Book: History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 21

T >> Thomas Carlyle >> History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 21




Of humane consolatory Anecdotes, in this kind, our Opposition
Kaltenborn gives several; of the rhadamanthine desolating or
destructive kind, though such also could not be wanting, if your
Assize is to be good for anything, he gives us none. And so far as
I can learn, the effective punishments, dismissals and the like,
were of the due rarity and propriety; though the flashes of unjust
rebuke, fulminant severity, lightnings from the gloom of one's own
sorrows and ill-humor, were much more frequent, but were seldom--I
do not know if ever--persisted in to the length of practical
result. This is a Rhadamanthus much interested not to be unjust,
and to discriminate good from bad! Of Ziethen there are two famous
Review Anecdotes, omitted and omissible by Kaltenborn, so well
known are they: one of each kind. At a certain Review, year not
ascertainable,--long since, prior to the Seven-Years War,--the
King's humor was of the grimmest, nothing but faults all round;
to Ziethen himself, and the Ziethen Hussars, he said various hard
things, and at length this hardest: "Out of my sight with you!"
[Madame de Blumenthal, Life of Ziethen, i.
265.] Upon which Ziethen--a stratum of red-hot kindling in Ziethen
too, as was easily possible--turns to his Hussars, "Right about,
RECHTS UM: march!" and on the instant did as bidden.
Disappeared, double-quick; and at the same high pace, in a high
frame of mind, rattled on to Berlin, home to his quarters, and
there first drew bridle. "Turn; for Heaven's sake, bethink you!"
said more than one friend whom he met on the road: but it was of no
use. Everybody said, "Ziethen is ruined;" but Ziethen never heard
of the thing more.

Anecdote Second is not properly of a Review, but of an incidental
Parade of the Guard, at Berlin (25th December, 1784), by the King
in person: Parade, or rather giving out of the Parole after it, in
the King's Apartments; which is always a kind of Military Levee as
well;--and which, in this instance, was long famous among the
Berlin people. King is just arrived for Carnival season;
old Ziethen will not fail to pay his duty, though climbing of the
stairs is heavy to a man of 85 gone. This is Madam Blumenthal's
Narrative (corrected, as it needs, in certain points):--

"SATURDAY, 25th DECEMBER, 1784, Ziethen, in spite of the burden of
eighty-six years, went to the Palace, at the end of the Parade, to
pay his Sovereign this last tribute of respect, and to have the
pleasure of seeing him after six months' absence. The Parole was
given out, the orders imparted to the Generals, and the King had
turned towards the Princes of the Blood,--when he perceived Ziethen
on the other side of the Hall, between his Son and his two Aides-
de-Camp. Surprised in a very agreeable manner at this unexpected
sight, he broke out into an exclamation of joy; and directly making
up to him,--'What, my good old Ziethen, are you there!' said his
Majesty: 'How sorry am I that you have had the trouble of walking
up the staircase! I should have called upon you myself. How have
you been of late?' 'Sire,' answered Ziethen, (my health is not
amiss, my appetite is good; but my strength! my strength!'
'This account,' replied the King, 'makes me happy by halves only:
but you must be tired;--I shall have a chair for you.'
[Thing unexampled in the annals of Royalty!] A chair," on order to
Ziethen's Aides-de-Camp, "was quickly brought. Ziethen, however,
declared that he was not at all fatigued: the King maintained that
he was. 'Sit down, good Father (MEIN LIEBER ALTER PAPA ZIETHEN,
SETZE ER SICH DOCH)!' continued his Majesty: 'I will have it so;
otherwise I must instantly leave the room; for I cannot allow you
to be incommoded under my own roof.' The old General obeyed, and
Friedrich the Great remained standing before him, in the midst of a
brilliant circle that had thronged round them. After asking him
many questions respecting his hearing, his memory and the general
state of his health, he at length took leave of him in these words:
'Adieu, my dear Ziethen [it was his last adieu!]--take care not to
catch cold; nurse yourself well, and live as long as you can, that
I may often have the pleasure of seeing you.' After having said
this, the King, instead of speaking to the other Generals, and
walking through the saloons, as usual, retired abruptly, and shut
himself up in his closet." [Blumenthal, ii. 341;
Militair-Lexikon, iv. 318. Chodowiecki has made an
Engraving of this Scene; useful to look at for its military
Portraits, if of little esteem otherwise. Strangely enough, both in
BLUMENTHAL and in Chodowiecki's ENGRAVING the year is given as 1785
(plainly impossible); Militair-Lexikon
misprints the month; and, one way or other, only Rodenbeck (iii.
316) is right in both day and year.]

Following in date these small Conway Phenomena, if these, so
extraneous and insignificant, can have any glimmer of memorability
to readers, are two other occurrences, especially one other, which
come in at this part of the series, and greatly more require to be
disengaged from the dust-heaps, and presented for remembrance.

In 1775, the King had a fit of illness; which long occupied certain
Gazetteers and others. That is the first occurrence of the two, and
far the more important. He himself says of it, in his HISTORY, all
that is essential to us here:--

"Towards the end of 1775, the King was attacked by several strong
consecutive fits of gout. Van Swieten, a famous Doctor's Son, and
Minister of the Imperial Court at Berlin, took it into his head
that this gout was a declared dropsy; and, glad to announce to his
Court the approaching death of an enemy that had been dangerous to
it, boldly informed his Kaiser that the King was drawing to his
end, and would not last out the year. At this news the soul of
Joseph flames into enthusiasm; all the Austrian troops are got on
march, their Rendezvous marked in Bohemia; and the Kaiser waits,
full of impatience, at Vienna, till the expected event arrives;
ready then to penetrate at once into Saxony, and thence to the
Frontiers of Brandenburg, and there propose to the King's Successor
the alternative of either surrendering Silesia straightway to the
House of Austria, or seeing himself overwhelmed by Austrian troops
before he could get his own assembled. All these things, which were
openly done, got noised abroad everywhere; and did not, as is easy
to believe, cement the friendship of the Two Courts. To the Public
this scene appeared the more ridiculous, as the King of Prussia,
having only had a common gout in larger dose than common, was
already well of it again, before the Austrian Army had got to their
Rendezvous. The Kaiser made all these troops return to their old
quarters; and the Court of Vienna had nothing but mockery for its
imprudent conduct." [ OEuvres de Frederic,
vi. 124.]

The first of these gout-attacks seems to have come in the end of
September, and to have lasted about a month; after which the
illness abated, and everybody thought it was gone. The Kaiser-
Joseph evolution must have been in October, and have got its
mockery in the next months. Friedrich, writing to VOLTAIRE, October
22d, has these words: ... "A pair of charming Letters from Ferney;
to which, had they been from the great Demiurgus himself, I could
not have dictated Answer. Gout held me tied and garroted for four
weeks;--gout in both feet and in both hands; and, such its extreme
liberality, in both elbows too: at present the pains and the fever
have abated, and I feel only a very great exhaustion." [Ib. xxv.
44.] "Four consecutive attacks; hope they are now all over;" but we
read, within the Spring following, that there have been in all
twelve of them; and in May, 1776, the Newspapers count eighteen
quasi-consecutive. So that in reality the King's strength was sadly
reduced; and his health, which did not recover its old average till
about 1780, continued, for several years after this bad fit, to be
a constant theme of curiosity to the Gazetteer species, and a
matter of solicitude to his friends and to his enemies.

Of the Kaiser's immense ambition there can be no question. He is
stretching himself out on every side; "seriously wishing," thinks
Friedrich, "that he could 'revivify the German Reich,'"--new
Barbarossa in improved FIXED form; how noble! Certainly, to King
Friedrich's sad conviction, "the Austrian Court is aiming to
swallow all manner of dominions that may fall within its grasp."
Wants Bosnia and Servia in the East; longs to seize certain
Venetian Territories, which would unite Trieste and the Milanese to
the Tyrol. Is throwing out hooks on Modena, on the Ferrarese, on
this and on that. Looking with eager eyes on Bavaria,--the
situation of which is peculiar; the present Kur-Baiern being
elderly, childless; and his Heir the like, who withal is already
Kur-Pfalz, and will unite the Two Electorates under one head;
a thing which Austria regards with marked dislike.
[ OEuvres de Frederic, vi. 123.] These are
anxious considerations to a King in Friedrich's sick state. In his
private circle, too, there are sorrows: death of Fouquet, death of
Quintus Icilius, of Seidlitz, Quantz (good old Quantz, with his
fine Flutings these fifty years, and the still finer memories he
awoke! [Friedrich's Teacher of the Flute; procured for him by his
Mother (supra vi. 144).]),--latterly an unusual number of deaths.
The ruggedly intelligent Quintus, a daily companion, and guest at
the supper-table, died few months before this fit of gout; and must
have been greatly missed by Friedrich. Fouquet, at Brandenburg,
died last year: his benefactor in the early Custrin distresses, his
"Bayard," and chosen friend ever since; how conspicuously dear to
Friedrich to the last is still evident. A Friedrich getting lonely
enough, and the lights of his life going out around him;--has but
one sure consolation, which comes to him as compulsion withal, and
is not neglected, that of standing steadfast to his work, whatever
the mood and posture be.

The Event of 1776 is Czarowitsh Paul's arrival in Berlin, and
Betrothal to a second Wife there; his first having died in
childbirth lately. The first had been of Friedrich's choosing, but
had behaved ill,--seduced by Spanish-French Diplomacies, by this
and that, poor young creature:--the second also was of Friedrich's
choosing, and a still nearer connection: figure what a triumphant
event! Event now fallen dead to every one of us; and hardly
admitting the smallest Note,--except for chronology's sake, which
it is always satisfactory to keep clear:--

"Czarowitsh Paul's first Wife, the Hessen-Darmstadt Princess of
Three, died of her first child April 26th, 1776: everybody
whispered, 'It is none of Paul's!' who, nevertheless, was
inconsolable, the wild heart of him like to break on the
occurrence. By good luck, Prince Henri had set out, by invitation,
on a second visit to Petersburg; and arrived there also on April
26th, [Rodenbeck, iii. 139-146.] the very day of the fatality.
Prince Henri soothed, consoled the poor Czarowitsh;
gradually brought him round; agreed with his Czarina Mother, that
he must have a new Wife; and dexterously fixed her choice on a
'Niece of the King's and Henri's.' Eldest Daughter of Eugen of
Wurtemberg, of whom, as an excellent General, though also as a
surly Husband, readers have some memory; now living withdrawn at
Mumpelgard, the Wurtemberg Apanage [Montbeillard, as the French
call it], in these piping times of Peace:--she is the Princess.
To King Friedrich's great surprise and joy. The Mumpelgard
Principalities, and fortunate Princess, are summoned to Berlin.
Czarowitsh Paul, under Henri's escort, and under gala and
festivities from the Frontier onward, arrived in Berlin 21st July,
1776; was betrothed to his Wurtemberg Princess straightway;
and after about a fortnight of festivities still more transcendent,
went home with her to Petersburg; and was there wedded, 18th
October following;--Czar and Czarina, she and he, twenty years
after, and their posterity reigning ever since. [ OEuvres
de Frederic, vi. 120-122.]

"At Vienna," says the King, "everybody was persuaded the Czarowitsh
would never come to Berlin. Prince Kaunitz had been,"--been at his
old tricks again, playing his sharpest, in the Court of Petersburg
again: what tricks (about Poland and otherwise) let us not report,
for it is now interesting to nobody. Of the Czarowitsh Visit itself
I will remark only,--what seems to be its one chance of dating
itself in any of our memories,--that it fell out shortly after the
Sherlock dinner with Voltaire (in 1776, April 27th the one event,
July 21st the other);--and that here is, by pure accident, the
exuberant erratic Sherlock, once more, and once only, emerging on
us for a few moments!--


EXUBERANT SHERLOCK AND ELEVEN OTHER ENGLISH ARE PRESENTED TO
FRIEDRICH ON A COURT OCCASION (8th October, 1777); AND TWO
OF THEM GET SPOKEN TO, AND SPEAK EACH A WORD. EXCELLENCY
HUGH ELLIOT IS THEIR INTRODUCER.

Harris, afterwards Earl of Malmesbury, succeeded Mitchell at
Berlin; "Polish troubles" (heartily indifferent to England),
"Dantzig squabbles" (miraculously important there),--nothing worth
the least mention now. Excellency Harris quitted Berlin in Autumn,
1776; gave place to an Excellency Hugh Elliot (one of the Minto
Elliots, Brother of the first Earl of Minto, and himself
considerably noted in the world), of whom we have a few words
to say.

Elliot has been here since April, 1777; stays some five years in
this post;--with not much Diplomatic employment, I should think,
but with a style of general bearing and social physiognomy, which,
with some procedures partly incidental as well, are still
remembered in Berlin. Something of spying, too, doubtless there
was; bribing of menials, opening of Letters: I believe a great deal
of that went on; impossible to prevent under the carefulest of
Kings. [An ingenious young Friend of mine, connected with
Legationary Business, found lately, at the Hague, a consecutive
Series, complete for four or five years (I think, from 1780
onwards), of Friedrich's LETTERS to his MINISTER IN LONDON,--Copies
punctually filched as they went through the Post-office there:--
specimens of which I saw; and the whole of which I might have seen,
had it been worth the effort necessary. But Friedrich's London
Minister, in this case, was a person of no significance or
intimacy; and the King's Letters, though strangely exact, clear and
even elucidative on English Court-Politics and vicissitudes, seemed
to be nearly barren as to Prussian.] Hitherto, with one exception
to be mentioned presently, his main business seems to have been
that of introducing, on different Court-Days, a great number of
Travelling English, who want to see the King, and whom the King
little wants, but quietly submits to. Incoherent Sherlock, whom we
discover to have been of the number, has, in his tawdry disjointed
Book, this Passage:--

"The last time of my seeing him [this Hero-King of my heart] was at
Berlin [not a hint of the time when]. He came thither to receive
the adieus of the Baron de Swieten, Minister from their Imperial
Majesties [thank you; that means 8th October, 1777 [Rodenbeck, iii.
172.]], and to give audience to the new Minister, the Count
Cobenzl. The Foreign Ministers, the persons who were to be
presented [we, for instance], and the Military, were all that were
at Court. We were ten English [thirteen by tale]: the King spoke to
the first and the last; not on account of their situation, but
because their names struck him. The first was Major Dalrymple.
To him the King said: 'You have been presented to me before?'
'I ask your Majesty's pardon; it was my Uncle' (Lord Dalrymple, of
whom presently). Mr. Pitt [unknown to me which Pitt, subsequent
Lord Camelford or another] was the last. THE KING: 'Are you a
relation of Lord Chatham's?' 'Yes, Sire.'--'He is a man whom I
highly esteem' [read "esteemed"].

"He then went to the Foreign Ministers; and talked more to Prince
Dolgorucki, the Russian Ambassador, than to any other. In the midst
of his conversation with this Prince, he turned abruptly to Mr.
Elliot, the English Minister, and asked: 'What is the Duchess of
Kingston's family name?' This transition was less Pindaric than it
appears; he had just been speaking of the Court of Petersburg, and
that Lady was then there." [Sherlock, ii. 27.] Whereupon Sherlock
hops his ways again; leaving us considerably uncertain. But, by a
curious accident, here, at first-hand, is confirmation of the
flighty creature;--a Letter from Excellency Elliot himself having
come our way:--


TO WILLIAM EDEN, ESQUIRE (of the Foreign Office, London;
Elliot's Brother-in-law; afterwards LORD AUCKLAND).

"BERLIN, 12th October, 1777.

"MY DEAR EDEN,--If you are waiting upon the pinnacle of all
impatience to give me news from the Howes [out on their then famous
"Seizure of Philadelphia," which came to what we know!], I am
waiting with no less impatience to receive it, and think every
other subject too little interesting to be mentioned. I must,
however, tell you, the King has been here; ["Came to Berlin 8th
October," on the Van-Swieten errand; "saw Princess Amelia twice;
and on the 9th returned to Potsdam" (Rodenbeck, iii. 172).] to the
astonishment of all croakers, hearty and in high spirits. He was
very civil to all of us. I was attended by one dozen English, which
nearly completes my half-hundred this season. Pitt made one of the
twelve, and was particularly distinguished.
KING: "Monsieur est-il parent de Mylord Chatham?' italic> PITT: 'Oui, Sire.' KING:
'C'est un homme que j'ai beaucoup estime.'

"You have no idea of the joy the people expressed to see the King
on Horseback,--all the Grub-street nonsense of 'a Country groaning
under the weight of its burdens,' of 'a Nation governed with a rod
of iron,' vanished before the sincere acclamations of all ranks,
who joined in testifying their enthusiasm for their great Monarch.
I long for Harris and Company [Excellency Harris; making for
Russia, I believe]; they are to pig together in my house; so that I
flatter myself with having a near view, if not a taste, of
connubial joys. My love to E and _e_ [your big _E_leanor and your
LITTLE, a baby in arms, who are my Sister and Niece;--pretty,
this!]. Your most affectionate, H. E.

"P.S. I quite forgot to tell you, I sent out a servant some time
ago to England to bring a couple of Horses. He will deliver some
Packets to you; which I beg you will send, with Lord Marischal's
compliments, to their respective Addresses. There is also a china
cup for Mr. Macnamara, Lawyer, in the Temple or Lincoln's Inn, from
the same person [lively old gentleman, age 91 gone; did die next
year]. What does Eleanor mean about my Congratulatory Letter to
Lord Suffolk [our Foreign Secretary, on his marriage lately]?
I wished his Lordship, most sincerely, every happiness in his new
state, as soon as I knew of it. I beg, however, Eleanor will do the
like;--and although it is not my system to 'congratulate' anybody
upon marriage, yet I never fail to wish them what, I think, it is
always two to one they do not obtain." [EDEN-HOUSE CORRESPONDENCE
(part of which, not this, has been published in late years).]

As to the Dalrymple of SHERLOCK, read this (FRIEDRICH TO
D'ALEMBERT, two years before [ OEuvres de Frederic, italic> xxv. 21: 5th August, 1775.]): ... "A Mylord of wonderful
name [Lord Dalrymple, if I could remember it], of amiable genius
(AU NOM BAROQUE, A L'ESPRIT AIMABLE), gave me a Letter on your
part. 'Ah, how goes the Prince of Philosophers, then? Is he gay;
is he busy; did you see him often?' To which the Mylord: 'I? No;
I am straight from London!'"--"QUOI DONC--?" In short, knowing my
Anaxagoras, this Mylord preferred to be introduced by him; and was
right: "One of the amiablest Englishmen I have seen; I except only
the name, which I shall never remember [but do, on this new
occasion]: Why doesn't he get himself unchristened of it, and take
that of Stair, which equally belongs to him?" (Earl of Stair by and
by; Nephew, or Grand-Nephew, of the great Earl of Stair, once so
well known to some of us. Becomes English Minister here in 1785, if
we much cared.)

That word of reminiscence about Pitt is worth more attention.
Not spoken lightly, but with meaning and sincerity;
something almost pathetic in it, after the sixteen years
separation: "A man whom I much esteemed,"--and had good reason to
do so! Pitt's subsequent sad and bright fortunes, from the end of
the Seven-Years War and triumphant summing up of the JENKINS'S-EAR
QUESTION, are known to readers. His Burton-Pynsent meed of honor
(Estate of 3,000 pounds a year bequeathed him by an aged Patriot,
"Let THIS bit of England go a noble road!"); his lofty silences, in
the World Political; his vehement attempts in it, when again asked
to attempt, all futile,--with great pain to him, and great disdain
from him:--his passionate impatiences on minor matters, "laborers
[ornamenting Burton-Pynsent Park, in Somersetshire] planting trees
by torchlight;" "kitchen people [at Hayes in North Kent, House
still to be seen] roasting a series of chickens, chicken after
chicken all day, that at any hour, within ten minutes, my Lord may
dine!"--these things dwell in the memory of every worthy reader.
Here, saved from my poor friend Smelfungus (nobody knows how much
of him I suppress), is a brief jotting, in the form of rough
MEMORANDA, if it be permissible:--

"Pitt four years King; lost in quicksands after that; off to Bath,
from gout, from semi-insanity; 'India should pay, but how?' Lost in
General-Warrants, in Wilkes Controversies, American Revolts,--
generally, in shallow quicksands;--dies at his post, but his post
had become a delirious one.

"A delicate, proud, noble man; pure as refined gold.
Something sensitive, almost feminine in him; yet with an edge, a
fire, a steadiness; liker Friedrich, in some fine principal points,
than any of his Contemporaries. The one King England has had, this
King of Four Years, since the Constitutional system set in.
Oliver Cromwell, yes indeed,--but he died, and there was nothing
for it but to hang his body on the gallows. Dutch William, too,
might have been considerable,--but he was Dutch, and to us proved
to be nothing. Then again, so long as Sarah Jennings held the
Queen's Majesty in bondage, some gleams of Kinghood for us under
Marlborough:--after whom Noodleism and Somnambulism, zero on the
back of zero, and all our Affairs, temporal, spiritual and eternal,
jumbling at random, which we call the Career of Freedom, till Pitt
stretched out his hand upon them. For four years; never again, he;
never again one resembling him,--nor indeed can ever be.

"Never, I should think. Pitts are not born often; this Pitt's ideas
could occur in the History of Mankind once only. Stranger theory of
society, completely believed in by a clear, sharp and altogether
human head, incapable of falsity, was seldom heard of in the world.
For King: open your mouth, let the first gentleman that falls into
it (a mass of Hanover stolidity, stupidity, foreign to you,
heedless of you) be King: Supreme Majesty he, with hypothetical
decorations, dignities, solemn appliances, high as the stars (the
whole, except the money, a mendacity, and sin against Heaven):
him you declare Sent-of-God, supreme Captain of your England;
and having done so,--tie him up (according to Pitt) with
Constitutional straps, so that he cannot stir hand or foot, for
fear of accidents: in which state he is fully cooked; throw me at
his Majesty's feet, and let me bless Heaven for such a Pillar of
Cloud by day.

"Pitt, closely as I could scrutinize, seems never to have doubted
in his noble heart but he had some reverence for George II.
'Reverenced his Office,' says a simple reader? Alas, no, my friend,
man does not 'reverence Office,' but only sham-reverences it.
I defy him to reverence anything but a Man filling an Office (with
or without salary) nobly. Filling a noble office ignobly; doing a
celestial task in a quietly infernal manner? It were kinder perhaps
to run your sword through him (or through yourself) than to take to
revering him! If inconvenient to slay him or to slay yourself (as
is oftenest likely),--keep well to windward of him; be not, without
necessity, partaker of his adventures in this extremely earnest
Universe! ...

"No; Nature does not produce many Pitts:--nor will any Pitt ever
again apply in Parliament for a career. 'Your voices, your most
sweet voices; ye melodious torrents of Gadarenes Swine, galloping
rapidly down steep places, I, for one; know whither I'" ...
--Enough.

About four months before this time, Elliot had done a feat, not in
the Diplomatic line at all, or by his own choice at all, which had
considerably astonished the Diplomatic world at Berlin, and was
doubtless well in the King's thoughts during this introduction of
the Dozen. The American War is raging and blundering along,--a
delectable Lord George Germaine (ALIAS Sackville, no other than our
old Minden friend) managing as War-Minister, others equally skilful
presiding at the Parliamentary helm; all becoming worse and worse
off, as the matter proceeds. The revolted Colonies have their
Franklins, Lees, busy in European Courts: "Help us in our noble
struggle, ye European Courts;, now is your chance on tyrannous
England!" To which France at least does appear to be lending ear.
Lee, turned out from Vienna, is at work in Berlin, this while past;
making what progress is uncertain to some people.

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