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Certain it is that he owes his nobility to his sword; and as certain it is that he is to be counted among the very few who share the Minister's confidence. Von Sohnspeer has certainly performed a thousand brilliant exploits; yet, in my opinion, the not least splendid day of his life was that of the battle of Leipsic.
Von Sohnspeer, on the contrary, danced in the true Vienna style, and whirled like a Dervish. All our good English prejudices against the soft, the swimming, the sentimental, melting, undulating, dangerous waltz would quickly disappear, if we only executed the dreaded manoeuvres in the true Austrian style. One might as soon expect our daughters to get sentimental in a swing.
If you could only have an idea what a relief conversing with you is, after having been dragged by the Crown Prince and whirled by that von Sohnspeer! Heigho! I could almost sigh at the very remembrance of that doleful Polonaise." The lady ended with a faint laugh a sentence which apparently had been commenced in no light vein.
Had the fate of Reisenburg depended on the result of the day, the Field Marshal, and his Generals, and Aides-de-camp, and Orderlies, could not have looked more agitated and more in earnest. Von Sohnspeer had not less than four horses in the field, on every one of which he seemed to appear in the space of five minutes.
In short, every "affair" of any character during the late war was fought over again in the tent of Field Marshal von Sohnspeer. At length from the Archduke Charles and Prince Schwartzenburg, the old grey-headed General got to Polybius and Monsieur Folard; and the Grand Duke now thinking that the "affair" was taking too serious a turn, broke up the party.
About three o'clock Vivian lay down on a sofa, and slept for a few hours. He started often in his short and feverish slumber. His dreams were unceasing and inexplicable. At first von Sohnspeer was their natural hero; but soon the scene shifted. Vivian was at Ems, walking under the well-remembered lime-trees, and with the Baroness.
He thought of her exceeding beauty, her exceeding love. He beheld this rare and lovely creature in the embrace of von Sohnspeer. He turned from the picture in disgust and indignation. She was his. Nature had decreed it. She should be the bride of no other man.
The manoeuvre was perfectly successful; and the troops of Reisenburg, complimented as true Germans, were pitied for their former unhappy fate in being forced to fight against their fatherland, and were immediately enrolled in the allied army; as such, they received a due share of all the plunder. He is a grand genius, young Master von Sohnspeer?" "Decidedly!
Count von Sohnspeer is too celebrated a personage at Reisenburg to have allowed even me to be long ignorant of his history; and as for the rest, as far as I can judge, they are most of them as obscure as myself, and not nearly as interesting as you are!" "Are you an Englishman?" asked the lady. "I am."
Leaning against the trunk of a tree at some little distance, Vivian Grey watched the formation and dissolution of the young Baroness' levee with lively interest. His eyes met the lady's as she raised them from the ground on von Sohnspeer quitting her. She immediately beckoned to Vivian, but without her usual smile. He was directly at her side, but she did not speak.
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