As far as the above description goes, any fairly practised hand might have invented the whole series of letters. Even Professor Palmblad does not venture to guess when the correspondence began. His assertion that Königsmark was at Hanover, in the military service of that state, in 1685, is disproved by the painstaking author of ‘Die Herzogin von Ahlden,’ who finds Königsmark settled there not till 1688. Palmblad, with his earlier date, points laughingly to the birth of Sophia Dorothea’s daughter, in 1687; and asks if the Prussian royal family, into which that daughter married, has in its veins the blood of Guelph or of Königsmark. In like easy manner, regardless of chronology, the Jacobites in England used to speak of the son of George I. as ‘Young Königsmark!’ When Königsmark was absent campaigning, the princess, says Palmblad, sent him her portrait, and he returned a gift of his own portrait, painted expressly for her in Brussels. Whereupon, Palmblad says, ‘the princess forwarded to him her diary.’ This has not yet been found or forged, but Palmblad has no doubt as to the nature of its contents. The whole story is founded on letters which the least scrupulous of autograph dealers would hesitate to warrant. What follows is to be read with the remembrance that the plotters against Sophia Dorothea never lost sight of her or of the count. They could not make a step without being observed by spies, employed by principals who wished to destroy both the princess and Königsmark. Through the very eye-holes of the tapestried figures in the palace human eyes peered, in search of evidence to work the ruin of those two friends. Not finding it, Königsmark was secretly murdered, and Sophia Dorothea shut up for the remainder of her life, on no other charge than that of deserting her husband’s society and refusing to return to it. This is Palmblad’s story: ‘During Königsmark’s presence at court, he was generally admitted to the princess by her confidant, after midnight, and he sometimes remained four-and-twenty hours with her. He had previously declared himself indisposed and under medical regimen as an excuse for appearing to keep within doors. Aye,’ adds Palmblad, bolder grown, ‘the princess herself glided secretly at night into Königsmark’s quarters’ (which were at some distance from the palace). ‘She speaks in the most fervid expressions of her love, her ‘_ardeur_,’ and declares herself ready to sacrifice for him her reputation, and to accompany him to the remotest corner of the world! Königsmark hesitates; his fortune is not secure, his position uncertain, and he must first seek glory and riches in war: but her prayers detain him in Hanover.’