THE PRISONER.


Two years had passed since Frederick von Trenck entered the fortress
of Magdeburg. Two years! What is that to those who live, work,
strive, and fight the battle of life? A short space of time, dashing
on with flying feet, and leaving nothing for remembrance but a few
important moments.

Two years! What is that to the prisoner? A gray, impenetrable
eternity, in which the bitter waters of the past fall drop by drop
upon all the functions of life, and hollow out a grave for the being
without existence, who no longer has the courage to call himself a
man. Two years of anxious waiting, of vain hopes, of ever-renewing
self-deception, of labor without result.

This was Trenck's existence, since the day the doors of the citadel
of Magdeburg closed upon him as a prisoner. He had had many bitter
disappointments, much secret suffering; he had learned to know human
nature in all its wickedness and insignificance, its love of money
and corruption, but also in its greatness and exaltation, and its
constancy and kindness.

Amongst the commandants and officers of the fortress whose duty it
was to guard Trenck, there were many hard and cruel hearts, which
exulted in his tortures, and who, knowing the king's personal enmity
to him, thought to recommend themselves by practising the most
refined cruelties upon the defenceless prisoner. But he had also
found warm human souls, who pitied his misfortunes, and who sought,