-"

"Nobody rules me," interrupted he indignantly, and a flush of anger or
shame suffused his face. "No, nobody rules me, and I shall never be
subject to any other will than my own."

"So you say now, Frederick, while you look into my eyes, while you are at
my side. But to-morrow, when I am no longer by, when your tutor shall have
proved with his cold, matter-of-fact arguments that the poor Princess
Ludovicka is no fit match for the Electoral Prince of
Brandenburg--to-morrow, when your tutor will chide his beloved
pupil for ever having allowed so foolish a love to enter his
heart, then--"

"I am a pupil no longer," interrupted he with glowing cheek. "I am
seventeen years old, and no tutor has any more power over me."

She seemed not to have heard him, and continued in her sweet, melancholy
voice: "To-morrow, when perhaps another messenger comes to summon you
home, when he brings you a letter from your father with the command to set
forth immediately, in which you are informed that he has selected a bride
for you, oh, then will the Electoral Prince Frederick William be naught
but the obedient son, who obeys his father's commands, who leaves this
country to seek his native land, and to wed the bride who has been chosen
for him by his father."

"No!" shouted the Electoral Prince fiercely, while he leaped up from the
divan, and stamped his foot upon the ground--"I say no, and once more no.
I shall not do what they order. I shall only follow my own will. And it is
my will, my fixed, unalterable will, to make you my wife, and this will I
shall carry into effect, despite my father, the German Emperor, and the
whole world. Ludovicka, I here offer you my hand. Do you accept it? Will
you be my wife?"

With a countenance irradiated by energy, pride, and love he held out his
hand to her, and smilingly she laid her own small hand in his. "Yes," she
said, "I will be your wife. With pride and joy I accept your beloved hand,
and swear that I love you, and will honor and obey you as my lord and my
beloved!"

He sank upon his knees before her, and kissed the hand which rested in his
own. "Ludovicka Hollandine, Princess of the Palatinate," he said, with
distinct and solemn voice, "I, Frederick William, Electoral Prince of
Brandenburg, vow and swear hereby to love and be faithful to you ever as
your wedded husband."

"I accept your oath, and return it!" she cried joyfully. "I, too, swear to
love and be ever true to you, and to ta