owd before
the palace. Presently she appeared in the balcony, and all saw the
traces of long anguish in the lovely face, now bright with grateful
smiles.

After a solemn service in the Dom, the king and queen drove through
the illuminated city to the opera-house. "The queen sat beside her
husband"--so wrote Fouque afterward--"and as she talked she often
raised her eyes to him with a very touching expression.... Our
beloved queen has thanked us with tears. Bonaparte has dimmed those
heavenly eyes ... and we must do all we can to make them sparkle
again."

The bare walls, the empty cabinets of the palace, accorded with the
almost ascetic habits now maintained there. Self-denial was made
easy by one belief, that Prussia would arise from her great
suffering stronger than before. The king and queen were not left to
work alone toward that high end. Able generals replaced those who,
through treachery or faint-heartedness, had surrendered the
fortresses. Stein, now chief minister, curtailed the rights of the
nobles, and gave the serfs an interest in guarding the soil they
tilled; while Scharnhorst, by an ingenious evasion of Napoleon's
edict limiting the Prussian army, contrived to have 200,000 men
rapidly drilled and trained. The universities founded at Berlin and
Breslau became the head-quarters of secret societies for the
deliverance of the Fatherland. Princes and professors, merchants
ruined by the Berlin decrees, and peasants ground down by French
exactions, joined the Jugendbund, and implicitly obeyed the orders
of its unseen heads. Through town and country spread that vast
brotherhood, fired by the songs of Tieck and Arnim to live or die
for Prussia.

And Louise watched thankfully the dawning promise of better days,
"though, alas! we may die before they come."

Perhaps that sad presentiment haunted her husband too. If she jested
with her children he would say wistfully, "The queen is quite
herself to-day. What a blessing it will be if her mind recovers its
joyous tone!"

That spring Louise was attacked by spasms of the heart. They did not
last long, and when the court moved to Potsdam she seemed to regain
strength, and showed much interest in discussing with Bishop Eylert
how best to train her boys so that they might serve their country.
Though very weak, she accompanied her family to Hohengieritz, the
king perforce returning to Berlin. The loving eyes that watched her
saw signs of amendment, but early on Monday