My Dear Heart,—­Now that the rush of today noon is past, I sit down in the evening to write you a few more lines in peace.  When I closed my letter today I did it with the intention of writing to you next a birthday letter, and thought I had plenty of time for it; it is only the 23d of March here.  I have thought it over, and find that a letter must go out today exactly to reach Frankfort on the 11th; it is hard to get used to the seven days’ interval which the post needs.  So I hurry my congratulations.  May God grant you His rich blessing in soul and body, for all your love and truth, and give you resignation and contentment in regard to the various new conditions of life, contrary to your inclinations, which you will meet here.  We cannot get rid of the sixtieth degree of latitude, and we have not chosen our own lot.  Many live happily here, although the ice is still solid as rock, and more snow fell in the night, and there are no garden and no Taunus here.

I could get along very well indeed here if I only knew the same of you, and, above all, if I had you with me.  All official matters—­and in them rests really the calling which in this world has fallen to my lot, and which you, through your significant “Yes” in the Kolziglow church, are bound to help bear in joy and sorrow—­all official matters are, in comparison with Frankfort, changed from thorns to roses; whether they will ever blossom is, indeed, uncertain.  The aggravations of the Diet and the palace venom look from here like childishness.  If we do not wantonly make ourselves disagreeable, we are welcome here.  Whenever the carriages are called here, and “Prusku passlanika" ("Prussian carriage”) is cried out among those waiting, then all the Russians look about with pleasant smiles, as though they had just popped down a ninety-degree glass of schnapps.  There is some social affair every evening, and the people are different from those in Frankfort.  Your aversion to court life will weaken.  You cannot fail to like the Czar; you have seen him already—­have you not!  He is extremely gracious to me, as well as the Czarina—­the young Czarina, I mean.  And it is easy to get along with the mother, in spite of her imposing presence.  I dined with her today with the Meiendorfs and Loen,[18] and it was just like that dinner at our house with Prince Carl and the Princess Anna, when we enjoyed ourselves so much.  In short, only take courage, and things will come out all right.  So far I have only agreeable impressions; the only thing that provokes me is that smoking is not allowed on the street.  One can have no idea in what disfavor the Austrians are over here; a mangy dog will not take a piece of meat from them.  I am sorry for poor Szechenyi; I do not dislike him.  They will either drive things to a war from here, or let it come, and then they will stick the bayonet into the Austrians’ backs; however peacefully people talk, and however I try to soften things down, as my duty demands, the