You speak gravely
of your approaching marriage, and as yet are not even engaged. You
speak of your bride, but Mademoiselle Orguelin has not yet accepted
you, and whether she will or not, you say, depends on me."
"Yes, on your majesty, for this girl, who is as proud of her three
millions as if it were the oldest and most illustrious pedigree,
consents to be my wife only on the condition that she is
acknowledged at court, and has access, as Countess Rhedern, to all
court festivities."
"Truly this is a great pretension!" exclaimed the queen, angrily. "A
pedlar's daughter who carries arrogance so far as to wish to appear
at the court of the King of Prussia! This can never be, and never
could I advocate such an innovation: it is destructive, and only
calculated to diminish the prestige of the nobility, and to deprive
it of its greatest and best privilege--that privilege which entitles
it alone to approach royalty. It was this view which prevented me
from receiving the so-called Count Neal at my court, although my son
the king admits him to his presence, and desires that I also should
recognize this count of his creation. But, as a queen and a lady, I
can never do this. There must be a rampart between royalty and the
low and common world, and a pure and unblemished nobility alone can
form this rampart.
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