THERE.
Friedrich spent ten days on his circuitous journey home; considerable
inspection to be done, in Minden, Magdeburg, not to speak of other
businesses he had. The old Newspapers are still more intent upon him,
now that the Herstal Affair has broken into flame: especially the
English Newspapers; who guess that there are passages of courtship going
on between great George their King and him. Here is one fact, correct in
every point, for the old London Public: "Letters from Hanover say, that
the King of Prussia passed within a small distance of that City the
16th inst. N.S., on his return to Berlin, but did not stop at
Herrenhausen;"--about which there has been such hoping and speculating
among us lately. [_Daily Post,_ 22d September, 1740; other London
Newspapers from July 31st downwards.] A fact which the extinct Editor
seems to meditate for a day or two; after which he says (partly in
ITALICS), opening his lips the second time, like a Friar Bacon's Head
significant to the Public: "Letters from Hanover tell us that the
Interview, which it was said his Majesty was to have with the King of
Prussia, did not take place, for certain PRIVATE REASONS, which our
Correspondent leaves us to guess at!"
It is well known Friedrich did not love his little Uncle, then or
thenceforth; still less his little Uncle him: "What is this Prussia,
rising alongside of us, higher and higher, as if it would reach our own
sublime level!" thinks the little Uncle to himself. At present there is
no quarrel between them; on the contrary, as we have seen, there is a
mutual capability of helping one another, which both recognize; but
will an interview tend to forward that useful result? Friedrich, in
the intervals of an ague, with Herstal just broken out, may have wisely
decided, No. "Our sublime little Uncle, of the waxy complexion, with the
proudly staring fish-eyes,--no wit in him, not much sense, and a great
deal of pride,--stands dreadfully erect, 'plumb and more,' with the
Garter-leg advanced, when one goes to see him; and his remarks are
not of an entertaining nature. Leave him standing there: to him let
Truchsess and Bielfeld suffice, in these hurries, in this ague that is
still upon us." Upon which the dull old Newspapers, Owls of Minerva
that then were, endeavor to draw inferences. The noticeable fact is,
Friedrich did, on this occasion, pass within a mile or two of his
royal Uncle, without seeing him; and had not, through life, another
opportunity; never saw the sublime little man at all, nor was again so
near him.
I believe Friedrich little knows the thick-coming difficulties of
his Britannic Majesty at this juncture; and is too impatient of these
laggard procedures on the part of a man with eyes A FLEUR-DE-TETE.
Modern readers too have forgotten Jenkins's Ear; it is not till
after long study and survey that one begins to perceive the anomalous
profundities of that phenomenon to the poor English Nation and its poor
George II.
The English sent off, last year, a scanty Expedition, "six ships of the
line," only six, under Vernon, a fiery Admiral, a little given to be
fiery in Parliamentary talk withal; and these did proceed to Porto-Bello
on the Spanish Main of South America; did hurl out on Porto-Bello such
a fiery destructive deluge, of gunnery and bayonet-work, as quickly
reduced the poor place to the verge of ruin, and forced it to surrender
with whatever navy, garrison, goods and resources were in it, to the
discretion of fiery Vernon,--who does not prove implacable, he or his,
to a petitioning enemy. Yes, humble the insolent, but then be merciful
to them, say the admiring Gazetteers. "The actual monster," how cheering
to think, "who tore off Mr. Jenkins's Ear, was got hold of [actual
monster, or even three or four different monsters who each did it, the
"hold got" being mythical, as readers see], and naturally thought he
would be slit to ribbons; but our people magnanimously pardoned him,
magnanimously flung him aside out of sight;" [_Gentleman's Magazine,_ x.
124, 145 (date of the Event is 3d December N.S., 1739).] impossible to
shoot a dog in cold blood.
Whereupon Vernon returned home triumphant; and there burst forth such a
jubilation, over the day of small things, as is now astonishing to
think of. Had the Termagant's own Thalamus and Treasury been bombarded
suddenly one night by red-hot balls, Madrid City laid in ashes, or Baby
Carlos's Apanage extinguished from Creation, there could hardly have
been greater English joy (witness the "Porto-Bellos" they still have,
new Towns so named); so flamy is the murky element growing on that
head. And indeed had the cipher of tar-barrels burnt, and of ale-barrels
drunk, and the general account of wick and tallow spent in illuminations
and in aldermanic exertions on the matter, been accurately taken, one
doubts if Porto-Bello sold, without shot fired, to the highest bidder,
at its floweriest, would have covered such a sum. For they are a
singular Nation, if stirred up from their stagnancy; and are much in
earnest about this Spanish War.
It is said there is now another far grander Expedition on the stocks:
military this time as well as naval, intended for the Spanish Main;--but
of that, for the present, we will defer speaking. Enough, the Spanish
War is a most serious and most furious business to those old English;
and, to us, after forced study of it, shines out like far-off
conflagration, with a certain lurid significance in the then night of
things. Night otherwise fallen dark and somniferous to modern mankind.
As Britannic Majesty and his Walpoles have, from the first, been dead
against this Spanish War, the problem is all the more ominous, and the
dreadful corollaries that may hang by it the more distressing to the
royal mind.
For example, there is known, or as good as known, to be virtually some
Family Compact, or covenanted Brotherhood of Bourbonism, French and
Spanish: political people quake to ask themselves, "How will the French
keep out of this War, if it continue any length of time? And in that
case, how will Austria, Europe at large? Jenkins's Ear will have kindled
the Universe, not the Spanish Main only, and we shall be at a fine
pass!" The Britannic Majesty reflects that if France take to fighting
him, the first stab given will probably be in the accessiblest quarter
and the intensely most sensitive,--our own Electoral Dominions where
no Parliament plagues us, our dear native country, Hanover. Extremely
interesting to know what Friedrich of Prussia will do in such
contingency?
Well, truly it might have been King George's best bargain to close
with Friedrich; to guarantee Julich and Berg, and get Fredrich to stand
between the French and Hanover; while George, with an England behind
him, in such humor, went wholly into that Spanish Business, the one
thing needful to them at present. Truly; but then again, there are
considerations: "What is this Friedrich, just come out upon the world?
What real fighting power has he, after all that ridiculous drilling and
recruiting Friedrich Wilhelm made? Will he be faithful in bargain; is
not, perhaps, from of old, his bias always toward France rather? And
the Kaiser, what will the Kaiser say to it?" These are questions for
a Britannic Majesty! Seldom was seen such an insoluble imbroglio of
potentialities; dangerous to touch, dangerous to leave lying;--and his
Britannic Majesty's procedures upon it are of a very slow intricate
sort; and will grow still more so, year after year, in the new
intricacies that are coming, and be a weariness to my readers and me.
For observe the simultaneous fact. All this while, Robinson at Vienna
is dunning the Imperial Majesty to remember old Marlborough days and the
Laws of Nature; and declare for us against France, in case of the
worst. What an attempt! Imperial Majesty has no money; Imperial Majesty
remembers recent days rather, and his own last quarrel with France
(on the Polish-Election score), in which you Sea-Powers cruelly stood
neuter! One comfort, and pretty much one only, is left to a nearly
bankrupt Imperial heart; that France does at any rate ratify Pragmatic
Sanction, and instead of enemy to that inestimable Document has become
friend,--if only she be well let alone. "Let well alone," says the sad
Kaiser, bankrupt of heart as well as purse: "I have saved the Pragmatic,
got Fleury to guarantee it; I will hunt wild swine and not shadows
any more: ask me not!" And now this Herstal business; the Imperial
Dehortatoriums, perhaps of a high nature, that are like to come? More
hopeless proposition the Britannic Majesty never made than this to the
Kaiser. But he persists in it, orders Robinson to persist; knocks at the
Austrian door with one hand, at the Prussian or Anti-Austrian with
the other; and gazes, with those proud fish-eyes, into perils and
potentialities and a sea of troubles. Wearisome to think of, were
not one bound to it! Here, from a singular CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY OF
ENGLAND, not yet got into print, are two Excerpts; which I will request
the reader to try if he can take along with him, in view of much that is
Coming:--
1. A JUST WAR.--"This War, which posterity scoffs at as the WAR OF
JENKINS'S EAR, was, if we examine it, a quite indispensable one; the
dim much-bewildered English, driven into it by their deepest instincts,
were, in a chaotic inarticulate way, right and not wrong in taking it as
the Commandment of Heaven. For such, in a sense, it was; as shall by and
by appear. Not perhaps since the grand Reformation Controversy, under
Oliver Cromwell and Elizabeth, had there, to this poor English People
(who are essentially dumb, inarticulate, from the weight of meaning
they have, notwithstanding the palaver one hears from them in certain
epochs), been a more authentic cause of War. And, what was the fatal
and yet foolish circumstance, their Constitutional Captains, especially
their King, would never and could never regard it as such; but had to be
forced into it by the public rage, there being no other method left in
the case.
"I say, a most necessary War, though of a most stupid appearance; such
the fatality of it:--begun, carried on, ended, as if by a People in a
state of somnambulism! More confused operation never was. A solid
placid People, heavily asleep (and snoring much, shall we say,
and inarticulately grunting and struggling under indigestions,
Constitutional and other? Do but listen to the hum of those extinct
Pamphlets and Parliamentary Oratories of theirs!),--yet an honestly
intending People; and keenly alive to any commandment from Heaven, that
could pierce through the thick skin of them into their big obstinate
heart. Such a commandment, then and there, was that monition about
Jenkins's Ear. Upon which, so pungent was it to them, they started
violently out of bed, into painful sleep-walking; and went, for twenty
years and more, clambering and sprawling about, far and wide, on the
giddy edge of precipices, over house-tops and frightful cornices and
parapets; in a dim fulfilment of the said Heaven's command. I reckon
that this War, though there were intervals, Treaties of Peace more than
one, and the War had various names,--did not end till 1763. And then, by
degrees, the poor English Nation found that (at, say, a thousand times
the necessary expense, and with imminent peril to its poor head, and all
the bones of its body) it had actually succeeded,--by dreadful exertions
in its sleep! This will be more apparent by and by; and may be a kind of
comfort to the sad English reader, drearily surveying such somnambulisms
on the part of his poor ancestors."
2. TWO DIFFICULTIES.--"There are Two grand Difficulties in this
Farce-Tragedy of a war; of which only one, and that not the worst of
the Pair, is in the least surmised by the English hitherto. Difficulty
First, which is even worse than the other, and will surprisingly
attend the English in all their Wars now coming, is: That their
fighting-apparatus, though made of excellent material, cannot
fight,--being in disorganic condition; one branch of it, especially the
'Military' one as they are pleased to call it, being as good as totally
chaotic, and this in a quiet habitual manner, this long while back.
With the Naval branch it is otherwise; which also is habitual there.
The English almost as if by nature can sail, and fight, in ships; cannot
well help doing it. Sailors innumerable are bred to them; they are
planted in the Ocean, opulent stormy Neptune clipping them in all
his moods forever: and then by nature, being a dumb, much-enduring,
much-reflecting, stout, veracious and valiant kind of People, they
shine in that way of life, which specially requires such. Without much
forethought, they have sailors innumerable, and of the best quality.
The English have among them also, strange as it may seem to the cursory
observer, a great gift of organizing; witness their Arkwrights and
others: and this gift they may often, in matters Naval more than
elsewhere, get the chance of exercising. For a Ship's Crew, or even a
Fleet, unlike a land Army, is of itself a unity, its fortunes disjoined,
dependent on its own management; and it falls, moreover, as no land army
can, to the undivided guidance of one man,--who (by hypothesis, being
English) has now and then, from of old, chanced to be an organizing man;
and who is always much interested to know and practise what has been
well organized. For you are in contact with verities, to an unexampled
degree, when you get upon the Ocean, with intent to sail on it, much
more to fight on it;--bottomless destruction raging beneath you and on
all hands of you, if you neglect, for any reason, the methods of keeping
it down, and making it float you to your aim!
"The English Navy is in tolerable order at that period. But as to the
English Army,--we may say it is, in a wrong sense, the wonder of
the world, and continues so throughout the whole of this History and
farther! Never before, among the rational sons of Adam, were Armies
sent out on such terms,--namely without a General, or with no General
understanding the least of his business. The English have a notion that
Generalship is not wanted; that War is not an Art, as playing Chess is,
as finding the Longitude, and doing the Differential Calculus are (and
a much deeper Art than any of these); that War is taught by Nature, as
eating is; that courageous soldiers, led on by a courageous Wooden Pole
with Cocked-hat on it, will do very well. In the world I have not found
opacity of platitude go deeper among any People. This is Difficulty
First, not yet suspected by an English People, capable of great opacity
on some subjects.
"Difficulty Second is, That their Ministry, whom they had to force into
this War, perhaps do not go zealously upon it. And perhaps even, in the
above circumstances, they totally want knowledge how to go upon it, were
they never so zealous; Difficulty Second might be much helped, were it
not for Difficulty First. But the administering of War is a thing
also that does not come to a man like eating.--This Second Difficulty,
suspicion that Walpole and perhaps still higher heads want zeal, gives
his Britannic Majesty infinite trouble; and"----And so, in short,
he stands there, with the Garter-leg advanced, looking loftily into a
considerable sea of troubles,--that day when Friedrich drove past him,
Friday, 16th September, 1740, and never came so near him again.
The next business for Friedrich was a Visit at Brunswick, to the
Affinities and Kindred, in passing; where also was an important
little act to be done: Betrothal of the young Prince, August Wilhelm,
Heir-Presumptive whom we saw in Strasburg, to a Princess of that
House, Louisa Amelia, younger Sister of Friedrich's own Queen. A modest
promising arrangement; which turned out well enough,--though the young
Prince, Father to the Kings that since are, was not supremely fortunate
otherwise. [Betrothal was 20th September, 1740; Marriage, 5th January,
1742 (Buchholz, i. 207).] After which, the review at Magdeburg; and home
on the 24th, there to "be busy as a Turk or as a M. Jordan,"--according
to what we read long since.