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  ROYAL HIGHNESS

  Translated from the German of
  THOMAS MANN
  by A. Cecil Curtis

  GROSSET & DUNLAP
  Publishers
  by arrangement with Alfred A. Knopf


  COPYRIGHT, 1909, S. FISCHER, VERLAG

  MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA




CONTENTS


  Prelude                           vii

  CHAPTER I
  The Constriction                    1

  CHAPTER II
  The Country                        25

  CHAPTER III
  Hinnerke the Shoemaker             37

  CHAPTER IV
  Doctor Ueberbein                   64

  CHAPTER V
  Albrecht II                       110

  CHAPTER VI
  The Lofty Calling                 146

  CHAPTER VII
  Imma                              168

  CHAPTER VIII
  The Fulfilment                    265

  CHAPTER IX
  The Rose-Bush                     328




PRELUDE


The scene is the Albrechtstrasse, the main artery of the capital, which
runs from Albrechtsplatz and the Old Schloss to the barracks of the
Fusiliers of the Guard. The time is noon on an ordinary week-day; the
season of the year does not matter. The weather is fair to moderate. It
is not raining, but the sky is not clear; it is a uniform light grey,
uninteresting and sombre, and the street lies in a dull and sober light
which robs it of all mystery, all individuality. There is a moderate
amount of traffic, without much noise and crowd, corresponding to the
not over-busy character of the town. Tram-cars glide past, a cab or two
rolls by, along the pavement stroll a few residents, colourless folk,
passers-by, the public--"people."

Two officers, their hands in the slanting pockets of their grey
great-coats, approach each other; a general and a lieutenant. The
general is coming from the Schloss, the lieutenant from the direction of
the barracks. The lieutenant is quite young, a mere stripling, little
more than a child. He has narrow shoulders, dark hair, and the wide
cheek-bones so common in this part of the world, blue rather
tired-looking eyes, and a boyish face with a kind but reserved
expression. The general has snow-white hair, is tall and
broad-shouldered, altogether a commanding figure. His eyebrows look like
cotton-wool, and his moustache hangs right down over his mouth and chin.
He walks with slow deliberation, his sword rattles on the asphalt, his
plume flutters in the wind, and at every step he takes the big red lapel
of his coat flaps slowly up and down.

And so these two draw near each other. Can this rencontre lead to any
complication? Impossible. Every observer can foresee the course this
meeting will naturally take. We have on one side and the other age and
youth, authority and obedience, years of services and docile
apprenticeship--a mighty hierarchical gulf, rules and prescriptions,
separate the two. Natural organization, take thy course! And, instead,
what happens? Instead, the following surprising, painful, delightful,
and topsy-turvy scene occurs.

The general, noticing the young lieutenant's approach, alters his
bearing in a surprising manner. He draws himself up, yet at the same
time seems to get smaller. He tones down with a jerk, so to speak, the
splendour of his appearance, stops the clatter of his sword, and, while
his face assumes a cross and embarrassed expression, he obviously cannot
make up his mind where to turn his eyes, and tries to conceal the fact
by staring from under his cotton-wool eyebrows at the asphalt straight
in front of him.

The young lieutenant too betrays to the careful observer some slight
embarrassment, which however, strange to say, he seems to succeed,
better than the grey-haired general, in cloaking with a certain grace
and self-command. The tension of his mouth is relaxed into a smile at
once modest and genial, and his eyes are directed with a quiet and
self-possessed calm, seemingly without an effort, over the general's
shoulder and beyond.

By now they have come within three paces of each other.