by a member of any deadly organization; the assassin was merely one of the millions of dissatisfied poor in the richest country on earth, where he saw liberty and justice becoming as paralytic as in Europe. Did the portent of that assassination never occur to you? And with this spirit abroad in the world we dare over here to play at divine rights, at being hereditary rulers of millions more enlightened than ourselves--we--pygmies--marionettes--who may be born as foolish as the last Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary, who thought that all eagles had two heads, and yet dare to mount a throne and cry ‘I am King!’ No one has ever more devoutly tried to do what he conceived to be his inherited duty than I have done. I have, for many years, been deliberately blind. During these last months in Hungary I have _held_ the scales to my eyes lest they fall off. Last night down there in the crypt, where, if you must know, I went in the hope of finding my old idols, I lost most of those scales. To-day I have lost the last of them. If I had it in my power to do, I would give liberty and the broadest sort of constitutional government to every man that breathes. I am mortified that it took the deprivation of my own liberty to force my brain to acknowledge the truth. I would rather I had been less human and welcomed the truth as the result of much deep and intelligent meditation. But to expect the godlike of one of us of royal blood is beyond reason, and I am thankful that I am not too dense to receive illumination from any source. But I loathe my blood. I hope to God I may live to see every monarch now alive a useful member of a republic and no man degraded by being forced to submit to what he had no hand in making. I am sorry to have detained and agitated you; and for any unintentional rudeness I hope your Majesty will forgive me. For you, until to-day, I have had a great respect. For what you stand for it is impossible that I should ever again have anything but the profoundest contempt. I will not detain you any longer except to repeat that you will save yourself a great deal of trouble if you give up at once this idea of marrying me to any man but the one I shall select for myself.” She no longer looked hideous. The relief of her emotions, the tide of passion which had surged over its dam laden with the profoundest truth of the century, had carried her to the heights of her nature, and she had never been more beautiful--nor more formidable. Not so the Emperor. He was purple, and his heavy underlip trembled. But he preserved his dignity, his soldierly bearing. As she moved aside to let him pass, he bowed courteously to her without speaking and left the room. XXXII The Princess Sarolta, Prince Illehazy, Countess Vilma Festetics, Alexandra Abbott, and Count Zrinyi sat in agitated conclave in the palace of Buda. The Countess Piroska Zápolya was officially in bed with an attack of influenza.