Then Barbara desired a more minute description of his dress, and when Wolf, laughing, confessed that he wore a cap only when he went to church, and on hot summer days he had even met him barefoot, she clasped her hands in astonishment and dismay.  Not until her friend assured her that among the thin, dark-haired Spaniards, with their close-cropped heads and flashing black eyes, he, with his fluttering golden curls and free, graceful movements, looked like a white swan among dark-plumaged ducks, did she raise her head with a contented expression, and the sunny glance peculiar to her again reminded her friend of the Emperor’s son.

His lofty brow, Wolf said, he had inherited from his father, and his mind was certainly bright; but what could be predicted with any certainty concerning the intellectual powers of a boy scarcely seven years old?  The pastor Bautista Bela was training him to piety.  The sacristan Francisco Fernandez ought to have begun to teach him to read a year ago; but until now Geronimo had always run away, and when he, Wolf, asked the worthy old man, at Dona Magdalena’s request, whether he would undertake to instruct him in the rudiments of Latin, as well as in reading and writing, he shook his head doubtfully.

Here a smile hovered around the speaker’s lips, and, as if some amusing recollection rose in his mind, he went on gaily:  “He’s a queer old fellow, and when I repeated my question, he put his finger against his nose, saying:  ’Whoever supposes I could teach a young romper like that anything but keeping quiet, is mistaken.  Why?  Because I know nothing myself.’  Then the old man reflected, and added, ’But—­I shall not even succeed in keeping this one quiet, because he is so much swifter than I.”

“And is the Emperor Charles satisfied with such a teacher for his son?” asked Barbara indignantly.

“Massi had described the sacristan to Don Luis as a learned man,” replied Wolf.  “But I have now told his Majesty of a better one.”

“Then you have talked to the Emperor?” asked Barbara, blushing.

Her friend nodded assent, and said mournfully:  “My heart still aches when I recall the meeting.  O Wawerl! what a man he was when, like a fool, I persuaded him in Ratisbon to hear you sing, and how he looked yesterday!”

“Tell me,” she here interrupted earnestly, raising her hands beseechingly.

“It can scarcely be described,” Wolf answered, as if under the spell of a painful memory.  “He could hardly hold himself up, even in the arm-chair in which he sat.  The lower part of his face seems withered, and the upper-even the beautiful lofty brow—­is furrowed by deep wrinkles.  At every third word his breath fails.  One of his diseases, Dr. Mathys says, would be enough to kill any other man, and he has more than there are fingers on the hand.  Besides, even now he will not take advice, but eats and drinks whatever suits his taste.”

Barbara shook her head angrily; but Wolf, noticing it, said:  “He is the sovereign, and who would venture to withhold anything on which his will is set?  But his desires are shrivelling like his face and his body.”