History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 10

T >> Thomas Carlyle >> History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 10

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Ups and downs there still were; sore fluctuating labor, as the
poor King struggles to his final rest, this morning. He was at the
window again, when the WACHT-PARADE (Grenadiers on Guard) turned
out; he saw them make their evolutions for the last time. [Pauli,
viii. 280.] After which, new relapse, new fluctuation. It was
about eleven o'clock, when Cochius was again sent for. The King
lay speechless, seemingly still conscious, in bed; Cochius prays
with fervor, in a loud tone, that the dying King may hear and
join. "Not so loud!" says the King, rallying a little. He had
remembered that it was the season when his servants got their new
liveries; they had been ordered to appear this day in full new
costume: "O vanity! O vanity!" said Friedrich Wilhelm, at sight of
the ornamented plush. "Pray for me, pray for me; my trust is in
the Saviour!" he often said. His pains, his weakness are great;
the cordage of a most tough heart rending itself piece by piece.
At one time, he called for a mirror: that is certain:--rugged wild
man, son of Nature to the last. The mirror was brought; what he
said at sight of his face is variously reported: "Not so worn out
as I thought," is Pollnitz's account, and the likeliest;--though
perhaps he said several things, "ugly face," "as good as dead
already;" and continued the inspection for some moments.
[Pollnitz, ii. 564; Wilhelmina, ii. 321.] A grim, strange thing.

"Feel mv pulse, Pitsch," said he, noticing the Surgeon of his
Giants: "tell me how long this will last."--"Alas, not long,"
answered Pitsch.--"Say not, alas; but how do you (He) know?"--
"The pulse is gone!"--"Impossible," said he, lifting his arm:
"how could I move my fingers so, if the pulse were gone?"
Pitsch looked mournfully steadfast. "Herr Jesu, to thee I live;
Herr Jesu, to thee I die; in life and in death thou art my gain
(DU BIST MEIN GEWINN)." These were the last words Friedrich
Wilhelm spoke in this world. He again fell into a faint.
Eller gave a signal to the Crown-Prince to take the Queen away.
Scarcely were they out of the room, when the faint had deepened
into death; and Friedrich Wilhelm, at rest from all his labors,
slept with the primeval sons of Thor.

No Baresark of them, nor Odin's self, I think, was a bit of truer
human stuff;--I confess his value to me, in these sad times, is
rare and great. Considering the usual Histrionic, Papin's-
Digester, Truculent-Charlatan and other species of "Kings," alone
attainable for the sunk flunky populations of an Era given up to
Mammon and the worship of its own belly, what would not such a
population give for a Friedrich Wilhelm, to guide it on the road
BACK from Orcus a little? "Would give," I have written; but alas,
it ought to have been "SHOULD give." What THEY "would" give is too
mournfully plain to me, in spite of ballot-boxes: a steady and
tremendous truth from the days of Barabbas downwards and upwards!
--Tuesday, 31st May, 1740, between one and two o'clock in the
afternoon, Friedrich Wilhelm died; age fifty-two, coming 15th
August next. Same day, Friedrich his Son was proclaimed at Berlin;
quilted heralds, with sound of trumpet and the like, doing what is
customary on such occasions.

On Saturday, 4th June, the King's body is laid out in state;
all Potsdam at liberty to come and see. He lies there, in his
regimentals, in his oaken coffin, on a raised place in the middle
of the room; decent mortuary draperies, lamps, garlands, banderols
furnishing the room and him: at his feet, on a black-velvet
TABOURET (stool), are the chivalry emblems, helmet, gauntlets,
spurs; and on similar stools, at the right hand and the left, lie
his military insignia, hat and sash, sword, guidon, and what else
is fit. Around, in silence, sit nine veteran military dignitaries;
Buddenbrock, Waldau, Derschau, Einsiedel, and five others whom we
omit to name. Silent they sit. A grim earnest sight in the shine
of the lamplight, as you pass out of the June sun. Many went, all
day; looked once again on the face that was to vanish.
Precisely at ten at night, the coffin-lid is screwed down:
twelve Potsdam Captains take the coffin on their shoulders;
four-and-twenty Corporals with wax torches, four-and-twenty
Sergeants with inverted halberts lowered; certain Generals on
order, and very many following as volunteers; these perform the
actual burial,--carry the body to the Garrison Church, where are
clergy waiting, which is but a small step off; see it lodged, oak
coffin and all, in a marble coffin in the side vault there, which
is known to Tourists. [Pauli, viii. 281.] It is the end of the
week, and the actual burial is done,--hastened forward for reasons
we can guess.

Filial piety by no means intends to defraud a loved Father of the
Spartan ceremonial contemplated as obsequies by him: very far from
it. Filial piety will conform to that with rigor; only adding what
musical and other splendors are possible, to testify his love
still more. And so, almost three weeks hence, on the 23d of the
month, with the aid of Dresden Artists, of Latin Cantatas and
other pomps (not inexcusable, though somewhat out of keeping), the
due Funeral is done, no Corpse but a Wax Effigy present in it;--
and in all points, that of the Potsdam Grenadiers not forgotten,
there was rigorous conformity to the Instruction left. In all
points, even to the extensive funeral dinner, and drinking of the
appointed cask of wine, "the best cask in my cellar." Adieu,
O King.

The Potsdam Grenadiers fired their three volleys (not
"PLACKERING," as I have reason to believe, but well); got their
allowance, dinner-liquor, and appointed coin of money: it was the
last service required of them in this world. That same night they
were dissolved, the whole Four Thousand of them, at a stroke;
and ceased to exist as Potsdam Grenadiers. Colonels, Captains, all
the Officers known to be of merit, were advanced, at least
transferred. Of the common men, a minority, of not inhuman height
and of worth otherwise, were formed into a new Regiment on the
common terms: the stupid splay-footed eight-feet mass were allowed
to stalk off whither they pleased, or vegetate on frugal pensions;
Irish Kirkman, and a few others neither knock-kneed nor without
head, were appointed HEYDUCS, that is, porters to the King's or
other Palaces; and did that duty in what was considered an
ornamental manner.

Here are still two things capable of being fished up from the sea
of nugatory matter; and meditated on by readers, till the
following Books open.

The last breath of Friedrich Wilhelm having fled, Friedrich
hurried to a private room; sat there all in tears; looking back
through the gulfs of the Past, upon such a Father now rapt away
forever. Sad all, and soft in the moonlight of memory,--the lost
Loved One all in the right as we now see, we all in the wrong!--
this, it appears, was the Son's fixed opinion. Seven years hence,
here is how Friedrich concludes the HISTORY of his Father, written
with a loyal admiration throughout: "We have left under silence
the domestic chagrins of this great Prince: readers must have some
indulgence for the faults of the Children, in consideration of the
virtues of such a Father." [ OEuvres, i. 174
( Memoires de Brandebourg: finished about
1747).] All in tears he sits at present, meditating these
sad things.

In a little while the Old Dessauer, about to leave for Dessau,
ventures in to the Crown-Prince, Crown-Prince no longer;
"embraces his knees;" offers, weeping, his condolence, his
congratulation;--hopes withal that his sons and he will be
continued in their old posts, and that he, the Old Dessauer,
"will have the same authority as in the late reign." Friedrich's
eyes, at this last clause, flash out tearless, strangely Olympian.
"In your posts I have no thought of making change: in your posts,
yes;--and as to authority, I know of none there can be but what
resides in the King that is sovereign!" Which, as it were, struck
the breath out of the Old Dessauer; and sent him home with a
painful miscellany of feelings, astonishment not wanting
among them.

At an after hour, the same night, Friedrich went to Berlin; met by
acclamation enough. He slept there, not without tumult of dreams,
one may fancy; and on awakening next morning, the first sound he
heard was that of the Regiment Glasenap under his windows,
swearing fealty to the new King. He sprang out of bed in a tempest
of emotion; bustled distractedly to and fro, wildly weeping.
Pollnitz, who came into the anteroom, found him in this state,
"half-dressed, with dishevelled hair, in tears, and as if beside
himself." "These huzzaings only tell me what I have lost!" said
the new King.--"HE was in great suffering," suggested Pollnitz;
"he is now at rest." "True, he suffered; but he was here with us:
and now--!" [Ranke (ii. 46, 47), from certain Fragments, still, in
manuscript, of Pollnits's Memoiren.

END OF BOOK X----

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