He had received a present of Alpine cheese, and he ordered some for
supper. The trap for his life was baited with toasted cheese. There is no
reason to think that he ate immoderately; but that night he was seized
with indigestion. Delirium followed; during which it is singular that his
mind teemed with a class of imagery and of passions the most remote (as it
might have been thought) from the voluntary occupations of his thoughts.
He raved about the State, and about those kings with whom he was
displeased; nor were his thoughts one moment removed from the public
service. Yet he was the least ambitious of princes, and his reign was
emphatically said to be bloodless. Finding his fever increase, he became
sensible that he was dying; and he ordered the golden statue of
Prosperity, a household symbol of empire, to be transferred from his own
bedroom to that of his successor. Once again, however, for the last time,
he gave the word to the officer of the guard; and, soon after, turning
away his face to the wall against which his bed was placed, he passed out
of life in the very gentlest sleep, "_quasi dormiret, spiritum reddidit_;"
or, as a Greek author expresses it, _kat iso hypno to malakotato_.
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