into deep meditation. She knew the horrors of a revolution, and
only saw in this new one a repetition of those scenes of terror
which she had experienced, and which had driven her out into the
world, up into the north, where she struggled on, until at length
she found a home with Otto's grandfather--a resting abode.

Everything great and beautiful powerfully affected Otto's soul;
only in one direction had he shown no interest--in the political
direction, and it was precisely politics which had most occupied
the grandfather in his seclusion. But Otto's soul was too
vivacious, too easily moved, too easily carried away by what lay
nearest him. "One must first thoroughly enter into life, before the
affairs of the world can seize upon us!" said he. "With the greater
number of those who in their early youth occupy themselves with
politics, it is merely affectation. It is with them like the boy
who forces himself to smoke tobacco so as to appear older than he
really is." Beyond his own country, France was the only land which
really interested Otto. Here Napoleon had ruled, and Napoleon's
name had reached his heart--he had grown up whilst this name passed
from mouth to mouth; the name and the deeds of the hero sounded to
him, yet a boy, like a great world adventure. How often had he
heard his grandfather, shaking his head, say, "Yes, now newspaper
writers have little to tell since Napoleon is quiet." And then he
had related to him of the hero at Arcole and among the Pyramids, of
the great campaign against Europe, of the conflagration at Moscow,
and the return from Elba.

Who has not written a play in his childhood? Otto's sole subject
was Napoleon; the whole history of the hero, from the snow-batteries
at Brienne to the rocky island in the ocean. True, this poem was