"And I? I have waited twenty years, to learn in this hour that all my waiting has been in vain. The Mark is lost, and you, Electoral Prince, with it. I shall tell your mother, I shall tell your friends, that you are lost to us. Farewell, sir, and, if you will, go to Count Schwarzenberg and tell him that I am a traitor and conspirator. I shall go back to Küstrin, and if I were not ashamed, I could weep over myself and you. No, I am not ashamed; look, sir, at least you have constrained me." And the tears gushed from his eyes and fell down upon his grizzly, gray beard. He clapped his hands before his face and sobbed aloud. The Electoral Prince turned pale. He fixed a glance full of confidence and love upon the colonel, and had already opened his lips for an answer, which he would probably have afterward repented, when Burgsdorf suddenly drew his hands from before his face and angrily shook his head. "I am a fool!" he said furiously, "and it would serve me right, old baby that I am, if you should laugh at me. Farewell!" He made a formal military salute, turned abruptly and crossed the apartment to the door. Now, when his hand was already upon the latch, the Electoral Prince made a few steps forward. Colonel Burgsdorf turned about. "Did you call me, sir?" "No, colonel, farewell!" The door closed, and Frederick William was alone. His large blue eyes were directed toward heaven with a look of inexpressible grief. "I have in this hour offered up a greater sacrifice than Abraham, when he sacrificed his son to his God," he whispered. "Has God accepted my sacrifice, will he in his mercy some day reward me for it?" VIII.--THE BANQUET.