oble poet; his broken
eyes are turned to heaven; his blue, cold lips are opened and wearily
stammering a few disconnected words. Perhaps he thinks in this last hour
of the last words of his last poem. Perhaps his stiffening lips murmured
these words which his mangled hand had written just before the battle:

"Death for one's fatherland is ever honorable.
How gladly will I die that noble death
When my destiny calls!"

Yes, death might have been beautiful, but fate is never propitious to
German poets. It would have been noble and sweet to die in the wild
tumult of battle, under the sound of trumpets, amid the shouts of
victory; sweet thus, with a smile upon the lip to yield up the immortal
spirit.

Ewald von Kleist, the German poet, received his death-wound upon the
field of battle, but he did not die there; he lives, he knows that the
battle is lost, that his blood has been shed in vain. The Cossack has
come down into his grave--with greedy eyes he gazes at the rich booty.
This bleeding, mangled body--this is to the Cossack not a man, it is
only a uniform which is his; with hands trembling with greed he tears it
from the quivering, bleeding form. What to him is the death-rattle and
the blood--even the bloody shirt dying frame. [Footnote: "History of the
Seven Years' War."--Thiebault, 363.] The Prussian warrior, the German
poet, lay there naked, his own blood alone covered his wounded body,
wrapped it in a purple mantle, worthy of the poet's crown with which his
countrymen had decked his brow.

But Ewald von Kleist is no longer a poet or a hero--he is a poor,
suffering, tortured child of earth; he lies on the damp ground, he
pleads for a few rags to cover his wounds, into which the muddy water of
the hole in which he lies is rushing.

And now fate seems favorable. A Russian officer is riding by--he takes
pity on the naked man with the gaping wounds; he throws him a soldier's
old mantle, a piece of bread, and a half gulden. [Footnote: "Seven
Years' War," 353.] The German poet receives the alms of the Russian
thankfully--he covers himself with the cloak, he tries to eat the bread.

But destiny is never propitious to German poets. The Cossacks swarm
again upon the battle-field, and again they approach the groaning
warrior in the open grave; he has no longer a glittering uniform, but
the Cossack takes all; the poor old mantle excites his greed--he tears
it from the unresisting soldier; he opens his hands