Thus it was that by the magic of beauty Aurora and her Countess sister found themselves installed at the Dresden Court, feted like Queens, receiving the caresses of the Court ladies, and the homage of every man, from Augustus himself to the youngest page, of whom a smile from their pretty lips made a veritable slave.  As for the Elector, sated as he was with the easy smiles and favours of fair women, he gave to the Swedish beauty, from the first, a homage he had never paid to any of her predecessors in his affection.

But Aurora was no woman to be easily won by any man.  She listened smilingly to the Elector’s honeyed words, and received his attentions with the gracious complaisance of a Queen.  When, however, he ventured to tell her that “her charms inspired him with a passion such as he had never felt for any woman,” she answered coldly, “I came here prepared for your generosity, but I did not expect that your kindness would assume a form to cause me shame.  I beg you not to say anything that can lessen the gratitude I owe you, and the respect I feel for you.”

Here indeed was a rebuff such as Augustus was little prepared for, or accustomed to.  The beauty, of whom he had hoped to make an easy conquest, was an iceberg whom all his ardour could not thaw.  He was in despair.  “I am sure she hates and despises me, while I love her dearer than life itself,” he confessed to his favourite Beuchling, who vainly tried to console and cheer him.  He confided his passion and his pain to Aurora’s sister, whose hopeful words were alike powerless to dispel his gloom.

When Aurora held aloof from him, he sent letter after letter of passionate pleading to her by the hand of the trusty Beuchling.  “If you knew the tortures I am suffering,” he wrote, “your kindness of heart could not resist pitying me.  I was mad to declare my passion so brutally to you.  Let me expiate my fault, prostrate at your feet; and, if you wish for my death, let me at least receive my sentence from your own sweet lips.”

To such a desperate state was Augustus brought within a few days of setting eyes on his new divinity!  As for Aurora of the tender heart, her lover’s distress thawed her more than a year of passionate protestations could have done.  She replied, assuring him of her gratitude, her esteem and respect, and begging him to dismiss such unworthy thoughts of her.  But she had no word of encouragement to send him in the note which her lover kissed so rapturously before placing it next his heart.

So alarmed, indeed, was Aurora, that she announced her intention of leaving forthwith a Court in which she was exposed to so much danger—­a project to which her sister gave a reluctant approval.  But the Countess Loewenhaupt was little disposed to leave a Court where she at least was having such a good time; for she, too, had her lovers, and among them the Prince of Fuerstenberg, the handsomest man in Saxony, whose devotion was more than agreeable to her.  She preferred to play the part of Cupid’s agent—­to exercise her diplomacy in bringing together those two foolish persons, her sister and the Elector.