She told him that they had overrated their strength.
"And relying on the great Friedrich's fame you deceived yourselves."
Louise's clear eyes met his steadily. "Sire, resting on the great
Friedrich's fame, we might naturally deceive ourselves, if, indeed,
we wholly did so."
Then she told him that she had come to entreat him to be generous to
Prussia. He answered respectfully, but made no promise. Again, with
exceeding earnestness, she implored at least for Magdeburg, just
then Friedrich Wilhelm entered, and Napoleon abruptly took leave.
"Sire," said Talleyrand warningly to him, when they were alone,
"shall posterity say that you threw away your great conquest for the
sake of a lovely woman?"
Louise meanwhile dwelt again and again on Napoleon's words, "You ask
a great deal, but I will think about it." Yet her heart was heavy,
and when arrayed for the evening banquet in the splendid attire so
long unworn, she likened herself sadly to the old German victims
decked for sacrifice. Napoleon said of her afterward, "I knew I
should see a beautiful and dignified queen; I found the most
interesting woman and admirable queen I had ever known."
The treaty of Tilsit restored to Friedrich Wilhelm a fragment of his
kingdom, but even this was to be held by the French till after the
payment of a huge indemnity. Napoleon's threat that he would make
the Prussian nobles beg their bread had hardly been a vain one, for
the unhappy Prussians had to feed, lodge, and clothe every French
soldier quartered in their land. Dark as was the outlook, Louise was
upheld by loving pride in her husband. "After Eylau he might have
deserted a faithful ally. This he would not do. I believe his
conduct will yet bring good fortune to Prussia."
To help forward that good fortune they sold most of the crown lands
and the queen's jewels, and had the gold plate melted down. Amid
their heavy anxieties and pains they were not wholly unhappy, these
two, who loved each other so entirely. "My Louise," the king said to
her one day, "you have grown yet dearer to me in this time of
trouble, for I more fully know the treasure I possess."
She, too, could write of him, "The king is kinder to me than ever, a
great joy and reward after a union of fourteen years." Still those
about her told of sleepless nights when prayer was her only relief.
Her eyes had lost their brightness, her cheeks were pale, her step
languid. By the Christmas of 1808 the last French soldier had
quitted Prussian soil; but it was not deemed safe for the royal
family to return at once to Berlin, and they spent the summer at
Hufen, near Königsberg. Parents and children were constantly
together, and the mother taught herself to believe that the sharp
trials of those years would tell for good on her boys and girls. "If
they had been reared in luxury and prosperity they might think that
so it must always be."
It was not till the end of 1809 that the exiles turned their faces
homeward. They travelled slowly, for the queen was still feeble.
Everywhere a glad welcome greeted them; and on December 23d, the day
on which, sixteen years before, she had entered the capital a
girl-bride, Louise drove through its familiar streets in a carriage
presented to her by the rejoicing citizens. Her father was waiting
at the palace gate. He helped her to alight and led her in. Three
years had gone by since she last crossed the threshold of her home,
and what years they had been! Nor was the return all joy, for she
knew and dreaded the changes she would find there. Napoleon and his
generals had not departed empty handed. They had stripped the rooms
of paintings and statues, of manuscripts and antiquities.
As the doors closed a great shout arose from the vast crowd before
the palace. Presently she appeared in the balcony, and all saw the
traces of long anguish in the lovely face, now bright with grateful
smiles.
After a solemn service in the Dom, the king and queen drove through
the illuminated city to the opera-house. "The queen sat beside her
husband"--so wrote Fouqué afterward--"and as she talked she often
raised her eyes to him with a very touching expression.... Our
beloved queen has thanked us with tears. Bonaparte has dimmed those
heavenly eyes ... and we must do all we can to make them sparkle
again."
The bare walls, the empty cabinets of the palace, accorded with the
almost ascetic habits now maintained there. Self-denial was made
easy by one belief, that Prussia would arise from her great
suffering stronger than before. The king and queen were not left to
work alone toward that high end. Able generals replaced those who,
through treachery or faint-heartedness, had surrendered the
fortresses. Stein, now chief minister, curtailed the rights of the
nobles, and gave the serfs an interest in guarding the soil they
tilled; while Scharnhorst, by an ingenious evasion of Napoleon's
edict limiting the Prussian army, contrived to have 200,000 men
rapidly drilled and trained. The universities founded at Berlin and
Breslau became the head-quarters of secret societies for the
deliverance of the Fatherland. Princes and professors, merchants
ruined by the Berlin decrees, and peasants ground down by French
exactions, joined the Jugendbund, and implicitly obeyed the orders
of its unseen heads. Through town and country spread that vast
brotherhood, fired by the songs of Tieck and Arnim to live or die
for Prussia.
And Louise watched thankfully the dawning promise of better days,
"though, alas! we may die before they come."
Perhaps that sad presentiment haunted her husband too. If she jested
with her children he would say wistfully, "The queen is quite
herself to-day. What a blessing it will be if her mind recovers its
joyous tone!"
That spring Louise was attacked by spasms of the heart. They did not
last long, and when the court moved to Potsdam she seemed to regain
strength, and showed much interest in discussing with Bishop Eylert
how best to train her boys so that they might serve their country.
Though very weak, she accompanied her family to Hohengieritz, the
king perforce returning to Berlin. The loving eyes that watched her
saw signs of amendment, but early on Monday, July 16th, the spasms
recurred. For hours no remedies availed. She could only gasp for
"Air! air!" and when the sharp pain had passed lay exhausted, now
murmuring a few words of some hymn learnt as a child, faintly
thanking God for each solace sent her, or entreating her grandmother
to rest. No complaint passed her lips; she was only "very, very
weary."
They told her that couriers had been despatched for the king, and
she asked anxiously, "Will he soon come?" Before dawn he came,
bringing the two elder boys. For those who tried to cheer him he had
only one mournful reply: "If she were not mine she might recover." A
gleam of joy lighted her pale face when he came to her bedside, but
perceiving his emotion she asked, "Am I then so very ill?" Unable to
reply, he hurriedly left the room, and she said to those standing
by, "His embrace was so wild, so fervent, that it seemed as though
he would take leave of me. Tell him not to do that, or I shall die
at once."
He returned bringing in the children.
"My Fritz! my Wilhelm!" She had only time for one long gaze, and
then the agonizing pain came again. One of the doctors tried to
raise her, but she sank back. "Only death can help me;" and as all
watched in breathless silence, she leaned her head against the
shoulder of a faithful attendant, murmured, "Lord Jesus, shorten
it!" and with one deep-drawn breath passed away.