trick perhaps—and then—to go away from the spot appointed to him as guard! Koláčný understood.
“Fear not, friend! How could I injure you? Let us lay aside our weapons and each go half way.” That voice did not deceive and Suk saw that Koláčný was propping his gun against a tree trunk. He looked around and went forward. Half way forward the soldiers met. The Prussian enemy with undisguised sincerity extended his hand.
“Just come, don’t be afraid. You and I have done nothing wrong to each other. We are brothers of one blood. What matters it to us what the rulers of these lands have done to each other?” said the Helvetian bible-loving descendant of the exiled Bohemian brethren emigrants. And the lively lad from the home kingdom understood him.
As these two deliberated, so, surely, many before them had reflected and doubtless many in future shall do, whether kings be philosophers or, as Plato dreamed—philosophers be kings.
“And here it ended,” added the old schoolmaster, who related the incident to me, as it had been handed down from ancient chronicles, indicating the ruined earthworks in which we paused to rest. “Both of the wise men became engrossed in conversation and were caught at it. Here in this place sat the Prussian king and hither they brought Koláčný for trial. He told all and in a short while after, they shot him down over there behind the breastworks. The other one
