Frederick the Great and His Family Part 71

"And now," said the king, when he had sealed and directed his letter, "now I am ready; my worldly affairs are settled. I am at the end of my sufferings, and dare claim that last, deep rest granted by Nature to us all. I have worked enough, suffered enough; and if, after a life of stormy disasters, I seek my grave, no one can say it was cowardly not to live--for all the weight of life rolled upon me, forced me to the ground, and the grave opened beneath my feet. I continued to hope, when overwhelmed with defeat at every point. Every morning brought new clouds, new sorrows. I bore it courageously, trusting that misfortune would soon weary, the storms blow over, and a clear, cloudless sky envelop me. I deceived myself greatly; my sorrows increased. And now, the worst has happened; my country is lost! Who dares say I should survive this loss? To die at the proper time is also a duty. The Romans felt this, and acted upon it. I am a true scholar of the old masters, and wish to prove myself worthy of them. When all is lost, the liberty to die should not be denied. The world has nothing more to do with me, and I laugh at her weak, unjust laws. Like Tiberius, will I live and die! Farewell, then, thou false existence; farewell, weak man! Ah!

there are so many fools--so few men amongst you; I have found so many faithless friends, so many traitors, so few honest men! In the hour of misfortune they all deserted me! But, no!" said he; "one remained true.

D'Argens never deceived me, and I had almost forgotten to take leave of him. Well, death must wait for me, while I write to D'Argens!"

A heavenly inspiration now beamed on his countenance; his eyes shone like stars. The holy muse had descended to comfort the despairing hero, to whisper loving and precious words to him. Thus standing at death's portals, Frederick wrote his most beautiful poem, called "Ami le sort en est jete'." A great wail of woe burst from his soul. The sorrows, the grievances hid until now from all, he portrayed in touching, beautiful words to his absent friend. He pictured to him his sufferings, his hopes, his struggles, and finally, his determination to die. When all this had been painted in the most glowing colors, when his wounds were laid bare, he wrote a last and touching farewell to his friend:

"Adieu, D'Argens! dans ce tableau, De mon trepas tu vois la cause; Au moins ne pense pas du neant du caveau, Que j'aspire a l'apotheose.

Tout ce que l'amitie par ces vers propose, C'est que tant qu'ici-bas le celeste flambeau; Eclairera tes jours tandis que je repose, Et lorsque le printemps paraissant de nouveau.

De son sein abondant t'offre les fleurs ecloses, Chaque fois d'un bouquet de myrthes et de roses, Tu daignes parer mon tombeau."

[Footnote: "Adieu, D'Argens! In this picture Thou wilt see the cause of my death; At least, do not think, a nothing in the vault, That I aspire to apotheosis.

All that friends.h.i.+p by these lines proposes Is only this much, that here the celestial torch May clear thy days while I repose, And each time when the Spring appears anew And from her abundant breast offers thee the flowers there enclosed That thou with a bouquet of myrtle and rose Wilt deign to decorate my tomb."]

"Ah!" murmured the king, as he folded and addressed his poetical letter, "how lovely it must now be at Sans-Souci! Well, well! my grave shall be there, and D'Argens will cover it with flowers. And have I no other friends at Sans-Souci? My good old hounds, my crippled soldiers! They cannot come to me, but I will go to them."

The king then arose, opened the door, and asked if a messenger was in readiness; receiving an answer in the affirmative, he gave the three letters to the adjutant. "And now my work is finished," said he, "now I can die." He took from his breast-pocket a small casket of gold which he always carried with him, and which, in the late battle, had served him as a s.h.i.+eld against the enemy's b.a.l.l.s. The lid had been hollowed in by a ball; strange to say, this casket, which had saved his life, was now to cause his death. For within it there was a small vial containing three pills of the most deadly poison, which the king had kept with him since the beginning of the war. The king looked at the casket thoughtfully.

"Death here fought against death; and still how glorious it would have been to die upon the battle-field believing myself the victor!" He held the vial up to the light and shook it; and as the pills bounded up and down, he said, smiling sadly, "Death is merry! It comes eagerly to invite me to the dance. Well, well, my gay cavalier, I am ready for the dance."

He opened the vial and emptied the pills into his hand. Then arose and approached the window to see once more the sky with its glittering stars and its brightly-beaming moon, and the battle-field upon which thousands of his subjects had this day found their death. Then raised the hand with the pills. What was it that caused him to hesitate? Why did his hand fall slowly down? What were his eyes so intently gazing on?

The king was not gazing at the sky, the stars, or the moon; but far off into the distance, at the Austrian camp-fires. There were the conquerors, there was Soltikow and Loudon with their armies. The king had observed these fires before entering the hut, but their number had now increased, a sign that the enemy had not advanced, but was resting.

How? Was it possible that the enemy, not taking advantage of their victory, was not following the conquered troops, but giving them time to rally, to outmarch them, perhaps time to reach the Spree, perhaps Berlin?

"If this is so," said the king, answering his own thoughts, "if the enemy neglects to give me the finis.h.i.+ng-blow, all is not lost. If there is a chance of salvation for my country, I must not die; she needs me, and it is, my duty to do all in my power to retrieve the past."

He looked again at the camp-fires, and a bright smile played about his lips.

"If those fires speak aright," said he, "my enemies are more generous--or more stupid--than I thought, and many advantages may still be derived from this lost battle. If so, I must return to my old motto that 'life is a duty.' And so long as good, honorable work is to be done, man has no right to seek the lazy rest of the grave. I must ascertain at once if my suspicions are correct. Death may wait awhile.

As long as there is a necessity for living, I cannot die."

He returned the pills to the vial and hid the casket in its former resting-place. Then pa.s.sing hastily through the room, he opened the door. The two adjutants were sitting upon the wooden bench in front of the hut; both were asleep. The grenadiers were pacing with even tread up and down before the house; deep quiet prevailed. The king stood at the door looking in amazement at the glorious scene before him. He inhaled with delight the soft summer air; never had it seemed to him so balmy, so full of strengthening power, and he acknowledged that never had the stars, the moon, the sky looked as beautiful. With lively joy he felt the night-wind toying with his hair. The king would not tire of all this; it seemed to him as if a friend, dead long since, mourned and bewailed, had suddenly appeared to him beaming with health, and as if he must open his arms and say, "Welcome, thou returned one. Fate separated us; but now, as we have met, we will never leave one another, but cling together through life and death, through good and evil report."

Life was the friend that appeared to Frederick, and he now felt his great love for it. Raising his eyes in a sort of ecstasy to the sky, he murmured, "I swear not to seek death unless at the last extremity, if, when made a prisoner, I cannot escape. I swear to live, to suffer, so long as I am free."

He had a.s.sumed the harness of life, and was determined to battle bravely with it.

CHAPTER XIII. THE TWO GRENADIERS.

Smiling, and with elastic step, the king advanced to meet the two grenadiers, who stood rooted to the spot as he approached them.

"Grenadiers," said he, "why are you not with your comrades?"

"Our comrades fled," said one.

"It is dishonorable to fly," said the other.

The king was startled. These voices were familiar, he had surely heard them before.

"I ought to know you," said he, "this is not the first time we have spoken together. What is your name, my son?"

"Fritz Kober is my name," said the grenadier.

"And yours?"

"Charles Henry Buschman," said the other.

"You are not mistaken, sir king! we have met and spoken before, but it was on a better night than this."

"Where was it?" said the king.

"The night before the great, the glorious battle of Leuthen," said Fritz Kober, gravely; "at that time, sir king, you sat at our tent-fire and ate dumplings with us. Charles Henry knows how to cook them so beautifully!"

"Ah! I remember," said the king; "you made me pay my share of the costs."

"And you did so, like a true king," said Fritz Kober. "Afterward you came back to our tent-fire, and Charles Henry Buschman told you fairy tales, n.o.body can do that so beautifully as Charles Henry, and you slept refres.h.i.+ngly throughout."

"No, no, grenadier," said the king, "I did not sleep, and I can tell you to-day all that Charles Henry related."

"Well, what was it?" said Fritz Kober, with great delight.

The king reflected a moment, and then said, in a soft voice:

"He told of a king who was so fondly loved by a beautiful fairy, that she changed herself into a sword when the king went to war and helped him to defeat his enemies! Is that it. Fritz Kober?"

"Nearly so, sir king; I wish you had such a fairy at your side to-day."

"Still, Fritz," whispered Charles Henry Buschman, "our king does not need the help of a fairy; our king can maintain his own cause, and G.o.d is with his sword."

"Do you truly believe that, my son?" said the king, deeply moved. "Have you still this great confidence in me? Do you still believe that I can sustain myself and that G.o.d is with me?"

"We have this confidence, and we will never lose it!" cried Charles Henry, quickly. "Our enemies over there have no Frederick to lead them on, no commander-in-chief to share with them hunger and thirst, and danger and fatigue; therefore they cannot love their leaders as we do ours."

"And then," said Fritz Kober, thoughtfully, "I am always thinking that this war is like a battle of the cats and hounds. Sometimes it looks as if the little cats would get the better of the great bulldogs; they have sharp claws, and scratch the dogs in the face till they can neither see nor hear, and must for a while give way; they go off, however, give themselves a good shake, and open their eyes, and spring forward as great and strong and full of courage as ever; they seize upon the poor cats in the nape of the neck and bite them deadly with their strong, powerful teeth. What care they if the cats do scratch in the mean while?

No, no, sir king, the cats cannot hold out to the end; claws are neither so strong nor so lasting as teeth."

"Yes," said the king, laughing, "but how do you know but our foes over there are the hounds and we are the little cats?"

"What!" cried Fritz Kober, amazed, "we shall be the cats? No, no, sir king, we are the great hounds."

"But how can you prove this?"

"How shall I prove it?" said Fritz Kober, somewhat embarra.s.sed. After a short pause, he cried out, gayly, "I have it--I will prove it. Those over there are the cats because they are Russians and Austrians, and do not serve a king as we do; they have only two empresses, two women. Now, sir king, am I not right? Women and cats, are they not alike? So those over there are the cats and we are the bull dogs!"

Frederick was highly amused. "Take care," said he, "that 'those over there' do not hear you liken their empresses to cats."

"And if they are empresses," said Fritz Kober, dryly, "they are still women, and women are cats."