se), Christiane Auguste von Gleichen held
the highest rank. Among the other ladies who had a right to be there,
was a Fran von Pfaffenrath, born Countess Solms, but yet only the wife
of a councillor, who had only just been ennobled, and to whom she had
been married in a not very regular way, for her husband had been tutor
in her parents' house: she had eloped with him, and had after many
troubles accomplished a reconciliation with her mother, and obtained a
diploma of nobility for her husband. Now Duke Anthony Ulrich, who was
residing at Frankfort, protected her, because, as the court whispered,
her sister had the advantage of being in the good graces of the old
gentleman. Naturally, she ought only to have ranked according to the
patent of her husband, but alas! she raised pretensions because she was
of high nobility. When therefore in October 1746, the doors of the
dining-room were to be opened, and the page was standing ready to
repeat grace, the Master-of-the-Horse entered and said to the _Frau
Landjaegermeisterin_: "His most Serene Highness has commanded that the
Frau von Pfaffenrath shall take rank before all other ladies." Frau von
Gleichen answered that she would never consent to that, but the Frau
von Pfaffenrath had placed herself favourably and took the precedence
of the _Frau Landjaegermeisterin_ before she could prevent it. Yet this
determined lady was far from submitting tamely. She hastened round the
table to the Duke's cabinet minister, and declared to him, as became a
lady of character after such an insult: "If _Frau von_ Pfaffenrath
again goes before me to table, I will pull her back even to the
sacrifice of her hooped gown, and will say a few words which will be
very disagreeable to her." The cabinet minister was in a great
embarrassment, for he knew the resolute character of _Frau von_
Gleichen. At last he advised her to rise from the table before grace,
then she would at all events go out first and so get the precedence.
Thus the _Landjaegermeisterin_ maintained her place, but she was much
offended, and so was the whole court, which split into two parties.
This quarrel of the ladies made a commotion in the whole of the holy
Roman Empire, occasioned a campaign between Gotha and Meiningen, and
was only ended by Frederick the Great, in a manner which reminds one of
the fable of the lion which took the royal share for himself.

_Frau von_ Gleichen appealed to the absent Duke for reparation. She
only rece