louded with sorrow, the eyebrows may not contract with rage, or lead
anyone to suspect, by so much as a twitch or a jerk, that anything in
the world outside has the slightest influence upon the business he may
happen to have on hand.

We may add that the General did not acquire this honourable title in
times of peace. Formerly, beneath the walls of Dresden, when he was a
lieutenant scarcely five-and-twenty years old, he had earned it by
holding a position on the battle-field as stubbornly as if he had really
been made of cast iron, whereby a totally defeated army corps was saved
from the annihilating pursuit of the triumphant foe. Even the enemy's
general had inquired on this occasion: "Who is that man of iron who
will neither break nor bend?" That, then, was how he had won the epithet
"iron."

Subsequently the nickname was applied in jest or flattery; you could
take it as spite, fear, or homage, according to the manner in which it
was pronounced, naturally always behind the General's back, for it went
very hard indeed with the man who ventured to pick a quarrel with him,
and still harder, if possible, with anybody who tried to flatter him.

* * * * *

In the ante-chamber of "the iron man" stood an orderly with a big sealed
dispatch in his hand, a tall grenadier-sort of warrior, with two stiffly
twisted moustachios, the pointed ends of which projected like a couple
of fixed bayonets. A deep scar furrowed each of his red cheeks from end
to end, a living testimony to the fact that this warrior was no mere
sucking soldier. His chin was planted firmly on his stiff cravat and
half hidden by the broad loop of his shako. His jacket was as white as
chalk, and his buttons shone as if they were fresh from the shop. On his
bosom gleamed gloriously the large copper medal of which the veterans of
former days used to be so proud. The warrior was standing motionless
behind the door, with the big sealed dispatch in his bosom; not a muscle
of him moves, his heels are pressed close together at attention, his
eyes now and then glance furtively from side to side, but his neck does
not stir the least little bit.

The oblique motion of his eyes, however, is explicable by the fact that
a trim little wench, a nursery-maid from some village hard by, with a
round radiant face, with her hair trailing down her back in ribboned
pigtails, is rummaging about the room as if she had no end of work to do
there, castin