The English, always a wonderful Nation, fought and subsidied from side to side of Europe for this Spanish-Suceession business;fought ten years, such fighting as they never did before or since, under "John Duke of Marlborough," who, as is well known, "beat the French thorough and thorough." French entirely beaten at last, not without heroic difficulty and as noble talent as was ever shown in diplomacy and war, are ready to do your will in all things;in this of giving up Spain, among others:--whereupon the English turn round, with a sudden new thought, "No, we will not have our WILL done; it shall be the other way, the way it WAS,--now that we bethink ourselves, after all this fighting for our will!"And make Peace on those terms, as if no war had been; and accuse the great Marlborough of many things, of theft for one.
A wonderful People; and in their Continental Politics (which indeed consist chiefly of Subsidies) thrice wonderful. So the Treaty of Utrecht is transacting itself; which that of Rastadt, on the part of Kaiser and Empire, unable to get on without Subsidies, will have to follow: and after such quantities of powder burnt, and courageous lives wasted, general AS-YOU-WERE is the result arrived at.
Old Friedrich's Ambassadors are present at Utrecht, jangling and pleading among the rest; at Berlin too the despatch of business goes lumbering on; but what thing, in the shape of business, at Utrecht or at Berlin, is of much importance to the old man?
Seems as if Enrope itself were waxing dim, and sinking to stupid sleep,--as we, in our poor royal person, full surely are. A Crown has been achieved, and diamond buttons worth 1,500 pounds apiece;but what is a Crown, and what are buttons, after all?--I suppose the tattle and SINGERIES of little Wilhelmina, whom he would spend whole days with; this and occasional visits to a young Fritzchen's cradle, who is thriving moderately, and will speak and do aperies one day,--are his main solacements in the days that are passing.
Much of this Friedrich's life has gone off like the smoke of fire-works, has faded sorrowfully, and proved phantasmal. Here is an old Autograph Note, written by him at the side of that Cradle, and touching on a slight event there; which, as it connects two venerable Correspondents and their Seventeenth Century with a grand Phenomenon of the Eighteenth, we will insert here. The old King addresses his older Mother-in-law, famed Electress Sophie of Hanover, in these terms (spelling corrected):--"CHARLOTTENBURG, den 30 August, 1712.
"Ew. Churf. Durchlaucht werden sich zweifelsohne mit uns erfreuen, dass der kleine Printz (PRINZ) Fritz nuhnmero (NUNMEHR)6 Zehne (ZAHNE) hat und ohne die geringste incommoditet (-TAT).
Daraus kann man auch die PREDESTINATION sehen, dass alle seine Bruder haben daran sterben mussen, dieser aber bekommt sie ohne Muhe wie seine Schwester. Gott erhalte ihn uns noch lange zum trohst (TROST), in dessen Schutz ich dieselbe ergebe und lebenslang verbleibe, "Ew. Churf. Durchl. gehorsamster Diener und treuer Sohn, "FRIEDRICH R."[Preuss, <italic> Friedrich der Grosse (Historische Skizze, <end italic> Berlin, 1838), p. 380.
Of which this is the literal English:--
"Your Electoral Serenity will doubtless rejoice with us that the little Prince Fritz has now got his sixth tooth without the least INCOMMODITE. And therein we may trace a pre-destination, inasmuch as his Brothers died of teething [<italic> Not of cannon-sound and weight of head-gear, then, your Majesty thinks? That were a painful thought? <end italic>]; and this one, as his Sister [WILHELMINA] did, gets them [THE TEETH] without trouble.
God preserve him long for a comfort to us:--to whose protection I commit DIESELBE [<italic> Your Electoral Highness, in the third person <end italic>], and remain lifelong, "Your Electoral Highness's most obedient Servant and true Son, "FRIEDRICH REX."One of Friedrich Rex's worst adventures was his latest; commenced some five or six years ago (1708), and now not far from terminating. He was a Widower, of weakly constitution, towards fifty: his beautiful ingenious "Serena," with all her Theologies, pinch-of-snuff Coronations and other earthly troubles, was dead;and the task of continuing the Hohenzollern progeny, given over to Friedrich Wilhelm the Prince Royal, was thought to be in good hands. Majesty Friedrich with the weak back had retired, in 1708, to Karlsbad, to rest from his cares; to take the salutary waters, and recruit his weak nerves a little. Here, in the course of confidential promenadings, it was hinted, it was represented to him by some pickthank of a courtier, That the task of continuing the Hohenzollern progeny did not seem to prosper in the present good hands; that Sophie Dorothee, Princess Royal, had already borne two royal infants which had speedily died: that in fact it was to be gathered from the medical men, if not from their words, then from their looks and cautious innuendoes, that Sophie Dorothee, Princess Royal, would never produce a Prince or even Princess that would live; which task, therefore, did now again seem to devolve upon his Majesty, if his Majesty had not insuperable objections? Majesty had no insuperable objections;old Majesty listened to the flattering tale; and, sure enough, he smarted for it in a signal manner.
By due industry, a Princess was fixed upon for Bride, Princess Sophie Louisa of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, age now twenty-four: