With these words he hurried back into the avenue. But when master and man had reached the spot where the body had lain, it was no longer visible. Marks of blood and of trampling feet, two broken swords and a ragged hat, were the only evidences that remained of the late combat. "Gone!" cried Otmar. "The other ruffians have returned and carried him off, _eb adta_!" exclaimed Farkas, with intense vexation. "Let us follow on their traces!" said the young noble. "See here! This way through the thicket! There are marks of broken boughs." And pushing his way through the bushes, he entered the dark wood, followed by his attendant. A moment afterwards the avenue was illuminated by the torches of the domestics from the archbishop's palace. CHAPTER III. "Spirit of men, Thou heart of our great enterprise, how much I love these voices in thee!" BEN. JONSON. "Love is ambitious, and loves majesty." DECKER. Upon an imposing hill, which rises from the Danube's banks, and frowns over the city of Presburg, still stand the extensive ruins of a fine old castle, which was destroyed by fire at the commencement of the present century, but which, at this period of history, was generally occupied as a residence by the rulers of Hungary, when they paid a royal visit to their Hungarian capital; and in the large hall of state in this immense building it was, that the Diet of the four orders of the kingdom, convoked by Maria Theresa, had assembled on the eleventh of September--the morning following that evening so eventful to Otmar and his young love. At the upper end of this large apartment, a throne had been arranged for the young Queen. In the spaces between the old portraits of the heads of the House of Hapsburg, which adorned the walls, were now displayed Hungarian banners. On either side of the throne, awaiting the arrival of Maria Theresa, were several of her German ministers and household; and, as it was well known that those immediately about her person had protested energetically against her appeal to her Hungarian subjects, these German servants of the Queen were regarded with no looks of good-will or sympathy by those who filled the hall.