Colonel von Jaschinsky was therefore compelled to deliver to Lieutenant von Trenck both the letters which were addressed to him.  The colonel looked at one of these letters with a most malicious expression; he was not at all curious concerning its contents, for he was well acquainted with them, and knew that as soon as Trenck received it, it would become a sword, whose deadly point would be directed to the breast of the young man.

He knew the letter, for he had seen it before, but he had not delivered it; he had fraudulently withheld it from Trenck, in order to send it to Berlin, to his friend Pollnitz, and to ask him if he did not think it well suited to accomplish their purpose of making Lieutenant von Trenck harmless, by bringing about his utter destruction.  Pollnitz had not answered up to this time, but to-day Colonel von Jaschinsky had received a letter from him, in which he said:  “It is now time to allow the letter of the pandour to work.  I carried the letter to the post, and I imagine that I played the part of a Job’s messenger to his impertinent young officer, who allows himself to believe that his colonel owes him two hundred ducats.  If you have ever really been his debtor, he will certainly be yours from to-day, for to you he will owe free quarters in one of the Prussian forts, and I hope for no short time.  When you inform the king of this letter from the pandour, you can also say that Lieutenant von Trenck received a second letter from Berlin, and that you believe it to be from a lady.  Perhaps the king will demand this letter, which I am positive Trenck will receive, for I mailed it myself, and it is equally certain that he will not destroy it, for lovers do not destroy the letters of the beloved.”

No, lovers never destroy the letters of the beloved.  What would have induced Frederick von Trenck to destroy this paper, on which her hand had rested, her eyes had looked upon, her breath touched, and on which her love, her vows, her longing, and her faith, were depicted?  No, he would not have exchanged it for all the treasures of the world—­this holy, this precious paper, which said to him that the Princess Amelia had not forgotten him, that she was determined to wait with patience, and love, and faith, until her hero returned, covered with glory, with a laurel-wreath on his brow, which would be brighter and more beautiful than the crown of a king.

As Trenck read these lines he wept with shame and humiliation.  Two battles had been already won, and his name had remained dark and unknown; two battles, and none of those heroic deeds which his beloved expected from him with such certainty, had come in his path.  He had performed his duty as a brave soldier, but he had not accomplished such an heroic act as that of Krauel, in the past year, which had raised the common soldier to the title of Baron Krauel von Ziskaberg, and had given to the unknown peasant a name whose fame would extend over centuries.  He had not astonished