y of his friends were at
present in Potsdam. D'Argens was in France, with his young wife, Barbe
Cochois; Voltaire, after a succession of difficulties and quarrels, had
departed forever; General Rothenberg had also departed to a land from
which no one returns--he was dead! My lord marshal had returned to
Scotland, Algarotti to Italy, and Bastiani still held his office in
Breslau. Sans-Souci, that had been heretofore the seat of joy and
laughing wit--Sans-Souci was now still and lonely; youth, beauty, and
gladness had forsaken it forever; earnestness and duty had taken their
place, and reigned in majesty within those walls that had so often
echoed with the happy laugh and sparkling jest of the king's friends and
contemporaries.

Frederick thought of this, as with folded hands he walked up and down,
and recalled the past. Sunk in deep thought, he remained standing before
a picture that hung on the wall above his secretary, which represented
Barbarina in the fascinating costume of a shepherdess, as he had seen
her for the first time ten years ago; it had been painted by Pesne for
the king. What recollections, what dreams arose before the king's soul
as he gazed at that bewitching and lovely face; at those soft, melting
eyes, whose glance had once made him so happy! But that was long ago;
it had passed like a sunbeam on a rainy day, it had been long buried in
clouds. These remembrances warmed the king's heart as he now stood so
solitary and loveless before this picture; and he confessed to that
sweet image, once so fondly loved, what he had never admitted to
himself, that his heart was very lonely.

But these painful recollections, these sad thoughts, did not last. The
king roused himself from those dangerous dreams, and on leaving the
picture cast upon it almost a look of hatred.

"This is folly," he said; "I will to work."

He approached the secretary, and seized the sealed letters and packets
that were lying there. "A letter and packet from the queen," he said,
wonderingly opening the letter first. Casting a hasty glance through it,
a mocking smile crossed his face. "She sends me a French translation of
a prayer-book," he said, shrugging his shoulders. "Poor queen! her heart
is not yet dead, though, by Heaven! it has suffered enough."

He threw the letter carelessly aside, without glancing at the book; its
sad, pleading prayer was but an echo of the thoughts trembling in her
heart.

"Bagatelles! nothing more," he m