History of Friedrich II of Prussia Volume XII Part 2

Gotter has fulfilled his instructions in regard to this important little Doc.u.ment; and now the effect of it is--? Gotter can report no good effect whatever. "Be cautious," Friedrich instructs him farther; "modify that Fifth Proposal; I will take less than the whole, 'if attention is paid to my just claims on Schlesien.'" To that effect writes Friedrich once or twice. But it is to no purpose; nor can Gotter, with all his industry, report other than worse and worse. Nay, he reports before long, not refusal only, but refusal with mockery: "How strange that his Prussian Majesty, whose official post in Germany, as Kur-Brandenburg and Kaiser's Chamberlain, has been to present ewer and towel to the House of Austria, should now set up for prescribing rules to it!" A piece of wit, which could not but provoke Friedrich; and warn him that negotiation on this matter might as well terminate. Such had been his own thought, from the first; but in compliance with Schwerin and Podewils he was willing to try.

Better for Maria Theresa, and for all the world how much better, could she have accepted this Fifth Proposition! But how could she,--the high Imperial Lady, keystone of Europe, though by accident with only a few pounds of ready money at present? Twenty years of bitter fighting, and agony to herself and all the world, were necessary first; a new Fact of Nature having turned up, a new European Kingdom with real King to it; NOT recognizable as such, by the young Queen of Hungary or by any other person, till it do its proofs.

WHAT BERLIN IS SAYING; WHAT FRIEDRICH IS THINKING.

What Friedrich's own humor is, what Friedrich's own inner man is saying to him, while all the world so babbles about his Silesian Adventure?

Of this too there are, though in diluted state, some glimmerings to be had,--chiefly in the Correspondence with Jordan.

Ingenious Jordan, Inspector of the Poor at Berlin,--his thousand old women at their wheels humming pleasantly in the background of our imaginations, though he says nothing of that,--writes twice a week to his Majesty: pleasant gossipy Letters, with an easy respectfulness not going into sycophancy anywhere; which keep the campaigning King well abreast of the Berlin news and rumors: something like the essence of an Old Newspaper; not without worth in our present Enterprise. One specimen, if we had room!

JORDAN TO THE KING (successively from Berlin,--somewhat abridged.)

No. 1. "BERLIN, 14th DECEMBER, 1740 [day after his Majesty left].

Everybody here is on tiptoe for the Event; of which both origin and end are a riddle to the most. I am charmed to see a part of your Majesty's Dominions in a state of Pyrrhonism; the disease is epidemical here at present. Those who, in the style of theologians, consider themselves ent.i.tled to be certain, maintain That your Majesty is expected with religious impatience by the Protestants, and that the Catholics hope to see themselves delivered from a mult.i.tude of imposts which cruelly tear up the beautiful bosom of their Church. You cannot but succeed in your valiant and stoical Enterprise, since both religion and worldly interest rank themselves under your flag.

"Wallis," Austrian Commandant in Glogau, "they say, has punished a Silesian Heretic of enthusiastic turn, as blasphemer, for announcing that a new Messiah is just coming. I have a taste for that kind of martyrdom. Critical persons consider the present step as directly opposed to certain maxims in the ANTI-MACHIAVEL.

"The word MANIFESTO--[your Majesty's little PATENT on entering Silesia, which no reader shall be troubled with at present]--is the burden of every conversation. There is a short Piece of the kind to come out to-day, by way of preface to a large complete exposition, which a certain Jurisconsult is now busy with. People crowd to the Bookshops for it, as if looking out for a celestial phenomenon that had been predicted.--This is the beginning of my Gazette; can only come out twice a week, owing to the arrangement of the Posts. Friday, the day your Majesty crosses into Silesia, I shall spend in prayer and devotional exercises: Astronomers pretend that Mars will that day enter"--no matter what.

NOTE, The above Manifesto rumor is correct; Jurisconsult is ponderous Herr Ludwig, Kanzler (Chancellor) of Halle University, monster of law-learning,--who has money also, and had to help once with a House in Berlin for one Nussler, a son-in-law of his, transiently known to us;--ponderous Ludwig, matchless or difficult to match in learning of this kind, will write ample enough Deductions (which lie in print still, to the extent of tons' weight), and explain the ERBVERBRUDERUNG and violence done upon it, so that he who runs may read. Postpone him to a calmer time.

No. 2. "BERLIN, SAt.u.r.dAY, 17th DECEMBER. Manifesto has appeared,"--can be seen, under thick strata of cobwebs, in many Books; [In _Helden-Geschichte,_ i. 448, 453 (what Jordan now alludes to); IB.

559-592 ["Deduction" itself, Ludwig in all his strength, some three weeks hence; in OLENSCHLAGER (doubtless); in &c. &c.] is not worth reading now: Incontestable rights which our House has for ages had on Schlesien, and which doubtless the Hungarian Majesty will recognize; not the slightest injury intended, far indeed from that; and so on!--"people are surprised at its brevity; and, studying it as theologians do a pa.s.sage of Scripture, can make almost nothing of it. Clear as crystal, says one; dexterously obscure by design, says another.

"Rumor that the Grand-Duke of Lorraine," Maria Theresa's Husband, "was at Reinsberg incognito lately," Grand-Duke a concerting party, think people looking into the thing with strong spectacles on their nose!

"M. de Beauvau [French Amba.s.sador Extraordinary, to whom the aces were promised if they came] said one thing that surprised me: 'What put the King on taking this step, I do not know; but perhaps it is not such a bad one.' Surprising news that the Elector of Saxony, King of Poland, is fallen into inconsolable remorse for changing his religion [to Papistry, on Papa's hest, many long years ago] and that it is not to the Pope, but to the King of Prussia, that he opens his heart to steady his staggering orthodoxy." Very astonis.h.i.+ng to Jordan. "One thing is certain, all Paris rings with your Majesty's change of religion" (over to Catholicism, say those astonis.h.i.+ng people, first conjurers of the universe)!

No. 3. "BERLIN, 20th DECEMBER. M. de Beauvau," French Amba.s.sador, "is gone. Ended, yesterday, his survey of the Cabinet of Medals; charmed with the same: charmed too, as the public is, with the rich present he has got from said Cabinet [coronation medal or medals in gold, I could guess]: people say the King of France's Medal given to our M. de Camas is nothing to it.

"Rumor of alliance between your Majesty and France with Sweden,"--premature rumor. Item, "Queen of Hungary dead in child-birth;"--ditto with still more emphasis! "The day before yesterday, in all churches, was prayer to Heaven for success to your Majesty's arms; interest of the Protestant religion being the one cause of the War, or the only one a.s.signed by the reverend gentlemen. At sound of these words, the zeal of the people kindles: 'Bless G.o.d for raising such a Defender! Who dared suspect our King's indifference to Protestantism?'"

A right clever thing this last (O LE BEAU COUP D'ETAT)! exclaims Jordan,--though it is not clever or the contrary, not being dramatically prearranged, as Jordan exults to think. Jordan, though there are dregs of old devotion lying asleep in him, which will start into new activity when stirred again, is for the present a very unbelieving little gentleman, I can perceive.--This is the substance of public rumor at Berlin for one week. Friedrich answers:--

TO M. JORDAN, AT BERLIN.

"QUARTER AT MILKAU, TOWARDS GLOGAU, 19th DECEMBER, 1740 [comfortable Jesuit-Establishment at Milkau, Friedrich just got in, out of the rain].--Seigneur Jordan, thy Letter has given me a deal of pleasure in regard to all these talkings thou reportest. To-morrow [not to-morrow, nor next day; wet troops need a rest] I arrive at our last station this side Glogau, which place I hope to get in a few days. All favors my designs: and I hope to return to Berlin, after executing them gloriously and in a way to be content with. Let the ignorant and the envious talk; it is not they that shall ever serve as loadstar to my designs; not they, but Glory [LA GLOIRE; Fame, depending not on them]: with the love of that I am penetrated more than ever; my troops have their hearts big with it, and I answer to thee for success. Adieu, dear Jordan. Write me all the ill that the public says of thy Friend, and be persuaded that I love and will esteem thee always."--F.

JORDAN TO THE KING.

No. 4; "BERLIN, 24th DECEMBER. Your Majesty's Letter fills me with joy and contentment. The Town declared your Majesty to be already in Breslau; founding on some Letter to a Merchant here. Ever since they think of your Majesty acting for Protestantism, they make you step along with strides of Achilles to the ends of Silesia.--Foreign Courts are all rating their Amba.s.sadors here for not finding you out.

"Wolf," his negotiations concluded at last, "has entered Halle almost like the triumphant Entry to Jerusalem. A concourse of pedants escorted him to his house. Lange [his old enemy, who accused him of Atheism and other things] has called to see him, and loaded him with civilities, to the astonishment of the old Orthodox." There let him rest, well b.u.t.toned in gaiters, and avoiding to mount stairs.... "Madame de Roucoulles has sent me the three objects adjoined, for your Majesty's behoof,"--woollen achievements, done by the needle, good against the winter weather for one she nursed. The good old soul. Enough now, of Jordan. [_OEuvres de Frederic,_ xvii. 75-78.]

Voltaire, who left Berlin 2d or 3d December, seems to have been stopt by overflow of rivers about Cleve, then to have taken boat; and is, about this very time, writing to Friedrich "from a vessel on the Coasts of Zealand, where I am driven mad." (Intends, privately, for Paris before long, to get his MAHOMET acted, if possible.) To Voltaire, here is a Note coming:

KING TO H. DE VOLTAIRE (at Brussels, if once got thither).

"QUARTER OF HERRENDORF IN SILESIA, 23d December, 1740.

"MY DEAR VOLTAIRE,--I have received two of your Letters; but could not answer sooner; I am like Charles Twelfth's Chess-King, who was always kept on the move. For a fortnight past, we have been continually afoot and under way, in such weather as you never saw.

"I am too tired to reply to your charming Verses; and s.h.i.+vering too much with cold to taste all the charm of them: but that will come round again. Do not ask poetry from a man who is actually doing the work of a wagoner, and sometimes even of a wagoner stuck in the mud. Would you like to know my way of life? We march from seven in the morning till four in the afternoon. I dine then; afterwards I work, I receive tiresome visits; with these comes a detail of insipid matters of business. 'Tis wrong-headed men, punctiliously difficult, who are to be set right; heads too hot which must be restrained, idle fellows that must be urged, impatient men that must be rendered docile, plunderers to restrain within the bounds of equity, babblers to hear babbling, dumb people to keep in talk: in fine, one has to drink with those that like it, to eat with those that are hungry; one has to become a Jew with Jews, a Pagan with Pagans.

"Such are my occupations;--which I would willingly make over to another, if the Phantom they call Fame (GLOIRE) did not rise on me too often. In truth, it is a great folly, but a folly difficult to cast away when once you are smitten by it. [Phantom of GLOIRE somewhat rampant in those first weeks; let us see whether it will not lay itself again, forevermore, before long!]

"Adieu, my dear Voltaire; may Heaven preserve from misfortune the man I should so like to sup with at night, after fighting in the morning!

The Swan of Padua [Algarotti, with his big hook-nose and dusky solemnly greedy countenance] is going, I think, to Paris, to profit by my absence; the Philosopher Geometer [big Maupertuis, in red wig and yellow frizzles, vainest of human kind] is squaring curves; poor little Jordan [with the kindly hazel eyes, and pen that pleasantly gossips to us]

is doing nothing, or probably something near it. Adieu once more, dear Voltaire; do not forget the absent who love you. FREDERIC." [_OEuvres de Frederic,_ xxii. 57.]

SCHWERIN AT LIEGNITZ; FRIEDRICH HUSHES UP THE GLOGAU PROBLEM, AND STARTS WITH HIS BEST SPEED FOR BRESLAU.

Meanwhile, on the Western road, and along the foot of the snowy peaks over yonder, Schwerin with the small Right column is going prosperously forwards. Two columns always, as the reader recollects,--two parallel military currents, flowing steadily on, shooting out estafettes, or horse-parties, on the right and left; steadily submerging all Silesia as they flow forward. Left column or current is in slight pause at Glogau here; but will directly be abreast again. On Tuesday, 27th, Schwerin is within wind of Liegnitz; on Wednesday morning, while the fires are hardly lighted, or the smoke of Liegnitz risen among the Hills, Schwerin has done his feat with the usual deftness: Prussian grenadiers came softly on the sentry, softly as a dream; but with sudden levelling of bayonets, sudden beckoning, "To your Guard-house!"--and there, turn the key upon his poor company and him. Whereupon the whole Prussian column marches in; tramp tramp, without music, through the streets: in the Market-place they fold themselves into a ranked ma.s.s, and explode into wind-harmony and rolling of drums. Liegnitz, mostly in nightcap, looks cautiously out of window: it is a deed done, IHR HERREN; Liegnitz ours, better late than never; and after so many years, the King has his own again. Schwerin is sumptuously lodged in the Jesuits, Palace: Liegnitz, essentially a Protestant Town, has many thoughts upon this event, but as yet will be stingy of speaking them.

Thus is Liegnitz managed. A pleasant Town, amid pleasant hills on the rocky Katzbach; of which swift stream, and other towns and pa.s.ses on it, we shall yet hear more. Population, silently industrious in weaving and otherwise, is now above 14,000; was then perhaps about half that number.

Patiently inarticulate, by no means bright in speech or sentiment; a much-enduring, steady-going, frugal, pious and very desirable people.

The situation of Breslau, all this while, is very critical. Much bottled emotion in the place; no Austrian Garrison admissible; Authorities dare not again propose such a thing, though Browne is turning every stone for it,--lest the emotion burst bottle, and take fire. I have dim account that Browne has been there, has got 300 Austrian dragoons into the Dom Insel (CATHEDRAL ISLAND; "Not in the City, you perceive!" says General Browne: "no, separated by the Oder, on both sides, from the rest of the City; that stately ma.s.s of edifices, and good military post");--and had hoped to get the suburbs burnt, after all. But the bottled emotion was too dangerous. For, underground, there are ANTI-Brownes: one especially; a certain busy Deblin, Shoemaker by craft, whom Friedrich speaks of, but gives no name to; this zealous Cordwainer, Deblin, and he is not the only individual of like humor, operates on the guild-brothers and lower populations: [Preuss, _Thronbesteigung,_ p. 469; _OEuvres de Frederic,_ ii. 61. ] things seem to be looking worse and worse for the Authorities, in spite of General Browne and his activities and dragoons.

What the issue will be? Judge if Friedrich wished the Young Dessauer come! Friedrich's Hussar parties (or Schwerin's, instructed by Friedrich) go to look if the Breslau suburbs are burnt. Far from it, if Friedrich knew;--the suburbs merely sit quaking at such a proposal, and wish the Prussians were here. "But there is time ahead of us," said everybody at Breslau; "Glogau will take some sieging!" Browne, in the course of a day or two,--guessing, I almost think, that Glogau was not to be besieged,--ranked his 300 Austrian dragoons, and rode away; sending the Austrian State-Papers, in half a score of wagons, ahead of him. "Archives of Breslau!" cried the general population, at sight of these wagons; and largely turned out, with emotion again like to unbottle itself. "Mere Tax-Ledgers, and records of the Government Offices; come and convince yourselves!" answered the Authorities. And the ten wagons went on; calling at Ohlau and Brieg, for farther lading of the like kind. Which wagons the Prussian light-horse chased, but could not catch. On to Mahren went these Archive-wagons; to Brunn, far over the Giant Mountains;--did not come back for a long while, nor to their former Proprietor at all. Tuesday, 27th, Leopold the Young Dessauer does finally arrive, with his Reserve, at Glogau: never man more welcome; such a fermentation going on at Breslau,--known to Friedrich, and what it will issue in, if he delay, not known. With despatch, Leopold is put into his charge; posts all yielded to him; orders given,--blockade to be strictness itself, but no fighting if avoidable; "starvation will soon do it, two months at most," hopes Friedrich, too sanguine as it proved:--and with earliest daylight on the 28th, Friedrich's Army, Friedrich himself in the van as usual, is on march again; at its best speed for Breslau. Read this Note for Jordan:--

FRIEDRICH TO M. JORDAN, AT BERLIN.

"HERRENDORF, 27th Dec. 1740.

"SIEUR JORDAN,--I march to-morrow for Breslau; and shall be there in four days [three, it happened; there rising, as would seem, new reason for haste]. You Berliners [of the 24th last] have a spirit of prophecy, which goes beyond me. In fine, I go my road; and thou wilt shortly see Silesia ranked in the list of our Provinces. Adieu; this is all I have time to tell thee. Religion [Silesian Protestantism, and Breslau's Cordwainer], religion and our brave soldiers will do the rest.

"Tell Maupertuis I grant those Pensions he proposes for his Academicians; and that I hope to find good subjects for that dignity in the Country where I am, withal. Give him my compliments.

"FREDERIC."

The march was of the swiftest,--swifter even than had been expected;--which, as Silesia is all ringing gla.s.s, becomes more achievable than lately. But certain regiments outdid themselves in marching; "in three marches, near upon seventy miles,"--with their baggage jingling in due proximity. Through Glasersdorf, thence through Parchwitz, Neumarkt, Lissa, places that will be better known to us;--on Sat.u.r.day, last night of the Year, his Majesty lodged at a Schloss called Pilsnitz, five miles to west of Breslau; and van-ward regiments, a good few, quartered in the Western and Southern suburbs of Breslau itself; suburbs decidedly glad to see them, and escape conflagration. The Town-gates are hermetically shut;--plenty of emotion bottled in the 100,000 hearts within. The sentries on the walls presented arms; nay, it is affirmed, some could not help exclaiming, "WILKOMMEN, IHR LIEBEN HERREN (Welcome, dear Sirs)!" [_Helden-Geschichte,_ i. 534.]

Colonel Posadowsky (active Horse Colonel whom we have seen before, who perhaps has been in Breslau before) left orders "at the Scultet Garden-House," that all must be ready and the rooms warmed, his Majesty intending to arrive here early on the morrow. Which happened accordingly; Majesty alighting duly at said Garden-House, near by the Schweidnitz Gate,--I fancy almost before break of day.

Chapter IV. -- BRESLAU UNDER SOFT PRESSURE.

The issue of this Breslau transaction is known, or could be stated in few words; nor is the manner of it such as would, for Breslau's sake, deserve many. But we are looking into Friedrich, wish to know his manners and aspects: and here, ready to our hand, a Paper turns up, compiled by an exact person with better leisure than ours, minutely detailing every part of the affair. This Paper, after the question, Burn or insert? is to have the lot of appearing here, with what abridgments are possible:--