquiesce in Pomerania becoming Swedish, and Cleves, Brandenburg, and Prussia Hapsburgian.”