Give
me the pen; I shall not be long about it." With extraordinary
rapidity he wrote words of such a size that it would have been easy
even for a short-sighted person to read them at a distance; and,
although they were drawn across the paper very irregularly, the
general always took pains to have broad intervals between the lines,
that there might be no probability of leaving them illegible. A
sheet was soon filled; Blucher fixed his signature, and contemplated
the paper for a moment. Half an hour afterward two other sheets,
filled with strange and uncouth characters, lay before the old
general, and he cast the pen aside with a sigh. "It is abominable
work to write letters," he said; "I cannot comprehend why you,
Gneisenau, who are so good a soldier, at the same time know so well
how to wield the pen. It is not my forte, although I had a notion
once to be a savant, and really become a sort of writer. In those
calamitous days, subsequent to 1807, despair and ennui sought for
some relief to my mind, and made me write a book, and I believe a
good one."
"A book?" asked Gueisenau, in amazement. "And you had it printed,
your excellency?"
"Not I; I was no such fool as to do that. The critics and newspaper
editors, who talk about every thing, and know nothing, would have
pounced upon my book, and severely censured it. No, my dear
Gneisenau, one must not cast pearls before swine.
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