I immediately proceeded in search of Manuel's acquaintance, and after some time reached his house, which was situated in the most obscure part of a narrow and dirty alley. The door was opened by an old negro, and I inquired if Gustavus H---- lived there. "I am the man," returned he; "walk in, master." I entered, and gave him the letter, and at his request seated myself upon an old stool in one corner of the apartment until he read it. "Strange, very strange," muttered he, gazing on me intently. "How is Mr Manuel?"--"Well enough at present," returned I; "but----." He stood still a moment, as if waiting the conclusion of my reply, and then went out of the room, but soon came back, carrying a bag, which he immediately put into my hands. Its weight was immense. "That's all," said he, "I guess Manuel don't intend that I should be his _bankeer_ long. Good morning, sir."
When I returned to my lodgings, I opened the bag, and, to my astonishment, found it full of doubloons. I could not believe that Manuel intended leaving me such a legacy, and went to the prison in the afternoon, that I might see him, and converse with him upon the subject; but I arrived there too late; he had anticipated the law by putting a period to his existence.
Fortune had now bestowed upon me the means of returning to my native country. I communicated this to Elizabeth, and entreated that we might make the journey of life together. She consented, and our mutual happiness was soon as great as our individual misery had been, when fate first brought us together.
"What is the day's news? Tell me something, my dear Colonel, for I am dying of _ennui_," said the showy Prince Charles of Buntzlau, one of the handsomest men about the court, and incomparably the greatest coxcomb.
"Not much more than yesterday," was the answer of Colonel the Baron von Herbert. "The world goes on pretty much the same as ever. We have an Emperor, five Electors, and fifty sovereign princes, in Presburg; men eat, drink, and sleep notwithstanding; and, until there is some change in these points, one day will not differ much from another to the end of the world."
"My dear Colonel," said the Prince, smoothing down the blackest and longest pair of mustaches in the imperial cuirassiers, "you seem to think little of us, the blood, the _couronnés_, the salt of the earth, who preserve Germany from being as vulgar as Holland. But I forget; you have a partiality for the _gens du peuple_."
