“Ah, would that we were once beyond the Russian boundary, for then, first, shall we be free.” “Then let us hasten our journey,” said Prince Ulrich; “once in the sledge, and every minute brings us nearer to freedom and happiness. Only hear how the horns are calling us, Anna--they call us to Germany! Come, take your son, wrap him close in your furred mantle, and let us hasten away--away from here!” The prince laid little Ivan in the arms of his wife, and drew her away with him. “Farewell, farewell, my Julia!” cried Anna, as she took he seat in the sledge. “Farewell!” was echoed as a low spirit-breath from the palace. Shuddering, Anna pressed her child to her bosom, and cast an anxiously interrogating glance at her husband, who was sitting by her. “Be calm, tranquillize yourself--it will all be well,” said the latter, with a smile. The postilion blew his horn--the horses started; gayly resounded the tones of the silver bells; with a light whizzing, away flew the sledge over the snow. It bore thence a dethroned emperor and his overthrown family! Rapidly did this richly-laden sledge pass through the streets, but, following it, was a troop of armed, grim-looking soldiers, like unwholesome ravens following their certain booty. At about the same hour, another armed troop passed through the streets of St. Petersburg. With drawn swords they surrounded two closely-covered sledges, the mysterious occupants of which no one was allowed to descry! The train made a halt at the same gate through which the overthrown imperial family had just passed. The soldiers surrounded the sledges in close ranks; no one was allowed a glimpse at those who alighted from them. But these extra precautions of the soldiery were unnecessary, as nobody wished to see the unfortunate objects. Every one timidly glanced aside, that they might not, by looking at the poor creatures, bring themselves into suspicion of favoring men suffering under the displeasure of the government. But though they looked not at them, every one knew who they were; though they dared not speak to each other, every one tremblingly said to himself: “There go Munnich and Ostermann to their trials!” Munnich and Ostermann, the faithful servants of Peter the Great--Munnich, whom Prince Eugene called “his beloved pupil;” Ostermann, of whom the dying Czar Peter said he had never caught him in a fault; that he was the only honest statesman in Russia--Munnich and Ostermann, those two great statesmen to whom Russia was chiefly indebted for what civilization and cultivation she had acquired, were now accused of high-treason, and sent for trial before a commission commanded to find them guilty and to punish them. They were to be put out of the way because they were feared, and to be feared was held as a crime deserving death!