For an hour the first regiment of Dragoons of the Guard had been drawn up on level ground behind a screen of low bushes, waiting the order to engage. For some time the fighting appeared to have ceased around them. Only a shattered gun carriage and the ground, pierced with deep holes like newly dug graves, heaped about with soft, yellowish earth, gave the spot the look of a battlefield. But the conflict was evident enough to the ear. On all sides thundered the cannon, and from the right came also the rattling of musketry. The roar of battle rose and fell like the gamut of a great orchestra executing the “Storm Movement” of the Pastoral Symphony. In the foreground, on a slight elevation, a group of officers were attentively examining the French position. One of them, a Major, stood a little apart smoking a cigarette and gazing dreamily into the distance. He might not, perhaps, have attracted a feminine observer, but a masculine eye would certainly have marked him as a man of striking intellect. He was about thirty, tall, slight, with cold gray eyes, a pale, thin face and pale, sarcastic lips, just shadowed by a delicate auburn mustache. This silent, self-contained [Pg 904]man had about him an air of strange listlessness and disenchantment that made him in every way a contrast to the tanned, sunburnt young fellows who stood about him, all on fire with the eagerness of battle. Taking off his helmet, he passed his hand over his forehead. It was an aristocratic, well-kept hand, with slender, bloodless fingers. The whole appearance of this officer—which even a uniform could not disguise—was that of a person of exceptional distinction, and indeed he was a person of very great distinction, being no other than Prince Louis von Hockstein Falckenbourg Gerau, the head of what was once a family of reigning princes. Early left an orphan, the Prince found himself when he came of age master of an almost unlimited fortune. From his mother, a musician of exquisite sensibility, he had inherited an artistic temperament and keen sense of the beautiful; while from his father, a haughty and somewhat eccentric noble, he had received a disposition of such violence and independence that it brooked no control from outside and recognized no law but its own will. It will take no great effort of the imagination to see how the world had treated the young prince. The Court distinguished him with special attentions; the ladies petted him; the men sought him. In this hot-house atmosphere of high life he came quickly to maturity, and, like most children brought up among older persons without companions of their own age, he was of a thoughtful, even suspicious, temperament. As, in addition to this, he looked at everything from a critical, almost skeptical, point of view, insisting on[Pg 905] getting to the bottom of every question, he did not make the mistake of most young men in his position—the mistake of thinking the attentions paid him homage to his own talent. Perfectly frank with himself, he recognized that they were paid to his title and fortune. “What do these people really know of me?” he often asked himself, on coming home from some Court festival to the solitude of his magnificent palace. “Nothing, and yet they scarcely wait for my mouth to open to applaud my speech! But if all the words I spoke this evening were written down and submitted to a man of sense, his honest verdict would have to be: ‘Well, perhaps this fellow isn’t exactly a fool, but he certainly is mighty little over mediocrity.’ Yet the world persists in treating me as if I were somebody! But it is not me—Louis—that they are really concerned with, but only Prince von Hockstein,” etc. Louis was actually jealous of the Prince. The latter seemed to him an enemy, bent on thwarting and overshadowing his real self, and the noble ambition awoke in him to amount to something, in himself, apart from his rank and fortune. But this was easier said than done; everywhere the Prince von Hockstein, etc., barred the way for Louis and would not let him pass. He enrolled himself at the University—the most aristocratic set among the students hastened to pay him court. The professors even, men whose genius until then he had revered, were overcome with joy when he appeared in their classrooms, and addressed their words markedly to him.[Pg 906] He soon had enough of this, and tried the army. His colonel thanked him for the honor he did the regiment in joining it; his superiors paid him flattering attentions; his fellow officers bored him. Then, too, the pettiness of garrison life was not much to his taste, so he quitted active service, but not until he had been rapidly promoted to the rank of major. Of course, all this time women had played some part in his life. There were a few trifling affairs with actresses that did not go deep, and some passing flirtations with women of the world. These last he quickly found unbearable, for—except in being a thousand times more exacting—the great ladies amounted to no more than did the ballet girls. One experience, however, came near being serious. The Prince, traveling incognito through the Black Forest to the watering-place of Norderney, chanced to take a place in the coupé of the diligence next to a lady also going to Norderney. She was of striking beauty and fascination, and the Prince was completely bewitched. He exerted himself immensely, but his attentions were all received with courteous indifference. Perhaps it was this indifference—a new experience—that charmed him. After he reached Norderney he continued to pay his court. He kept his incognito and simply called himself Herr von Gerau. The lady was surrounded by a crowd of admirers, and accepted Louis’s daily bouquets just as she did those of the others. She treated all her admirers with indifference, possibly to the Prince her manner was a shade colder than to the rest. At this critical moment,[Pg 907] a certain great personage, an acquaintance of Louis, arrived at Norderney, and etiquette required the Prince to pay him a visit of ceremony in full dress uniform. Of course his name and rank could no longer be concealed. The fair lady beheld her admirer in his magnificent blue uniform, and learned who he really was. Immediately she had eyes for no one else, and seemed by smiles and glances to give him every encouragement and to ask pardon for her former neglect. By way of answer, the Prince sent her a package containing his uniform and jeweled pin in the shape of a crown. These were accompanied by a note in which he declared he gave her in perpetuity and in sole proprietorship the only things she had cared for in him. He was on the point of starting to hunt reindeer in Norway when the war of 1870 broke out. He immediately asked leave to join his regiment, and the request, of course, was at once granted. Patriotism and enthusiasm had very little to do with his action. He rejoined his regiment in the first place because it was the correct thing to do, and in the second because he hoped that war might possibly give him some new sensations. Was he again disappointed? He was inclined to think so. Now for two weeks he had been in the enemy’s country, and he had had no extraordinary experience. When you have two good servants and unlimited money, even in a campaign there are few hardships, especially in a victorious army. As for heroic deeds, there had simply been no occasion for them. And the old weariness had come upon him[Pg 908] again, as he stood in front of his regiment, smoking his cigarette. The French artillery was now advancing upon the ditch, and their balls struck the German batteries that it defended, making great havoc. Two regiments of infantry were ordered to the support of the batteries. Marching first came the Third Westphalians. They passed so near the group of officers that Prince Louis could distinguish each face, each expression. The poor fellows had been marching for fourteen hours under the burning August sun. They were covered with dust and sweat and their uniforms were soiled with mud. But in no way did these heroes betray their deadly fatigue. Their eyes, reddened by the heat, flamed with the enthusiasm of war, their dry throats found strength to shout “Hurrah!” The whole regiment forgot their fatigue, and seemed, as they marched under fire, like men refreshed and stimulated by a generous draft. “Poor devils,” thought the Prince, “they are running to death as if it were a kermess dance. What are they thinking about?—nothing, probably. They are driven on by a blind desire of conquest. What good will victory do them? How will it better their lot—if they have the luck to escape death? Glory for Germany? Perhaps for me that might be worth something, hardly for them. Victory might add to the splendor of my uniform. Still, I don’t know, I wear it so seldom. Perhaps if I go to Japan next year, the Mikado will receive me better if I belong to a victorious nation, but whether we beat the French or they[Pg 909] beat us, I suspect I will always get the same welcome at the Jockey Club in Paris and the Mediterranean Club in Nice. But those nobodies over there, what will their glorious and victorious country do for them? They won’t get much of it in their village. All they know of the ‘Fatherland’ is the taxgatherers and the police, and they will be what they have always been. And yet there they are full of enthusiasm, I can’t deny it—it shakes even me. Well, we ought to thank the poets who sing about patriotism and military glory, and the schoolmasters who teach the people’s hearts the poets’ words. Marvelous power of a word that can lead a prosaic peasant to give his life for an abstraction, an imagination!” But even as with the quickness of lightning these thoughts passed through his mind, the Prince felt a sensation that amazed him. It was a feeling of confusion, of shame. It seemed as if he had been speaking his thoughts aloud and as if a group of grave and noble figures had listened to his words, and were now looking at him in a silence full of pity and disdain. Down in the depths of his soul, where the mocking light of his skeptical spirit failed to penetrate, he seemed to hear an imperial voice rebuking him and silencing his doubt. “I am right,” his mind said. “You are wrong,” declared the voice. “Well, anyway, I shall not deceive myself with romantic dreams,” cried Reason; but already it seemed to the Prince that the words were spoken by a stranger, and he shrank back from them indignantly. [Pg 910] By this time the Third Westphalians had covered the entire slope of the ditch, the sharpshooters were already at the top. There was a moment’s hesitation, for the first heads that appeared above the ditch called forth a deadly fire from the enemy. Several men fell, but those behind pressed on, and in spite of their terrible fatigue, tried with hands and feet to make the ascent that would have been play to men in good condition. As they marched on, all on fire with noble ardor, Heine’s words came back to the Prince: “How I love the dear, good Westphalians! They are so sure, so firm, so faithful. It is magnificent to see them on the field of battle, those heroes, with their lion hearts.” Pushed on by their “lion hearts,” the Westphalians continued to scramble up the slope, expending their last breath in the effort to go forward. But the French, maddened by this outburst, forced them, after a terrible combat man to man, to recoil to the bottom of the ditch, which began to fill up with heaps of dead and wounded. The survivors tried to retreat up the other slope, and now the spectators above beheld a heart-rending sight. The men were so completely exhausted that they could not make the easy ascent. The muskets fell from their hands, and the French made many prisoners. Above there was the greatest excitement. The Eighth Westphalians arrived, commanded by the General in person, and started immediately to the aid of its comrades. The French were forced back and many prisoners were recaptured. But the advantage was of short duration. New masses of the enemy’s infantry[Pg 911] were coming up, and in the distance the cavalry were seen approaching. Prince Louis had followed the combat with increasing emotion—he felt his heart beat alternately with joy and fear. It seemed to him now that the critical moment had come, and he read the same impression in the faces of the other officers. The Colonel called his orderly and sprang into the saddle. The trumpets sounded, and a sudden movement passed through the regiment. In a moment every one was on horseback, sabres clinked against the spurs, the horses neighed. Again the trumpets sounded and the whole troop began the march. Prince Louis glanced at his watch—it was half-past six in the evening. As he rode along at the head of the first squadron, a short distance from the Colonel and adjutants, he felt himself seized by a sensation he had never in his life experienced. The madness, the feverish impatience of a moment before had melted away with the consciousness of acting for a given purpose. The knowledge of activity, of seeking a definite end, brought him rest. He stopped looking for reasons; he thought no more of criticizing. The spirit of doubt was driven out of him. He obeyed with the ardor, the belief, the simple obedience of a child, the irresistible command that was pushing his entire being forward. This man, so proud of his ego, he, who had always sought happiness by the unlimited activity of his personal will, now found that will so crushed and bound that it was scarcely perceptible. A Power, call it Natural Law, call it the Divine[Pg 912] Will, that is ever manifesting itself by the course of history, had entered into him and taken possession of him. He was no longer master of his destiny, he was taken out of himself by a stranger—was it a supernatural vision, a great genius, a Delivering Christ?—Louis felt himself only a screw, a rivet in the machinery of the world’s history, and strange to say this dissolving of his individuality in a great whole, as complete as the melting of a piece of sugar in a glass of water, caused him neither sorrow nor regret. On the contrary, a strange pleasure penetrated his entire being and made him tremble with joy. He felt himself very small, yet at the same time he saw in himself something great that transcended the limit of his own personality. In a word, he had found at last that sensation he had always desired. He was delivered from his prison of egotism and at large among great generalities. The regiment was now descending the slope, avoiding the heaps of dead and wounded. The horses quickly ascended the opposite side and, the trumpets sounding, the regiment separated into two lines and advanced. What followed might have been taken for a representation of the conflict of the gods in Valhalla. The French cuirassiers, riding toward the sun, were illumined with an unearthly light, their shining sabres seemed like tongues of flame, their cuirasses and helmets shone like white-hot steel. The German dragoons had their backs to the sun, and the long black shadows of horses and horsemen galloping ahead along[Pg 913] the ground made it look as if sombre ghosts were leading the living to the attack. The two troops met with a terrible shock. The sublime vision of the moment before was gone, and in its stead was a horrible, confused mêlée. Men fought hand to hand, plunging their sabres into the bodies of their enemies, without knowing exactly what they did. The French were forced to retreat, still fighting. The Germans pursued, hurrahing with joy, their horses dripping with blood. The pursuit stopped near a little brook. Prince Louis felt as if he were awaking from a dream; he caressed his noble horse and looked about him. The enemy’s artillery was being drawn off; the survivors of the cuirassiers followed the artillery. In the distance the columns of infantry were also retreating, keeping up an irregular, ineffectual fire. “It is strange,” observed a young lieutenant near the Prince, showing him his sabre, “my sabre is covered with blood up to the hilt, and yet I have not the least idea how it happened.” The Prince was about to answer, when he felt a terrible blow on his chest, as if he had been struck by the hand of an invisible giant, or by the horn of a bull. He put his hand to his breast. It was covered with blood. He just realized that he must have been struck by a ball, when he lost consciousness. When he came to himself, he was lying on the trampled ground, his head resting against a saddle. His tunic was unfastened and his comrades were standing about him. He felt no pain, only a sensation[Pg 914] of great fatigue, hard to describe, a little like that of a man who is drowning. “How do you feel, Prince?” asked the lieutenant-colonel, who was bending over him. “It seems to me,” he answered, in a voice that could scarcely be heard, a slight smile on his lips, “as if I must cry: ‘Long live the King, long live the Fatherland’.” These were his last words.