the dispatches, I say,--I am the King of Sweden!"

"You--a girl--king?" was all that the astonished courier could stammer
out. Then, as the real facts dawned upon him, he knelt at the feet of
the young queen and presented his dispatches.

"Withdraw, sir!" said Christina, taking the papers from his hand with
but the scant courtesy of a nod; "we will read these and return a
suitable answer to your master."

The courier withdrew, still dazed at this strange turn of affairs; and
Christina, leaning carelessly against the council-table, opened the
dispatches.

Suddenly she burst into a merry but scarcely lady-like laugh. "Ha,
ha, ha! this is too rare a joke, Karl," she cried. "Lord Chancellor,
Mathias, Torstenson!" she exclaimed, as these members of her council
entered the apartment, "what think you? Here come dispatches from the
Emperor of Germany begging that you, my council, shall consider the
wisdom of wedding me to his son and thereby closing the war! His son,
indeed! Ferdinand the Craven!"

"And yet, Madam," suggested the wise Oxenstiern, "it is a matter that
should not lightly be cast aside. In time you must needs be married. The
constitution of the kingdom doth oblige you to."

"Oblige!" and the young girl turned upon the gray-headed chancellor
almost savagely. "Oblige! and who, Sir Chancellor, upon earth shall
OBLIGE me to do so, if I do it not of mine own will? Say not OBLIGE to
me."

This was vigorous language for a girl of scarce fourteen; but it was
"Christina's way," one with which both the Council and the people soon
grew familiar. It was the Vasa(1) nature in her, and it was always
prominent in this spirited young girl--the last descendant of that
masterful house.

(1) Vasa was the family name of her father and the ancient king of
Sweden.

But now the young Prince Karl Gustavus had something to say.

"Ah, cousin mine," and he laid a strong though boyish hand upon the
young girl's arm. "What need for couriers or dispatches that speak of
suitors for your hand? Am not I to be your husband? From babyhood you
have so promised me."

Christina again broke into a loud and merry laugh.

"Hark to the little burgomaster,"(1) she cried; "much travel hath made
him, I do fear me, soft in heart and head. Childish promises, Karl. Let
such things be forgotten now. You are to be a soldier--I, a queen."

(1) Prince Charles Gustavus, afterward Charles XI., King of Sweden, and
father of the famous Charles XII.,