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“What impossible creatures you geniuses are to please!” he said. “Tell me, my friend, has there ever been, since you first began your career, a bit of homage or approbation that has really pleased you?”

“Oh, yes!” said the poet, in a tone that sounded like Oh, no!

“I don’t believe it,” said the Duke. “Come, now, could you, if you were asked, describe the happiest and proudest hour of your life?”

A new expression came into the poet’s eyes, and lighted up his gaunt intellectual face. Some old memories awoke within him, and it is doubtful if he saw the landscape at which he was gazing. But the Duke was not quick, though kind; he thought that Friedrich had not heard him, and repeated the question.

“Yes,” said the poet. “Yes, indeed I could.”

“Well, then, let me guess,” said the Duke, facetiously. (He fancied that he was bringing his crusty genius into capital condition.) “Was it when your great tragedy of ‘Boadicea’ was first performed in Berlin, and the theatre rose like one man to offer homage, and the gods sent thunder? I wish they had ever treated my humble efforts with as much favour. Was it then?”

“No!”

“Was it when his Imperial Majesty the Emperor of —- was pleased to present you with a gold snuff-box set with diamonds, and to express his opinion that your historical plays were incomparably among the finest productions of poetic genius?”

“His Imperial Majesty,” said Friedrich, “is a brave soldier; but, a–hem!–an indifferent critic. I do not take snuff, and his Imperial Majesty does not read poetry. The interview was gratifying, but that was not the occasion. No!”

“Was it when you were staying with Dr. Kranz at G—-, and the students made that great supper for you, and escorted your carriage both ways with a procession of torches?”

“Poor boys!” said the poet, laughing; “it was very kind, and they could ill afford it. But they would have drunk quite as much wine for any one who would have taken the inside out of the University clock, or burnt the Principal’s wig, as they did for me. It was a very unsteady procession that brought me home, I assure you. The way they poked the torches in each other’s faces left one student, as I heard, with no less than eight duels on his hands. And, oh! the manner in which they howled my most pathetic love songs! No! no!”

The Duke laughed heartily.

“Is it any of the various occasions on which the fair ladies of Germany have testified their admiration by offerings of sympathy and handiwork?”

“No!” roared the poet.

“Are you quite sure?” said the Duke, slyly. “I have heard of comforters, and slippers, and bouquets, and locks of hair, besides a dozen of warm stockings knit by the fair hands of —-“

“Spare me!” groaned Friedrich, in mock indignation. “Am I a pet preacher, that I should be smothered in female absurdities? I have hair that would stuff a sofa, comforters that would protect a regiment in Siberia, slippers, stockings —-. I shall sell them, I shall burn them. I would send them back, but the ladies send nothing but their Christian names, and to identify Luise, and Gretchen, and Catherine, and Bettina, is beyond my powers. No!”

When they had ceased laughing the Duke continued his catechism.

“Was it when the great poet G—- (your only rival) paid that handsome compliment to your verses on —-“

“No!” interrupted the poet. “A thousand times no! The great poet praised the verses you allude to simply to cover his depreciation of my ‘Captive Queen,’ which is among my best efforts, but too much in his own style. How Germany can worship his bombastic —- but that’s nothing! No.”

“Was it when you passed accidentally through the streets of Dresden, and the crowd discovered you, and carried you to the hotel on its shoulders?”

The momentary frown passed from Friedrich’s face, and he laughed again.

“And when the men who carried me twisted my leg so that I couldn’t walk for a fortnight, to say nothing of the headache I endured from bowing to the populace like a Chinese mandarin? No!”