With
this uniform I have become a new man. I am no longer an impatient
septuagenarian, cursing and killing flies on the wall because he has
no one else on whom to vent his wrath; but I am a soldier standing
composedly at his post, and waiting for the hour when he will be
able to destroy his enemy. Come, my friends,--come with me!"
He drew the two with him, and walked so rapidly through the rooms
that they were scarcely able to accompany him. They entered the
large reception-room, opened only on festive occasions. It contained
nothing but some tinselled furniture, a few tables with marble tops,
and on the pillars between the windows large Venetian mirrors.
Otherwise the walls were bare, except over the sofa, where hung, in
a finely-carved and gilded frame, a painting, which however was
covered with a large veil of black crape.
Blucher conducted the two to this painting; for a moment he stood
still and gazed on it gravely and musingly, and, raising his right
hand with a quick jerk, he tore down the mourning-veil.
"Queen Louisa!" exclaimed Scharnhorst, admiring the tall and
beautiful lady smiling on him. "Yes," said Blucher, solemnly, "Queen
Louisa! The guardian angel of Prussia, whose heart Napoleon broke!
This pride and joy of all our women had to depart without hoping
even in the possibility that the calamities which ruined her might
come to an end.
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