My admonitions were given aloud, and in a tone of command; but I perceived that they failed to create any impression upon my moustached neighbors. I might have ordered nectar or hypocras, for all that they seemed to care about me. I raked up in memory all the impertinent and insolent things Henri Heine had ever said of Austria; I bethought me how they tyrannized in the various provinces of their scattered empire, and how they were hated by Hun, Slavac, and Italian; I revelled in those slashing leading articles that used to show up the great but bankrupt bully, and I only wished I was “own correspondent” to something at home to give my impressions of “Austria and her military system.” Little as you think of that pale sad-looking stranger, who sits sipping his wine in solitude at the foot of the table, he is about to transmit yourselves and your country to a remote posterity. “Ay!” muttered I, “to be remembered when the Danube will be a choked-up rivulet, and the park of Schônbrunn a prairie for the buffalo.” I am not exactly aware how or why these changes were to have occurred, but Lord Macaulay's New Zealander might have originated them. While I thus mused and brooded, the tramp of four horses came clattering down the street, and soon after swept into the arched doorway of the inn with a rolling and thunderous sound. “Here he comes; here he is at last! said a young officer, who had rushed in haste to the window; and at the announcement a very palpable sentiment of satisfaction seemed to spread itself through the company, even to the grim old field-marshal, who took his pipe from his mouth to say,-- “He is in time,--he saves 'arrest!'” As he spoke, a tall man in uniform entered the room, and walking with military step till he came in front of the General, said, in a loud but respectful voice,-- “I have the honor to report myself as returned to duty.” The General replied something I could not catch, and then shook him warmly by the hand, making room for him to sit down next him. “How far did your Royal Highness go? Not to Coire?” said the General. “Far beyond it, sir,” said the other. “I went the whole way to the Splügen, and if it were not for the terror of your displeasure, I 'd have crossed the mountain and gone on to Chiavenna.” The fact that I was listening to the narrative of a royal personage was not the only bond of fascination to me, for somehow the tone of the speaker's voice sounded familiarly to my ears, and I could have sworn I had heard it before. As he was at the same side of the table with myself, I could not see him; but while he continued to talk, the impression grew each moment more strong that I must have met him previously.