, who had obtained such honor.

Fame, fame! again echoed in Ulrich's soul; if there is a word, which
raises a man above himself and implants his own being in that of millions
of fellow-creatures, it is this.

And now he urged one steed after another until it broke down, giving
himself no rest even at night; half an hour's ride outside of Madrid he
overtook the Venetian, and passed by him with a courteous greeting.

The king was not in the capital, and he went on without delay to the
Escurial.

Covered with dust, splashed from head to foot with mud, bruised, tortured
as if on the rack, he clung to the saddle, yet never ceased to use whip
and spur, and would trust his message to no other horseman.

Now the barren peaks of the Guadarrama mountains lay close before him,
now he reached the first workshops, where iron was being forged for the
gigantic palace in process of building. How many chimneys smoked, how
many hands were toiling for this edifice, which was to comprise a royal
residence, a temple, a peerless library, a museum and a tomb.

Numerous carts and sledges, on which blocks of light grey granite had
been drawn hither, barred his way. He rode around them at the peril of
falling with his horse over a precipice, and now found himself before a
labyrinth of scaffolds and free-stone, in the midst of a wild, grey,
treeless mountain valley. What kind of a man was this, who had chosen
this desert for his home, in life as well as in death! The Escurial
suited King Philip, as King Philip suited the Escurial. Here he felt most
at ease, from here the royal spider ceaselessly entangled the world in
his skilful nets.

His majesty was attending vespers in the scarcely completed chapel. The
chief officer of the palace, Fray Antonio de Villacastin, seeing Ulrich
slip from his horse, hastened to receive the tottering soldier's tidings,
and led him to the church.

The 'confiteor' had just commenced, but Fray Antonio motioned to the
priests, who interrupted the Mass, and Ulrich, holding the prophet's
standard high aloft, exclaimed: "An unparalleled victory!--Don Juan
. . . October 7th . . . ! at Lepanto--the Ottoman navy totally
destroyed . . . !"

Philip heard this great news and saw the standard, but seemed to have
neither eyes nor ears; not a muscle in his face stirred, no movement
betrayed that anything was passing in his mind. Murmuring in a sarcastic,
rather than a joyous tone: "Don Juan has dared much," he gave a sig