his company this time;--the Kaiser himself, however, walking,
nearly roasted in the sun, in heavy purple-velvet cloak, with a
big wax-candle, very superfluous, guttering and blubbering in the
right hand of him, along the streets of Augsburg. Kur-Brandenburg,
Kur-Mainz, high cousins of George, were at this Diet of Augsburg;
Kur-Brandenburg (Elector Joachim I., Cicero's son, of whom we have
spoken, and shall speak again) being often very loud on the
conservative side; and eloquent Kur-Mainz going on the
conciliatory tack. Kur-Brandenburg, in his zeal, had ridden on to
Innspruck, to meet the Kaiser there, and have a preliminary word
with him. Both these high Cousins spoke, and bestirred themselves,
a good deal, at this Diet. They had met the Kaiser on the plains
of the Lech, this morning; and, no doubt, gloomed unutterable
things on George and his Speech. George could not help it.

Till his death in 1543, George is to be found always in the front
line of this high Movement, in the line where Kur-Sachsen, John
the Steadfast (DER BESTANDIGE), and young Philip the Magnanimous
of Hessen were, and where danger and difficulty were. Readers of
this enlightened gold-nugget generation can form to themselves no
conception of the spirit that then possessed the nobler kingly
mind. "The command of God endures through Eternity,
Verbum Dei Manet In AEternum," was the Epigraph and
Life-motto which John the Steadfast had adopted for himself;
"V. D. M. I. AE.," these initials he had engraved on all the
furnitures of his existence, on his standards, pictures, plate, on
the very sleeves of his lackeys,--and I can perceive, on his own
deep heart first of all. V. D. M. I. E.:--or might it not be read
withal, as Philip of Hessen sometimes said (Philip, still a young
fellow, capable of sport in his magnanimous scorn),