quis de Cambon the post of cantinière to the regiment. | and chattels exactly as we have seen the Germans coming in our time, in 1871, The Revolution was beginning. Every to occupy all the good posts in Alsace and where soldiers were mutinying and claim- Lorraine, and thrusting out the original ing their pay, which they could not get. holders. Rosenthal was a pretty good Foreign regiments were employed to re-reader and writer, and could keep acduce them to submission, and this led to counts, but he had not the remotest idea the massacres of August, 1790. Rosen- of the management of woods and waters. thal's regiment was broken up, and he and his wife opened a small cabaret_at | Sainte-Suzanne. Unfortunately the emigrés had carried away all the money. Business was at a standstill; the Prussians were pouring into the Champagne; the youth of the country were flying to the rescue of la patrie en danger; and the battle of Valmy, the siege of Mayence, and the rising of La Vendée soon followed. But that troubled neither him nor his wife. He had the place and got the pay. The rest is mere matter of detail. What signifies? It is not worth mentioning. And, moreover, all the old servants of Prince Yeri Hans came out to meet the citizen Rosenthal. They did not behave like the Alsacians, who received the Prussians with dark looks, and then shut themselves in. And all the honorable personages of Pirmasens came up in In the midst of all these events the powdered wigs and ceremonial dresses, name of Bernadotte was already begin-accompanied by their ladies and their ning to be heard of. He had been in daughters, to present their respects to the 1790 an officer of inferior rank at Mar-new official. So did the peasants come forseilles; in 1792 a colonel in Custine's ward with smiles and welcomes, and cries army. When Françoise read of his first of "Vive Citizen Rosenthal, our new masexploits of arms she was greatly troubled ter! and long live his lovely lady!" because she had married Christian instead of Jean Baptiste; and Rosenthal boiled over with rage because he, a possible descendant of kings, was obliged to serve out drams behind a bar, while the other fellow was prancing on horseback at the head of a regiment. Things went from bad to worse. Soon the Austrians and Prussians broke into Alsace and Lorraine, blockaded Landau, and threatened Sainte-Suzanne. In this distress Françoise secretly wrote to her dear Bernadotte, telling him of all their sufferings, and entreating him to help them. No sooner had the letter gone when Hoche totally defeated the Germans at Woerth, in Alsace, and drove them back, to the great joy of all the inhabitants, and a week after Rosenthal was astonished to receive the appointment of conservator of woods and rivers in the principality of Pirmasens, while all the nobles of the grand duchy went off to rejoin their princes in Zurich, Vienna, and St. Petersburg. Never did Rosenthal learn to whom he owed his appointment. Of course, he supposed that the republic had discovered his extraordinary administrative capabilities, which in no way surprised him, for he had an excellent opinion of himself. What great services a clever and sensible woman is able to do for her husband | without his suspecting it! So Françoise and Rosenthal started for their new residence in a cart loaded with their goods All that was most affecting. But, as Robespierre had many admirers in the neighborhood, Rosenthal, like a prudent man, took care to make a speech to all these people upon the rights of man and the dignity of the citizen. Which being over, he settled himself down in his château, where everything was so comfortable; hid away the cart in which he had come; occupied the apart ments of the prince; tried on his robe de chambre and his furred slippers; and occupied his grand four-posted bedstead with Françoise, who thought it was just like a chapel ! III. IN this manner the prophecies of Catinetta were coming to pass "You shall have joy and misery, but more of joy than of misery, and you shall rise in the world." And yet Rosenthal and his wife were in imminent danger without being aware of it; for the citizen Saint-Just, who was haunting the western provinces, found out that a crowd of delegates sent out by the republic to democratize the conquered countries were enjoying the places and emoluments of their new positions and giving themselves up without scruple to the delights of Capua; and, as a virtuous republican, he was displeased. He therefore drew up a list of these aristocrats, with the name of Christian Rosenthal von Löwenhaupt at their head, and deter mined to eliminate them for the encouragement of a virtuous posterity; which undoubtedly he would have done if he had not himself disappeared in the storm of Thermidor. Rosenthal, having happily escaped this rock, passed from that time forward for a determined and able Thermidorian; he confined himself to his place on the frontier in the midst of the forests of Hundsrück; and there he shut himself up safe like a rat in its cheese, caring for nothing but to keep out of the revolutionary troubles. And what would you have? We are not all Spartans — and Rosenthal, imbued with high-bred prejudices, repub. lican though he was, and paid by the republic, had only one idea in his head that of renewing in his own person the broken line of the Löwenhaupts; and as soon as there came a quieter time he has tened to reconstruct, with the help of a learned scholar of Heidelberg whom he handsomely rewarded for his trouble, the genealogical tree of his ancestors from the time of Olaus III. in the year 1000. That tree, hung on the wall, filled a whole salon, in which Rosenthal walked for hours with crossed arms contemplating his glory. The explanation of this is that there was something German about the man, and it is well known that all Germans worship titles. natas of Bach, Mozart, and Haydn were performed with much solemnity, the hunting-parties in autumn on horseback, the sledge-parties in winter, the return to the château, the tables loaded with game and fish, and decorated with flowers in December, and the blazing fires when I remember all this, I am not at all surprised that Citizen Saint-Just, foreseeing what all this might come to, should have marked the name of Rosenthal von Löwenhaupt with a red cross. But I am surprised that later on Bonaparte, first consul, then emperor, should have allowed a conservator of woods and forests to live in that sumptuous style - he who was so keen to observe whatever concerned him. self personally. Perhaps, however, the long genealogical tree dazzled his eyes — for great dynasties and little dynasties were a weakness of his. At any rate, this lasted for twenty years, and in these twenty years old dynasties vanished and new ones arose, war swept over the world, the map of Europe was several times remodelled, treaties were made and unmade every year, opinions changed, the noblesse returned to their domains, the Church was again set up, a thousand fortunes were made, thanks to these events, and still M. le Conservateur Rosenthal was there smiling out of his great gilt frame upon his Françoise, who smiled back at him out of hers. Nothing moved them. In the meanwhile Jean Baptiste had won battles; he had been made brigadiergeneral, general of division, ambassador to Vienna, marshal of France, prince of Ponté Corvo, governor of the Hanseatic League, and prince royal of Sweden ! And at every one of these promotions Françoise wrote to Jean Baptiste from her heart to congratulate him on his prosperity, and Bernadotte sent her each time a gracious reply. There is nothing in life like old friends; they alone know the toils of the way. Their sympathetic admiration touches our very souls. The rest are only fair-weather friends. I have two splendid lifelike and lifesize portraits by an Italian artist of my father-in-law Rosenthal and his wife on the pinnacle of their greatness. Monsieur le Conservateur stands in a purple gala dress with a white waistcoat, lace fall, and silver-hilted sword; his countenance rosy and smiling, his wig well-powdered, following you with his great blue eyes and bidding you welcome; you would never have supposed that this could be the former publican, but rather Prince Yeri Hans himself, and the more when you see in the background the castle peeping out from among the oak-trees. Then there was a good hunting-picture, and it would be very interesting to the ratepayers of Pirmasens to know how much that cost. At Pirmasens calls, compliments, conThe other portrait was that of his wid-gratulations, Christmas-trees, and all the ow, Françoise, smiling and rosy like her small ceremonies of the small German husband, nose slightly turned up, lips full courts, went on without intermission, unand graciously smiling, and opening to der all the rules of etiquette. show a set of ivory teeth. And when I remember all that my grandmother told me of her little levées where all the aristocracy of Pirmasens were proud to appear, the old councillors in Voltairean wigs; the ladies in their grandeur; the evening parties where so There was a kind of a bond of affection between M. von Löwenhaupt and the simple people of Hundsrück, whose natural protector he believed himself to be, after the fashion of good kings who are the fathers of their subjects. Oh yes, that good man was rocking himself pleasantly in the cradle of his illusions, and he was happy in believing in himself. Never had his people under him been more submissive and more devoted. He was smiled upon, bowed to as far as he could be seen; when all at once every face grew dark. Fortune was turning her back upon us, and the French, always conquerors hitherto, had at last been defeated. Then it happened, as it is told in the book of Job, how one servant after another came in quick succession with the news of the destruction of all his cattle by the Sabæans and by fire from heaven, the loss of all his servants and his camels by the Chaldeans, and the death of all his sons and daughters. Now those terrible messengers who came to put an end to the dancing and the fêtes and complimentary visits were called Baylen, Talavera, Arapiles, and Vittoria; these came from the south. Others were called Moscow, Beresina, Kulm, Dennewitz, Gross Beeren; they came from the north, powdered with snow, in the uniforms of Calmuks, lance in rest, and attended by wolves and ravens. Everybody shuddered, for these messengers knocked at every door and every window, shouting hoarsely, Hurrah! here we are! here is the end come!" The last messenger of all was named Leipzig; he drew after him innumerable wagons filled with wounded, dead, and dying men. Fear followed him, and treason was not far behind. On the nights of December 31st, 1813, and January 1st, 1814, the enemy crossed the Rhine over all the bridges. Whether by treason or through neglect, the posts had been weakened along the river and the troops withdrawn from the islands, just when the allied forces were making preparations to effect the passage. Alsace and Lorraine were invaded; our decimated regiments were falling back by forced marches into the interior. One day, at two in the afternoon (said Grandmother Françoise, trembling at the very remembrance), I was alone, with my little girl in my arms, looking out of a window of the château up the road to Landshut, and thinking of the sad future that lay before us. By that road the Allies were expected; they were already occupying Kaiserslautern, a few leagues off. Since the evening before we had been carefully watched by the Kammerrath Piper, our fastest friend, who used to come every morning and bring apples and gilded walnuts to our little Anna, and to myself a bouquet of hothouse flowers, amusing us with silly compliments and telling me all the news and the gossip of the place for my entertainment. This excellent man had very suddenly altered his tune. At the head of twenty other friends he had run in the night before to arrest us, with our wagons of movables, just as we were going to take flight to Bitche, and had sent us in again, crying, "Stay where you are, Monsieur and Madame Rosenthal! We will answer for you with our lives. You will wait for the orders of our virtuous Prince Yeri Hans, who is at length coming into his estates, which have been too long in the hands of the Jacobins. He will decide what is to be done with you." And so we were imprisoned in our own house, and I was gazing up the high-road, anxious and pale, expecting every minute to see our innumerable enemies. Rosenthal was confined to his room by two peasants armed with pitchforks. The child was crying. An old Lorraine servant and an old Alsacian manservant alone remained faithful to us, and they were in custody as well as we. While I was thus looking before me full of fears, suddenly a dozen French hussars appeared on the right at the edge of the wood coming over the hillside to reach the road through the valley. They were trotting through fields of snow, but without haste. Their commander, fifty paces to the front, sitting close in his saddle, with the fur of his colback over his eyes, his nose in the air, and his enor mous red moustaches stretching to his ears, was examining the country. At first I thought I had never seen such a barbarous-looking ruffian, with his ragged pelisse, heavy trousers leathered to the knees, his feet firmly planted in the stirrups, and his sword swinging from a long strap. His lean, black horse, long-maned and long-tailed, was a wild-looking animal, and by its way of stretching out its neck it must have been a Hungarian or a Cossack horse. Yet, as I observed this horseman reconnoitring, some distant recollection seemed to say, "I have seen that man before." The others, all old soldiers with muttonchop whiskers and long moustaches, had a look of their chief about them. After reaching the road, the chief, still in front, galloped to the top of the hill on the left to observe the Kaiserslautern road; from that spot he could also see Pirmasens at the foot of the hill behind the château. After that he trotted back | I saw the Austrian officer, a tall, fair man, and began to speak to his men with great whose breast was covered with medals animation. His gestures were rapid, and and orders, stretched on the ground, with be was pointing in the direction of Lands- arms extended as if to stop me; but fear hut, saying that the enemy would come in lending wings, I passed over his body and that direction. pushed open the gate, crying in the ut most distress, But whilst I was watching and looking for an instant towards Pirmasens, imagine my feelings on seeing debouching from the principal street, behind our park wall, fifteen horsemen in white uniforms and feathered shakos. They were pushing on at the double, close under the walls, and could not see the hussars who on their side were not expecting them either. These horse soldiers were followed afar by a crowd of people, townsfolk, and countryfolk, armed with sticks; and at their head marched the Kammerrath Piper, from which I understood plainly that an Austrian advanced guard had reached Pirmasens that morning, and our good friends having denounced us, had come to seize us. And Rosenthal too could see them coming. Our position was a very painful and a very dangerous one; for all that mob were evidently bent upon ill-using us, and I could not but tremble for my child. But, thank God, deliverance was at hand. On reaching the road, after passing the park wall, the Germans found themselves two or three hundred yards from the hussars, who were making for Landshut, and looking round when they heard the galloping, recognized the enemy. Instantly the swords flashed in the sun. All my life long I shall remember the hussar officer darting down the first upon the Austrian like a hawk. Surprised at this sudden attack, the German took a step aside to avoid the encounter, and spurring his horse leaped over the low wall of our yard; but the Frenchman followed him as if on wings, and there before my eyes, with one sabre-thrust, he killed the Aus trian. Scarcely had I seen this when he had already leaped back, and was rushing into the midst of the conflict; at every sweep of his sword an enemy fell, and at that moment, in the midst of my terror, cried, "There's Zimmer!" And as opened the window, holding my little one in my arms, to call for help, the Austrians were already in full retreat towards Wissembourg, leaving five of their number on the ground. All those excellent people, who had been on guard over us in the château, had escaped down the park avenue. I ran down the principal staircase. In the court "Zimmer! Zimmer! save us! save my child! save me!" Then the officer of hussars, with his sword dropping blood still in his hand, turned round and his men also- and looked at me. I was raising my child, and Zimmerfor it was indeed he - cried joyfully, yet roughly, "What! is that you, Françoise? I am glad to see you again," and he was off his horse in a moment, greeting me most warmly. "Well, Françoise, for twenty years I have been thinking about you. There's nothing in the world like first love." I held out my little girl to him, and he looked attentively at her and said, "She is just like you. She mustn't be frightened at my moustaches. I must kiss her." And all his men on horseback round us, with the excitement of battle still fresh upon them, looked on with pleasure. Zimmer sheathed his sword and said, "Dismount! The enemy are gone far enough; but two men will stand and watch both here and there," pointing to Landshut and Wissembourg. Then, handing his bridle to a man, he turned round, and, taking me by the arm as he used to do, he cried, "Let us go in, Françoise." Rosenthal had just come down-stairs. They recognized each other and shook hands. Up-stairs, in the salon, I said a few words to Zimmer about our position, and then we soon found out that he had learnt many things in his twenty years of fighting, for, calling out of the window to one of his hussars, he ordered him to mount instantly and gallop to Pirmasens, to the Hôtel de Ville, and to order two thousand rations-bread, meat, eau-de-vie and provender for six hundred horses, the which to be found by ten that night, the burgomaster and notables to be responsible. Then, turning round to us and laughing, he said, "Pack up! Put your money and all your valuables in a good strong cart. You have got horses; put in the two best that you have. If you require four, take four, for the roads through the woods to Bitche are abominable. I have been campaigning here under Custine, with Houchard, and I dare say they are no better now than they were then. And at seven exactly we shall start. No one will stop our way. The good people at Pirmasens," said he, winking, "hearing that two thousand Frenchmen and six hundred horses may be expected at any mo ment, will no more stir from their doors than a hen out of her shelter." We were astonished at his clever manœuvre. "Now, Françoise,” said he, “ I am going to inspect your larder. I dare say you have got some good wine. Ro senthal, come, let us have a glass. And my men and horses, too, must have their wants satisfied." They went down together, and immediately I, with our two servants, began to load a wagon with all our best linen, carpets, and movables of every kind; and yet we were obliged to leave behind many things which would have suited us very well at this present time. Of my own property I only took the two portraits, the great marble clock, and a few valuable pictures, and my mother-of-pearl casket with necklaces, collars, and laces. But we had to leave behind all our terra-cotta hunting-pieces, vases, chandeliers, and a hundred beautiful things that ornamented our rooms. I cannot bear to think of these losses. But we were in such a hurry to get away that they could not be saved. Below we could hear Zimmer, Rosenthal, and the hussars eating, drinking, and laughing, without a thought of all these misfortunes. The two sentinels kept guard outside, the horses were fed, and so night came on. At Pirmasens all those people who in the morning were running in a mob to hang us were making all speed to the Hôtel de Ville with the required rations, and we could hear the town-crier shouting at every corner and hurrying on the backward ones. At seven it was dark. I had put on my best fur-lined cloak, and sat waiting to start. Zimmer made me take a glass of wine; he put a couple of bottles into the bottom of our wagon, and obliged me to eat a little, with the remark that the night would be a rough one. And so we went on talking, but poor Rosenthal did not join in. He was stunned with his fall in consternation at being driven away. Incredible! Twenty years master of the whole country round, all the people at your feet, and all the principal inhabitants waiting your pleas ure in your antechamber, and then forced to fly like thieves surprised in the act! What a lesson for those who pretend that might is right! About midnight we had reached the old French territory, and at every little village the people, frightened at the sounds of war, rushed to their windows. They remembered how, twenty years before, Wurmser and Brunswick had been driven over to the right bank by a single battle, but there were now no volunteers of 1792, commanded by such men as Hoche, Kléber, and Marceau. Their bones lie buried everywhere between Madrid and Moscow; the thunder of the cannon will never wake them more. years they had been fighting for Jerome, for Joseph, or for conscription, and this had not the same effect as the cry of La patrie en danger! For About five we came to the edge of the forest, and the fortress of Bitche came in sight at the distance of a couple of leagues. Zimmer reconnoitred the country, saw no signs of the enemy, and prepared to bid us a kindly farewell, telling us that his duty was to observe the movements of the enemy; and that as we were now in safety, he was obliged to leave us to pursue our way to Phalsbourg. Then I could not refrain from tears on leav- he added, "At Phalsbourg it is possible ing that beautiful residence at Pirmasens, you may find the gates shut. The comwhere we had spent such happy days, and mander is an old friend of mine; send to which we never expected to return. In him this note and the drawbridge will be half an hour we were in the dark and let down for you. You have a start of silent woods. The swirling snowflakes, twelve hours; don't lose a minute! Husthe gloomy masses of trees, the galloping sars, forward!" and they went off like an horsemen before and behind us, the heavy | angry whirlwind in the direction of Hil |