The evenings were passed pleasantly and quietly. The countess would read aloud or would play on the zither, with which instrument she would accompany herself while she sang. Thekla would sit at her embroidery and would chat merrily to Malcolm, and ask many questions about Scotland and the life which the ladies led in that, as she asserted, “cold and desolate country.” Sometimes the count's chaplain would be present and would gravely discuss theological questions with the count, wearying Malcolm and Thekla so excessively, that they would slip away from the others and play checkers or cards on a little table in a deep oriel window where their low talk and laughter did not disturb the discussions of their elders. Once Malcolm was absent for two days on a visit to the village in the mountains he had so much aided in defending. Here he was joyfully received, and was glad to find that war had not penetrated to the quiet valley, and that prosperity still reigned there. Malcolm lingered at Mansfeld for some time after he felt that his strength was sufficiently restored to enable him to rejoin his regiment; but he knew that until the spring commenced no great movement of troops would take place, and he was so happy with his kind friends, who treated him completely as one of the family, that he was loath indeed to tear himself away. At last he felt that he could no longer delay, and neither the assurances of the count that the Protestant cause could dispense with his doughty services for a few weeks longer, or the tears of Thekla and her insistance that he could not care for them or he would not be in such a hurry to leave, could detain him longer, and mounting a horse with which the count had presented him he rode away to rejoin his regiment. No military movements of importance had taken place subsequent to the battle of Lutzen. Oxenstiern had laboured night and day to repair as far as possible the effects of the death of Gustavus. He had been left by the will of the king regent of Sweden until the king's daughter, now a child of six years old, came of age, and he at once assumed the supreme direction of affairs. It was essential to revive the drooping courage of the weaker states, to meet the secret machinations of the enemy, to allay the jealousy of the more powerful allies, to arouse the friendly powers, France in particular, to active assistance, and above all to repair the ruined edifice of the German alliance and to reunite the scattered strength of the party by a close and permanent bond of union.