History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 6
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Carlyle's "History of Friedrich II of Prussia"
BOOK VI.
DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT, AND CROWN-PRINCE,
GOING ADRIFT UNDER THE STORM-WINDS.
1727-1730.
Chapter I.
FIFTH CRISIS IN THE KAISER'S SPECTRE-HUNT.
The Crown-Prince's young Life being, by perverse chance, involved
and as it were absorbed in that foolish question of his English
Marriage, we have nothing for it but to continue our sad function;
and go on painfully fishing out, and reducing to an authentic
form, what traces of him there are, from that disastrous beggarly
element,--till once he get free of it, either dead or alive.
The WINDS (partly by Art-Magic) rise to the hurricane pitch, upon
this Marriage Project and him; and as for the sea, or general tide
of European Politics--But let the reader look with his own eyes.
In the spring of 1727, War, as anticipated, breaks out; Spaniards
actually begin battering at Gibraltar; Kaiser's Ambassador at
London is angrily ordered to begone. Causes of war were many:
1. Duke de Ripperda--tumbled out now, that illustrious diplomatic
bulldog, at Madrid--sought asylum in the English Ambassador's
house; and no respect was had to such asylum: that is one cause.
2. Then, you English, what is the meaning of these war-fleets in
the West Indies; in the Mediterranean, on the very coast of Spain?
We demand that you at once take them home again:--which cannot be
complied with. 3. But above all things, we demand Gibraltar of
you:--which can still less be complied with. Termagant Elizabeth
has set her heart on Gibraltar: that, in such opportunity as this
unexpected condition of the Balances now gives her, is the real
cause of the War.
Cession of Gibraltar: there had been vague promises, years ago, on
the Kaiser's part; nay George himself, raw to England at that
date, is said to have thought the thing might perhaps be done.--
Do it at once, then!" said the Termagant Queen, and repeated, with
ever more emphasis;--and there being not the least compliance, she
has opened parallels before the place, and begun war and ardent
firing there; [22d February, 1727 (Scholl, ii. 212). Salmon,
Chronological Historian (London, 1747;
a very incorrect dark Book, useful only in defect of better),
ii. 173. Coxe, Memoirs of Walpole, i. 260,
261; ii. 498-515.] preceded by protocols, debates in Parliament;
and the usual phenomena. It is the Fifth grand Crisis in the
Kaiser's spectre-huntings; fifth change in the color of the
world-lobster getting boiled in that singular manner;--Second
Sputter of actual War.
Which proved futile altogether; and amounts now, in the human
memory; to flat zero,--unless the following infinitesimally small
fraction be countable again:--
"Sputtering of War; that is to say, Siege of Gibraltar. A siege
utterly unmemorable, and without the least interest, for existing
mankind with their ungrateful humor,--if it be not; once more,
that the Father of TRISTRAM SHANDY was in it: still a Lieutenant
of foot, poor fellow; brisk, small, hot-tempered, loving, 'liable
to be cheated ten times a day if nine will not suffice you.'
He was in this Siege; shipped to the Rock to make stand there;
and would have done so with the boldest,--only he got into duel
(hot-tempered, though of lamb-like innocence), and was run through
the body; not entirely killed, but within a hair's breadth of it;
and unable for service while this sputtering went on. Little Lorry
is still living; gone to school in Yorkshire, after pranks enough,
and misventures,--half-drowning 'in the mill-race at Annamoe in
Ireland,' for one. [Laurence Sterne's Autobiography italic> (cited above).] The poor Lieutenant Father died,
soldiering in the West Indies; soon after this; and we shall not
mention him again. But History ought to remember that he is 'Uncle
Toby,' this poor Lieutenant, and take her measures!--The Siege of
Gibraltar, we still see with our eyes, was in itself Nothing."
Truly it might well enough have grown to universal flame of War.
But this always needs two parties; and pacific George would not be
second party in it. George, guided by pacific Walpole, backed by
pacific Fleury, answers the ardent firing by phlegmatic patience
and protocolling; not by counter-firing, except quite at his
convenience, from privateers, from war-ships here and there, and
in sulky defence from Gibraltar itself. Probably the Termagant,
with all the fire she has, will not do much damage upon Gibraltar?
Such was George's hope. Whereby the flame of war, ardent only in
certain Spanish batteries upon the point of San Roque, does not
spread hitherto,--though all mortals, and Friedrich Wilhelm as
much as any, can see the imminent likelihood there is. In such
circumstances, what a stroke of policy to have disjoined Friedrich
Wilhelm from the Hanover Alliance, and brought him over to our
own! Is not Grumkow worth his pension? "Grumkow serves honorably."
Let the invaluable Seckendorf persevere.
CROWN-PRINCE SEEN IN DRYASDUST'S GLASS, DARKLY.
To know the special figure of the Crown-Prince's way of life in
those years, who his friends, companions were, what his pursuits
and experiences, would be agreeable to us; but beyond the outline
already given, there is little definite on record. He now resides
habitually at Potsdam, be the Court there or not; attending
strictly to his military duties in the Giant Regiment; it is only
on occasion, chiefly perhaps in "Carnival time," that he gets to
Berlin, to partake in the gayeties of society. Who his associates
there or at Potsdam were? Suhm, the Saxon Resident, a cultivated
man of literary turn, famed as his friend in time coming, is
already at his diplomatic post in Berlin, post of difficulty just
now; but I know not whether they have yet any intimacy. [Preuss,
Friedrich mit seinen Verwandten und Freunden, p. 24.]
This we do know, the Crown-Prince begins to be noted for his
sprightly sense, his love of literature, his ingenuous ways;
in the Court or other circles, whatsoever has intelligence
attracts him, and is attracted by him. The Roucoulles Soirees,--
gone all to dim backram for us, though once so lively in their
high periwigs and speculations,--fall on Wednesday. When the
Finkenstein or the others fall,--no doubt his Royal Highness
knows it. In the TABAKS-COLLEGIUM, there also, driven by duty, he
sometimes appears; but, like Seckendorf and some others, he only
affects to smoke, and his pipe is mere white clay. Nor is the
social element, any more than the narcotic vapor which prevails
there, attractive to the young Prince,--though he had better hide
his feelings on the subject.
Out at Potsdam, again, life goes very heavy; the winged Psyche
much imprisoned in that pipe-clay element, a prey to vacancy and
many tediums and longings. Daily return the giant drill-duties;
and daily, to the uttermost of rigorous perfection, they must be
done:--"This, then, is the sum of one's existence, this?"
Patience, young "man of genius," as the Newspapers would now call
you; it is indispensably beneficial nevertheless! To swallow one's
disgusts, and do faithfully the ugly commanded work, taking no
council with flesh and blood: know that "genius," everywhere in
Nature, means this first of all; that without this, it means
nothing, generally even less. And be thankful for your Potsdam
grenadiers and their pipe-clay!--
Happily he has his Books about him; his flute: Duhan, too, is
here, still more or less didactic in some branches;
always instructive and companionable, to him.
The Crown-Prince reads a great deal; very many French Books, new
and old, he reads; among the new, we need not doubt, the
Henriade of M. Arouet Junior (who now calls himself
VOLTAIRE), which has risen like a star of the first magnitude in
these years. [London, 1723, in surreptitious incomplete state,
La Ligue the title; then at length, London,
1726, as Henriade, in splendid 4to,--by
subscription (King, Prince and Princess of Wales at the top of
it), which yielded 8,000 pounds: see Voltaire, OEuvres
Completes, xiii. 408.] An incomparable piece,
patronized by Royalty in England; the delight of all kindred
Courts. The light dancing march of this new "Epic," and the brisk
clash of cymbal music audible in it, had, as we find afterwards,
greatly captivated the young man. All is not pipe-clay, then, and
torpid formalism; aloft from the murk of commonplace rise
glancings of a starry splendor, betokening--oh, how much!
Out of Books, rumors and experiences, young imagination is forming
to itself some Picture of the World as it is, as it has been.
The curtains of this strange life-theatre are mounting, mounting,
--wondrously as in the case of all young souls; but with what
specialties, moods or phenomena of light and shadow, to this young
soul, is not in any point recorded for us. The "early Letters to
Wilhelmina, which exist in great numbers," from these we had hoped
elucidation: but these the learned Editor has "wholly withheld as
useless," for the present. Let them be carefully preserved, on the
chance of somebody's arising to whom they may have uses!--
The worst feature of these years is Friedrich Wilhelm's discontent
with them. A Crown-Prince sadly out of favor with Papa. This has
long been on the growing hand; and these Double-Marriage troubles,
not to mention again the new-fangled French tendencies (BLITZ
FRANZOSEN!), much aggravate the matter, and accelerate its rate of
growth. Already the paternal countenance does not shine upon him;
flames often; and thunders, to a shocking degree;--and worse days
are coming.
Chapter II.
DEATH OF GEORGE I.
Gibraltar still keeps sputtering; ardent ineffectual bombardment
from the one side, sulky, heavy blast of response now and then
from the other: but the fire does not spread; nor will, we may
hope. It is true, Sweden and Denmark have joined the Treaty of
Hanover, this spring; and have troops on foot, and money paid
them; But George is pacific; Gibraltar is impregnable; let the
Spaniards spend their powder there.
As for the Kaiser, he is dreadfully poor; inapt for battle
himself. And in the end of this same May, 1727, we hear, his
principal ally, Czarina Catherine, has died;--poor brown little
woman, Lithuanian housemaid, Russian Autocrat, it is now all one;
--dead she, and can do nothing. Probably the Kaiser will sit
still? The Kaiser sits still; with eyes bent on Gibraltar, or
rolling in graud Imperial inquiry and anxiety round the world;
war-outlooks much dimmed for him since the end of May.
Alas, in the end of June, what far other Job's-post is this that
reaches Berlin and Queen Sophie? That George I., her royal Father,
has suddenly sunk dead! With the Solstice, or Summer pause of the
Sun, 21st or 22d June, almost uncertain which, the Majesty of
George I. did likewise pause,--in his carriage, on the road to
Osnabruck,--never to move more. Whereupon, among the simple
People, arose rumors of omens, preternaturalisms, for and against:
How his desperate Megaera of a Wife, in the act of dying, had
summoned him (as was presumable), to appear along with her at the
Great Judgment-Bar within year and day; and how he has here done
it. On the other hand, some would have it noted, How "the
nightingales in Herrenhausen Gardens had all ceased singing for
the year, that night he died,"--out of loyalty on the part of
these little birds, it seemed presumable. [See Kohler,
Munzbelustigungen, x. 88.]
What we know is, he was journeying towards Hanover again, hopeful
of a little hunting at the Gorhde; and intended seeing Osnabruck
and his Brother the Bishop there, as he passed. That day, 21st
June, 1727, from some feelings of his own, he was in great haste
for Osnabruck; hurrying along by extra-post, without real cause
save hurry of mind. He had left his poor old Maypole of a Mistress
on the Dutch Frontier, that morning, to follow at more leisure.
He was struck by apoplexy on the road,--arm fallen powerless,
early in the day, head dim and heavy; obviously an alarming case.
But he refused to stop anywhere; refused any surgery but such as
could be done at once. "Osnabruck! Osnabruck!" he reiterated,
growing visibly worse. Two subaltern Hanover Officials,
"Privy-Councillor von Hardenberg, KAMMERHERR (Chamberlain) von
Fabrice, were in the carriage with him;" [Gottfried,
Historische Chronik (Frankfurt, 1759), iii. 872.
Boyer, The Political State of Great Britain,
vol. xxxiii. pp. 545, 546.] King chiefly dozing, and at last
supported in the arms of Fabrice, was heard murmuring, "C'EST FAIT
DE MOI ('T is all over with me)!" And "Osnabruck! Osnabruck!"
slumberously reiterated he: To Osnabruck, where my poor old
Brother, Bishop as they call him, once a little Boy that trotted
at my knee with blithe face, will have some human pity on me!
So they rushed along all day, as at the gallop, his few attendants
and he; and when the shades of night fell, and speech had now left
the poor man, he still passionately gasped some gurgle of a sound
like "Osnabruck;" --hanging in the arms of Fabrice, and now
evidently in the article of death. What a gallop, sweeping through
the slumber of the world: To Osnabruck, Osnabruck!
In the hollow of the night (some say, one in the morning), they
reach Osnabruck. And the poor old Brother,--Ernst August, once
youngest of six brothers, of seven children, now the one survivor,
has human pity in the heart of him full surely. But George is
dead; careless of it now. [Coxe (i. 266) is "indebted to his
friend Nathaniel Wraxall" for these details,--the since famous Sir
Nathaniel, in whose Memoirs (vague, but NOT
mendacious, not unintelligent) they are now published more at
large. See his Memoirs of the Courts of Berlin, Dresden,
&c. (London. 1799), i. 35-40; also
Historical Memoirs (London, 1836), iv. 516-518.]
After sixty-seven years of it, he has flung his big burdens,--
English crowns, Hanoverian crownlets, sulkinesses, indignations,
lean women and fat, and earthly contradictions and confusions,--
fairly off him; and lies there.
The man had his big burdens, big honors so called, absurd enough
some of them, in this world; but he bore them with a certain
gravity and discretion: a man of more probity, insight and general
human faculty than he now gets credit for. His word was sacred to
him. He had the courage of a Welf, or Lion-Man; quietly royal in
that respect at least. His sense of equity, of what was true and
honorable in men and things, remained uneffaced to a respectable
degree; and surely it had resisted much. Wilder puddle of muddy
infatuations from without and from within, if we consider it
well,--of irreconcilable incoherences, bottomless universal
hypocrisies, solecisms bred with him and imposed on him,--few sons
of Adam had hitherto lived in.
He was, in one word, the first of our Hanover Series of English
Kings; that hitherto unique sort, who are really strange to look
at in the History of the World. Of whom, in the English annals,
there is hitherto no Picture to be had; nothing but an empty blur
of discordant nonsenses, and idle, generally angry, flourishings
of the pen, by way of Picture. The English Nation, having flung
its old Puritan, Sword-and-Bible Faith into the cesspool,--or
rather having set its old Bible-Faith, MINUS any Sword, well up in
the organ-loft, with plenty of revenue, there to preach and organ
at discretion, on condition always of meddling with nobody's
practice farther,--thought the same (such their mistake) a mighty
pretty arrangement; but found it hitch before long. They had to
throw out their beautiful Nell-Gwynn Defenders of the Faith;
fling them also into the cesspool; and were rather at a loss what
next to do. "Where is our real King, then? Who IS to lead us
Heavenward, then; to rally the noble of us to him, in some small
measure, and save the rest and their affairs from running
Devilward?"--The English Nation being in some difficulty as to
Kings, the English Nation clutched up the readiest that came to
hand; "Here is our King!" said they,--again under mistake, still
under their old mistake. And, what was singular, they then avenged
themselves by mocking, calumniating, by angrily speaking, writing
and laughing at the poor mistaken King so clutched!--It is high
time the English were candidly asking themselves, with very great
seriousness indeed, WHAT it was they had done, in the sight of God
and man, on that and the prior occasion? And above all, What it is
they will now propose to do in the sequel of it! Dig gold-nuggets,
and rally the IGnoble of us?--
George's poor lean Mistress, coming on at the usual rate of the
road, was met, next morning, by the sad tidings. She sprang from
her carriage into the dusty highway; tore her hair (or headdress),
half-frantic; declared herself a ruined woman; and drove direct to
Berlin, there to compose her old mind. She was not ill seen at
Court there; had her connections in the world. Fieldmarshal
Schulenburg, who once had the honor of fighting (not to his
advantage) with Charles XII., and had since grown famous by his
Anti-Turk performances in the Venetian service, is a Brother of
this poor Maypole's; and there is a Nephew of hers, one of
Friedrich Wilhelm's Field-Officers here, whom we shall meet by and
by. She has been obliging to Queen Sophie on occasions; they can,
and do, now weep heartily together. I believe she returned to
England, being Duchess of Kendal, with heavy pensions there;
and "assiduously attended divine ordinances, according to the
German Protestant form, ever afterwards." Poor foolish old soul,
what is this world, with all its dukeries!--
The other or fat Mistress, "Cataract of fluid Tallow," Countess of
Darlington, whom I take to have been a Half-Sister rather, sat
sorrowful at Isleworth; and kept for many years a Black Raven,
which had come flying in upon her; which she somehow understood to
be the soul, or connected with the soul, of his Majesty of happy
memory. [Horace Walpole, Reminiscences. ]
Good Heavens, what fat fluid-tallowy stupor, and entirely sordid
darkness, dwells among mankind; and occasionally finds itself
lifted to the very top, by way of sample!--
Friedrich Wilhelm wept tenderly to Brigadier Dubourgay, the
British Minister at Berlin (an old military gentleman, of
diplomatic merit, who spells rather ill), when they spoke of
this sad matter. My poor old Uncle; he was so good to me in
boyhood, in those old days, when I blooded Cousin George's nose!
Not unkind, ah, only proud and sad; and was called sulky, being of
few words and heavy-laden. Ah me, your Excellenz; if the little
nightingales have a11 fallen silent, what may not I, his Son and
sephew, do?--And the rugged Majesty blubbered with great
tenderness; having fountains of tears withal, hidden in the rocky
heart of him, not suspected by every one. [Dubourgay's Despatches,
in the State-Paper Office.]
I add only that the Fabrice, who had poor George in his arms that
night, is a man worth mentioning. The same Fabrice (Fabricius, or
perhaps GOLDSCHMIDT in German) who went as Envoy from the
Holstein-Gottorp people to Charles XII. in his Turkish time;
and stayed with his Swedish Majesty there, for a year or two,
indeed till the catastrophe came. His Official LETTERS from that
scene are in print, this long while, though considerably
forgotten; [ Anecdotes du Sejour du Roi de Suide a Bender,
ou Lettres de M. le Baron de Fabrice pour servir d'elaircissement
a l'Histoire de Charles XII. (Hambourg, 1760, 8vo).]
a little Volume, worth many big ones that have been published on
that subject. The same Fabrice, following Hanover afterwards, came
across to London in due course; and there he did another memorable
thing: made acquaintance with the Monsieur Arouet, then a young
French Exile there, Arouet Junior ("LE JEUNE or L. J."), who,--
by an ingenious anagram, contrived in his indignation at such
banishment,--writes himself VOLTAIRE ever since; who has been
publishing a HENRIADE, and doing other things. Now it was by
questioning this Fabrice, and industriously picking the memory of
him clean, that M. de Voltaire wrote another book, much more of an
"Epic" than Henri IV.,--a HISTORY, namely, OF CHARLES XII.; [See
Voltaire, OEuvres Completes, ii. 149, xxx. 7, 127.
Came out in 1731 (ib. xxx. Avant-Propos, p. ii).] which seems to
me the best-written of all his Books, and wants nothing but TRUTH
(indeed a dreadful want) to make it a possession forever.
VOLTAIRE, if you want fine writing; ADLERFELD and FABRICE, if you
would see the features of the Fact: these three are still the
Books upon Charles XII.
HIS PRUSSIAN MAJESTY FALLS INTO ONE OF HIS HYPOCHONDRIACALFITS.
Before this event, his Majesty was in gloomy humor; and special
vexations had superadded themselves. Early in the Spring, a
difficult huff of quarrel, the consummation of a good many grudges
long subsisting, had fallen out with his neighbor of Saxony, the
Majesty of Poland, August, whom we have formerly heard of, a
conspicuous Majesty in those days; called even "August the Great"
by some persons in his own time; but now chiefly remembered by his
splendor of upholstery, his enormous expenditure in drinking and
otherwise, also by his three hundred and fifty-four Bastards
(probably the maximum of any King's performance in that line), and
called August DER STARKE, "August the Physically Strong."
This exemplary Sovereign could not well be a man according to
Friedrich Wilhelm's heart: accordingly they had their huffs and
little collisions now and then: that of the Protestant Directorate
and Heidelberg Protestants, for instance; indeed it was generally
about Protestantism; and more lately there had been high words and
correspondings about the "Protestants of Thorn" (a bad tragedy, of
Jesuit intrusion and Polish ferocity, enacted there in 1724);
[Account of it in Buchholz, i. 98-102.]--in which sad business
Friedrich Wilhelm loyally interfered, though Britannic George of
blessed memory and others were but lukewarm; and nothing could be
done in it. Nothing except angry correspondence with King August;
very provoking to the poor soul, who had no hand but a nominal
one in the Thorn catastrophe, being driven into it by his unruly
Diet alone.
In fact, August, with his glittering eyes and excellent physical
constitution, was a very good-humored fellow; supremely pleasant
in society; and by no means wishful to cheat you, or do you a
mischief in business,--unless his necessities compelled him;
which often were great. But Friedrich Wilhelm always kept a good
eye on such points; and had himself suffered nothing from the gay
eupeptic Son of Belial, either in their old Stralsund copartnery
or otherwise. So that, except for these Protestant affairs,--and
alas, one other little cause,--Friedrich Wilhelm had contentedly
left the Physically Strong to his own course, doing the civilities
of the road to him when they met; and nothing ill had fallen out
between them. This other little cause--alas, it is the old story
of recruiting; one's poor Hobby again giving offence!
Special recruiting brabbles there had been; severe laws passed in
Saxony about these kidnapping operations: and always in the Diets,
when question rose of this matter, August had been particularly
loud in his denouncings. Which was unkind, though not unexpected.
But now, in the Spring of 1727, here has a worse case than
any arisen.
Captain Natzmer, of I know not what Prussian Regiment,
"Sachsen-Weimar Cuirassiers" [ Militair-Lexikon, italic> iii. 104.] or another, had dropt over into Saxony, to see
what could be done in picking up a tall man or two. Tall men, one
or two, Captain Natzmer did pick up, nay a tall deserter or two
(Saxon soldier, inveigled to desert); but finding his operations
get air, he hastily withdrew into Brandenburg territory again.
Saxon Officials followed him into Brandenburg territory; snapt
him back into Saxon; tried him by Saxon law there;--Saxon law,
express in such case, condemns him to be hanged; and that is his doom accordingly.
"Captain Natzmer to swing on the gallows? Taken on Brandenburg
territory too, and not the least notice given me?" Friedrich
Wilhelm blazes into flaming whirlwind; sends an Official
Gentleman, one Katsch, to his Excellenz Baron von Suhm (the
Crown-Prince's cultivated friend), with this appalling message:
"If Natzmer be hanged, for certain I will use reprisals;
you yourself shall swing!" Whereupon Suhm, in panic, fled over the
marches to his Master; who bullied him for his pusillanimous
terrors; and applied to Friedrich Wilhelm, in fine frenzy of
indignant astonishment, "What, in Heaven's name, such meditated
outrage on the law of nations, and flat insult to the Majesty of
Kings, can have meant?" Friedrich Wilhelm, the first fury being
spent, sees that he is quite out of square; disavows the reprisals
upon Suhm. "Message misdelivered by my Official Gentleman, that
stupid Katsch; never did intend to hang Suhm; oh, no;" with much
other correspondence; [In Mauvillon (ii. 189-195) more of it than
any one will read.]--and is very angry at himself, and at the
Natzmer affair, which has brought him into this bad pass.
Into open impropriety; into danger of an utter rupture, had King
August been of quarrelsome turn. But King August was not
quarrelsome; and then Seckendorf and the Tobacco-Parliament,--on
the Kaiser's score, who wants Pragmatic Sanction and much else out
of these two Kings, and can at no rate have them quarrel in the
present juncture,--were eager to quench the fire. King August let
Natzmer go; Suhm returned to his post; [Pollnitz, ii. 254.] and
things hustled themselves into some uneasy posture of silence
again;--uneasy to the sensitive fancy of Friedrich Wilhelm above
all. This is his worst collision with his Neighbor of Saxony;
and springing from one's Hobby again!--
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