“In truth,” replied Drda, “there is little to eat where I have been. The residents are surly; and yet their hospitality will not permit a stranger to depart so long as they can overcome his disposition to be gone.” Here a shade of care she struggled to conceal passed over Lady Ludmila’s face. A sentiment of sympathy did exhibit itself; and a slight tremor of the lip told of an emoticon she would not avow. Drda received scant opportunity for dalliance, however. As Rudolph had seized the entire revenues of Moravia for two years to indemnify himself for military expenses, and as these sources of income constituted in fact the chief dependence of Wenzel for household disbursements, the charges of the palace formed a subject of great anxiety to Zawis. Drda accordingly received commission to investigate the economic condition of Moravia, and endeavor to restore order to the finances of that dukedom, which, according to ancient custom, belonged to Wenzel until the birth of an heir to the crown.
During nearly two years Zawis held his place and his dignity; and Wenzel exhibited a boy’s preference for the counsels of his mother over the petty fractiousness and girlish whims of his queen. With difficulty Wenzel acquired some of the elements of education. He learned to read, and imbibed some ideas of state duties from persons around him; but all mingled with the fictions told to him by idle mercenaries who amused his imagination with tales of magic and of supernatural inventions. He grew suspicious, moody, perplexed by the contradictions between his kingly
