By this Herstal token, which is now blazing abroad, now and for a month
to come, it can be judged that the young King of Prussia intends to
stand on his own footing, quite peremptorily if need be; and will by
no means have himself led about in Imperial harness, as his late Father
was. So that a dull Public (Herrenhausen very specially), and Gazetteer
Owls of Minerva everywhere, may expect events. All the more indubitably,
when that spade-work comes to light in the Wesel Country. It is
privately certain (the Gazetteers not yet sure about it, till they see
the actual spades going), this new King does fully intend to assert his
rights on Berg-Julich; and will appear there with his iron ramrods, the
instant old Kur-Pfalz shall decease, let France and the Kaiser say No
to it or say Yes. There are, in fact, at a fit place, "Buderich in
the neighborhood of Wesel," certain rampart-works, beginnings as of
an Entrenched Camp, going on;--"for Review purposes merely," say the
Gazetteers, IN ITALICS. Here, it privately is Friedrich's resolution,
shall a Prussian Army, of the due strength (could be well-nigh 100,000
strong if needful), make its appearance, directly on old Kur-Pfalz's
decease, if one live to see such event. [Stenzel, iv. 61.] France and
the Kaiser will probably take good survey of that Buderich phenomenon
before meddling.
To do his work like a King, and shun no peril and no toil in the course
of what his work may be, is Friedrich's rule and intention. Nevertheless
it is clear he expects to approve himself magnanimous rather in the
Peaceable operations than in the Warlike; and his outlooks are, of all
places and pursuits, towards Reinsberg and the Fine Arts, for the time
being. His Public activity meanwhile they describe as "prodigious,"
though the ague still clings to him; such building, instituting,
managing: Opera-House, French Theatre, Palace for his Mother;--day by
day, many things to be recorded by Editor Formey, though the rule about
them here is silence except on cause.
No doubt the ague is itself privately a point of moment. Such a
vexatious paltry little thing, in this bright whirl of Activities,
Public and other, which he continues managing in spite of it; impatient
to be rid of it. But it will not go: there IT reappears always, punctual
to its "fourth day,"--like a snarling street-dog, in the high Ball-room
and Work-room. "He is drinking Pyrmont water;" has himself proposed
Quinquina, a remedy just come up, but the Doctors shook their heads; has
tried snatches of Reinsberg, too short; he intends soon to be out there
for a right spell of country, there to be "happy," and get quit of his
ague. The ague went,--and by a remedy which surprised the whole world,
as will be seen!
WILHELMINA'S RETURN-VISIT.
Monday, 17th October, came the Baireuth Visitors; Wilhelmina all in a
flutter, and tremor of joy and sorrow, to see her Brother again, her old
kindred and the altered scene of things. Poor Lady, she is perceptibly
more tremulous than usual; and her Narrative, not in dates only, but in
more memorable points, dances about at a sad rate; interior agitations
and tremulous shrill feelings shivering her this way and that, and
throwing things topsy-turvy in one's recollection. Like the magnetic
needle, shaky but steadfast (AGITEE MAI CONSTANTE). Truer nothing can
be, points forever to the Pole; but also what obliquities it makes; will
shiver aside in mad escapades, if you hold the paltriest bit of old iron
near it,--paltriest clack of gossip about this loved Brother of mine!
Brother, we will hope, silently continues to be Pole, so that the needle
always comes back again; otherwise all would go to wreck. Here, in
abridged and partly rectified form, are the phenomena witnessed:--
"We arrived at Berlin the end of October [Monday, 17th, as above said].
My younger Brothers, followed by the Princes of the Blood and by all
the Court, received us at the bottom of the stairs. I was led to my
apartment, where I found the Reigning Queen, my Sisters [Ulrique,
Amelia], and the Princesses [of the Blood, as above, Schwedt and the
rest]. I learned with much chagrin that the King was ill of tertian ague
[quartan; but that is no matter]. He sent me word that, being in his
fit, he could not see me; but that he depended on having that pleasure
to-morrow. The Queen Mother, to whom I went without delay, was in a dark
condition; rooms all hung with their lugubrious drapery; everything yet
in the depth of mourning for my Father. What a scene for me! Nature has
her rights; I can say with truth, I have almost never in my life been so
moved as on this occasion." Interview with Mamma--we can fancy it--"was
of the most touching." Wilhelmina had been absent eight years. She
scarcely knows the young ones again, all so grown;--finds change on
change: and that Time, as he always is, has been busy. That night the
Supper-Party was exclusively a Family one.
Her Brother's welcome to her on the morrow, though ardent enough, she
found deficient in sincerity, deficient in several points; as indeed a
Brother up to the neck in business, and just come out of an ague-fit,
does not appear to the best advantage. Wilhelmina noticed how ill he
looked, so lean and broken-down (MAIGRE ET DEFAIT) within the last two
months; but seems to have taken no account of it farther, in striking
her balances with Friedrich. And indeed in her Narrative of this Visit,
not, we will hope, in the Visit itself, she must have been in a high
state of magnetic deflection,--pretty nearly her maximum of such,
discoverable in those famous MEMOIRS,--such a tumult is there in her
statements, all gone to ground-and-lofty tumbling in this place; so
discrepant are the still ascertainable facts from this topsy-turvy
picture of them, sketched by her four years hence (in 1744). The truest
of magnetic needles; but so sensitive, if you bring foreign iron near
it!
Wilhelmina was loaded with honors by an impartial Berlin Public that is
Court Public; "but, all being in mourning, the Court was not brilliant.
The Queen Mother saw little company, and was sunk in sorrow;--had not
the least influence in affairs, so jealous was the new King of his
Authority,--to the Queen Mother's surprise," says Wilhelmina. For the
rest, here is a King "becoming truly unpopular [or, we fancy so, in
our deflected state, and judging by the rumor of cliques]; a general
discontent reigning in the Country, love of his subjects pretty much
gone; people speaking of him in no measured terms [in certain cliques].
Cares nothing about those who helped him as Prince Royal, say some;
others complain of his avarice [meaning steady vigilance in outlay]
as surpassing the late King's; this one complained of his violences of
temper (EMPORTEMENS); that one of his suspicions, of his distrust, his
haughtinesses, his dissimulation" (meaning polite impenetrability
when he saw good). Several circumstances, known to Wilhelmina's own
experience, compel Wilhelmina's assent on those points. "I would
have spoken to him about them, if my Brother of Prussia [young August
Wilhelm, betrothed the other day] and the Queen Regnant had
not dissuaded me. Farther on I will give the explanation of all
this,"--never did it anywhere. "I beg those who may one day read these
MEMOIRS, to suspend their judgment on the character of this great Prince
till I have developed it." [Wilhelmina, ii. 326.] O my Princess, you
are true and bright, but you are shrill; and I admire the effect of
atmospheric electricity, not to say, of any neighboring marine-store
shop, or miserable bit of broken pan, on one of the finest magnetic
needles ever made and set trembling!
Wilhelmina is incapable of deliberate falsehood; and this her impression
or reminiscence, with all its exaggeration, is entitled to be heard in
evidence so far. From this, and from other sources, readers will assure
themselves that discontents were not wanting; that King Friedrich was
not amiable to everybody at this time,--which indeed he never grew to be
at any other time. He had to be a King; that was the trade he followed,
not the quite different one of being amiable all round. Amiability is
good, my Princess; but the question rises, "To whom?--for example,
to the young gentleman who shot himself in Lobegun?" There are young
gentlemen and old sometimes in considerable quantities, to whom, if you
were in your duty, as a King of men (or even as a "King of one man and
his affairs," if that is all your kingdom), you should have been
hateful instead of amiable! That is a stern truth; too much forgotten by
Wilhelmina and others. Again, what a deadening and killing circumstance
is it in the career of amiability, that you are bound not to be
communicative of your inner man, but perpetually and strictly the
reverse! It may be doubted if a good King can be amiable; certainly he
cannot in any but the noblest ages, and then only to a select few. I
should guess Friedrich was at no time fairly loved, not by those nearest
to him. He was rapid, decisive; of wiry compact nature; had nothing of
his Father's amplitudes, simplicities; nothing to sport with and fondle,
far from it. Tremulous sensibilities, ardent affections; these we
clearly discover in him, in extraordinary vivacity; but he wears them
under his polished panoply, and is outwardly a radiant but metallic
object to mankind. Let us carry this along with us in studying him;
and thank Wilhelmina for giving us hint of it in her oblique
way.--Wilhelmima's love for her Brother rose to quite heroic pitch in
coming years, and was at its highest when she died. That continuation
of her MEMOIRS in which she is to develop her Brother's character,
was never written: it has been sought for in modern times; and a few
insignificant pages, with evidence that there is not, and was not, any
more, are all that has turned up. [Pertz, _Ueber die Denkwurdigkeiten
der Markgrafin van Bayreuth_ (Paper read in the _Akademie der
Wissenschaften,_ Berlin, 25th April, 1850)].
Incapable of falsity prepense, we say; but the known facts, which stand
abundantly on record if you care to search them out, are merely as
follows: Friedrich, with such sincerity as there might be, did welcome
Wilhelmina on the morrow of her arrival; spoke of Reinsberg, and of air
and rest, and how pleasant it would be; rolled off next morning, having
at last gathered up his businesses, and got them well in hand, to
Reinsberg accordingly; whither Wilhelmina, with the Queen Regnant and
others of agreeable quality, followed in two days; intending a long and
pleasant spell of country out there. Which hope was tolerably fulfilled,
even for Wilhelmina, though there did come unexpected interruptions, not
of Friedrich's bringing.
UNEXPECTED NEWS AT REINSBERG.
Friedrich's pursuits and intended conquests, for the present, are of
peaceable and even gay nature. French Theatre, Italian Opera-House,
these are among the immediate outlooks. Voltaire, skilled in French
acting, if anybody ever were, is multifariously negotiating for a
Company of that kind,--let him be swift, be successful. [Letters of
Voltaire (PASSIM, in these months).] An Italian Opera there shall
be; the House is still to be built: Captain Knobelsdorf, who built
Reinsberg, whom we have known, is to do it. Knobelsdorf has gone
to Italy on that errand; "went by Dresden, carefully examining the
Opera-House there, and all the famed Opera-Houses on his road." Graun,
one of the best judges living, is likewise off to Italy, gathering
singers. Our Opera too shall be a successful thing, and we hope, a
speedy. Such are Friedrich's outlooks at this time.
A miscellaneous pleasant company is here; Truchsess and Bielfeld, home
from Hanover, among them; Wilhelmina is here;--Voltaire himself perhaps
coming again. Friedrich drinks his Pyrmont waters; works at his public
businesses all day, which are now well in hand, and manageable by
couriers; at evening he appears in company, and is the astonishment of
everybody; brilliant, like a new-risen sun, as if he knew of no illness,
knew of no business, but lived for amusement only. "He intends Private
Theatricals withal, and is getting ready Voltaire's MORT DE CESAR."
[Preuss, _Thronbesteigung,_ p. 415.] These were pretty days at
Reinsberg. This kind of life lasted seven or eight weeks,--in spite of
interruptions of subterranean volcanic nature, some of which were surely
considerable. Here, in the very first week, coming almost volcanically,
is one, which indeed is the sum of them all.
Tuesday forenoon, 25th October, 1740, Express arrives at Reinsberg;
direct from Vienna five days ago; finds Friedrich under eclipse, hidden
in the interior, laboring under his ague-fit: question rises, Shall
the Express be introduced, or be held back? The news he brings is huge,
unexpected, transcendent, and may agitate the sick King. Six or seven
heads go wagging on this point,--who by accident are namable, if readers
care: "Prince August Wilhelm," lately betrothed; "Graf Truchsess,"
home from Hanover; "Colonel Graf von Finkenstein," old Tutor's Son, a
familiar from boyhood upwards; "Baron Pollnitz" kind of chief Goldstick
now, or Master of the Ceremonies, not too witty, but the cause of wit;
"Jordan, Bielfeld," known to us; and lastly, "Fredersdorf," Major-domo
and Factotum, who is grown from Valet to be Purse-Keeper, confidential
Manager, and almost friend,--a notable personage in Friedrich's History.
They decide, "Better wait!"
They wait accordingly; and then, after about an hour, the trembling-fit
being over, and Fredersdorf having cautiously preluded a little, and
prepared the way, the Despatch is delivered, and the King left with his
immense piece of news. News that his Imperial Majesty Karl VI. died,
after short illness, on Thursday, the 20th last. Kaiser dead: House
of Hapsburg, and its Five Centuries of tough wrestling, and
uneasy Dominancy in this world, ended, gone to the distaff:--the
counter-wrestling Ambitions and Cupidities not dead; and nothing but
Pragmatic Sanction left between the fallen House and them! Friedrich
kept silence; showed no sign how transfixed he was to hear such tidings;
which, he foresaw, would have immeasurable consequences in the world.
One of the first was, that it cured Friedrich of his ague. It braced
him (it, and perhaps "a little quinquina which he now insisted on") into
such a tensity of spirit as drove out his ague like a mere hiccough;
quite gone in the course of next week; and we hear no more of that
importunate annoyance. He summoned Secretary Eichel, "Be ready in
so many minutes hence;" rose from his bed, dressed himself; [Preuss,
_Thronbesteigung,_ p. 416.]--and then, by Eichel's help, sent off e
for Schwerin his chief General, and Podewils his chief Minister. A
resolution, which is rising or has risen in the Royal mind, will be
ready for communicating to these Two by the time they arrive, on the
second day hence. This done, Friedrich, I believe, joined his company in
the evening; and was as light and brilliant as if nothing had happened.