Page:Works of Heinrich Heine 07.djvu/49

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PREFACE.
29

If Napoleon had not then been occupied with far more important matters than thinking of His Majesty Frederic William the Third, he would certainly have put the latter entirely out of the way. Some time after, when all the kings of Europe united in a rabble of conspiracy against Napoleon, and the man of the people succumbed to this émeute of princes, and the Prussian donkey gave the dying lion the final kick, he regretted too late the sin of omission. When he paced up and down in his wooden cage of Saint Helena, and remembered that he had cajoled the Pope and forgotten to crush Prussia, then he gnashed his teeth, and if a rat then came in his way, he stamped upon and killed the poor beast.

Now Napoleon is dead and lies well closed in his leaden coffin under the sands of Longwood on the island of Saint Helena. All round him spreads the sea. Therefore you have nothing to fear. Nor need you fear the last three gods who yet remain in heaven, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; for you are on good terms with


    of promise by a sound document. It is the bulletin of the battle of Jena. In very truth the condition of the King of Prussia was then wretched in the extreme. From this he was rescued by his people, to whom he out of gratitude promised a free constitution. How deeply had he sunk when he lived as a private individual at Königsberg, and read nothing but Lafontaine's tales!"—Note by the German Editor.