ght, madam,' replied the Prince. 'For six years that we
have been good friends, I have observed you to grow younger.'

'Flatterer!' cried she, and then with a change, 'But why should I say
so,' she added, 'when I protest I think the same? A week ago I had a
council with my father director, the glass; and the glass replied, "Not
yet!" I confess my face in this way once a month. O! a very solemn
moment. Do you know what I shall do when the mirror answers, "Now"?'

'I cannot guess,' said he.

'No more can I,' returned the Countess. 'There is such a choice!
Suicide, gambling, a nunnery, a volume of memoirs, or politics--the last,
I am afraid.'

'It is a dull trade,' said Otto.

'Nay,' she replied, 'it is a trade I rather like. It is, after all,
first cousin to gossip, which no one can deny to be amusing. For
instance, if I were to tell you that the Princess and the Baron rode out
together daily to inspect the cannon, it is either a piece of politics or
scandal, as I turn my phrase. I am the alchemist that makes the
transmutation. They have been everywhere together since you left,' she
continued, brightening as she saw Otto darken; 'that is a poor snippet of
malicious gossip--and they were everywhere cheered--and with that
addition all becomes political intelligence.'

'Let us change the subject,' said Otto.

'I was about to propose it,' she replied, 'or rather to pursue the
politics. Do you know? this war is popular--popular to the length of
cheering Princess Seraphina.'

'All things, madam, are possible,' said the Prince; and this among
others, that we may be going into war, but I give you my word of honour I
do not know with whom.'

'And you put up with it?' she cried. 'I have no pretensions to morality;
and I confess I have always abominated the lamb, and nourished a romantic
feeling for the wolf. O, be done with lambiness! Let us see there is a
prince, for I am weary of the distaff.'

'Madam,' said Otto, 'I thought you were of that faction.'

'I should be of yours, _mon Prince_, if you had one,' she retorted. 'Is
it true that you have no ambition? There was a man once in England whom
they call the kingmaker. Do you know,' she added, 'I fancy I could make
a prince?'

'Some day, madam,' said Otto, 'I may ask you to help make a farmer.'

'Is that a riddle?' asked the Countess.

'It is,' replied the Prince, 'and a very good one too.'

'Tit for tat. I will ask you another,' she returned.