her virtuous hesitation, for Madame de Ruth, who had returned
to Stuttgart post-haste on hearing of his Highness's advent, constantly
counselled her to hold back. Wilhelmine herself realised that a battle's
importance is generally gauged by its difficulty, and the ultimate
victory more highly prized if hardly won. Sometimes she wondered why she
knew these things, and laughingly she told Madame de Ruth of this.

'Dear child,' said the old woman with her thin, satirical smile, 'we
women come into the world knowing such things; whereas men--poor, beloved
fools!--need experience, philosophy, and the Lord knows what, to teach
them. Alas! by the time they have learned they no longer need their
knowledge, for by that time cruel old age has got them in its grey, dull
clutches.'

Another factor in Wilhelmine's life at that time was the Duke's friend
Baron Forstner, a man of excellent and sterling qualities, but one of
those unfortunate mortals cursed with a lugubrious manner which makes
their goodness seem to be but one more irritating characteristic of a
tiresome personality. Forstner was genuinely devoted to the Duke; he had
been the companion of the Prince's childhood, had shared his studies,
and had followed him on his travels to the various European courts and in
the campaigns where Eberhard Ludwig had so mightily distinguished
himself. How cruel it is that devotion may be so entirely masked by some
wearisome trait, as to turn the whole affection into a source of
irritation to its object! Forstner perpetually reminded his Highness of
his duty.

Now Eberhard Ludwig was possessed of a high regard for that stern code of
life which is called Duty; he had all a soldier's respect for rule, for
obedience, all a gentleman's reverence for honour and truth; yet these
things, as presented by Forstner, were to him odious, and his first
impulse was to go counter to any advice proffered in the drab-coloured
guise of Forstner's counsel, and by his deep, dreary voice.

'L'osseux,' the Bony One, Madame de Ruth dubbed him; and truly the
sobriquet was justified, for the man was so long and thin as to give the
impression of bones strung on strings. He walked in jerks: his flat,
narrow feet posed precisely, the head held forward, like some gaunt bird
seeking with its lengthy beak for any meagre grain which might chance in
its way. Somehow one felt the grain he sought must be meagre. 'The good
God wills that Forstner lives,' said Madame de Ru