"You dare to insult me!" he cried. "You are impudent enough to charge me with perjury! You--"The archduke on seeing his brother so close before him, furious and with clinched fist, started back a few steps. "Your majesty," he said, "I am sure you do not intend to insult your brother. Pray take your hand away, for if it should touch my face, my forehead, Ishould be obliged to forget that you are the emperor, that you are my brother, and should demand satisfaction of you.""The emperor would not give satisfaction to a rebel," said Francis, dropping his arm slowly; "he would crush the rebel by a word, and deliver the traitor into the hands of his judges.""Well, then, do so," exclaimed John; "punish me, let me expiate with my blood the boldness with which I reminded you of the sacred promise which you gave to the Tyrolese. But do not forget your word;do not abandon the faithful Tyrol; do not destroy the only hope of these honest, innocent children of nature, who confide so touchingly in their emperor! Oh, your majesty, let us both forget the vehement words which anger and grief caused us to utter just now! I implore your majesty's forgiveness--I confess that I sinned grievously against my emperor. But now have mercy in your turn! See, I bow to you, I kneel down before you, and implore you, by your imperial honor and in the name of the Tyrol, do not abandon the Tyrol and its commander-in-chief, Andreas Hofer, and do not forget your solemn promise that you would never consent to a treaty of peace that would not forever incorporate the Tyrol with your states. You want to make peace with Napoleon; but the treaty has not been proclaimed yet, the world does not know of it yet, and it is still possible for your majesty to break off the negotiations. Oh, do so, your majesty;redeem the word you pledged to the Tyrol, and do not conclude a peace which will not indissolubly unite the Tyrol with your monarchy. Permit the Tyrolese at least to conquer their liberty once more, and, after they have done so, protect it. Send me to the Tyrol, permit me to place myself at the head of the brave mountaineers, and you shall see that the Tyrolese will rise as one man and fight with the courage of lions. Oh, your majesty, send me to the Tyrol, that the Tyrolese and the whole world may learn that the emperor of Austria keeps his word and does not abandon them, and that he sends his own brother to them in order to tell them that he will not consent to any peace which will not incorporate their country with Austria!"The emperor burst into loud and scornful laughter. "Ah, you are very shrewd, brother," he said; "you think I myself should give you permission to go to the Tyrol and play there, with redoubled splendor, your part as savior and liberator of the province. You think I am ignorant of your nice little plan, and do not know why you wish to go to the Tyrol, and what intentions you entertain in regard to it. Yes, sir, I know all! I am aware of your plans. I know that you are a revolutionist and rebel. You wanted to make yourself sovereign of the Tyrol. That is the reason why you incited the people to rebellion, and intrigued and plotted until the poor peaceable peasants became insurgents and rebels against their Bavarian king, and unfurled the banner of blood with frantic fanaticism. You say thousands have fallen in the Tyrol in the struggle for liberty; you say thousands lie wounded on the gory soil of their native country; that prosperity has disappeared, and poverty and starvation reign in the Tyrol? Well, then, all this is your work; it is your fault. You stirred up the insurrection, and committed the heavy crime of inciting a people to revolution. The Tyrol belonged to Bavaria; the Tyrolese were subjects of the King of Bavaria; nothing gave them the right to shake off the rule of their king and choose another sovereign. And you think I should be so weak as to approve of the bad example set by the Tyrolese, and encourage the crimes committed by the revolutionists? You think I should sanction your work and consecrate your traitorous schemes by permitting you to go to the Tyrol in order to preach insurrection once more, make yourself sovereign of the Tyrol, come to an understanding with M. Bonaparte, and be recognized and confirmed by him as Duke of Tyrol?""Brother," cried John, in dismay, "I--"
"Hush," interrupted the emperor, imperiously; "no one has a right to say a word when I am speaking. I am not speaking to you as your brother, but as your emperor. And as your emperor, I tell you now, you will not go to the Tyrol, you will not dare to cross again the frontiers of the Tyrol without my permission; and I promise you that you will have to wait a long while for this permission. And as your emperor I order you further to inform the Tyrolese that I have concluded peace with France, and to call upon them to lay down their arms and submit to their fate.""Your majesty, never, never will I do that!" cried John.
