THREE:The Russians, with empty meal-wagons and starving soldiers, had taken possession of Frankfort-on-the-Oder on the 29th of July. The city contained twelve thousand inhabitants. The ransom which the Russian general demanded to save the city from pillage by the Cossacks was four hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Pillage by the Cossacks! No imagination can conceive the horrors of such an event. Nearly one hundred thousand men, frenzied with intoxication, brutal in their habits, restrained by no law, would inflict every outrage which fiends could conceive of. Well might fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, turn pale and feel the blood curdle in their veins at the thought. Four hundred and fifty thousand dollars ransom! That was nearly forty dollars for each individual, man, woman, and child! Compliance with the demand was impossible. Frankfort, in its impoverishment, could by no possibility raise a tenth part of the sum. Dreadful was the consternation. There was no relenting; the money or the pillage!My own private conjecture, I confess, has rather grown to be, on much reading of those Rulhires and distracted books, that the czarinawho was a grandiose creature, with considerable magnanimities, natural and acquired; with many ostentations, some really great qualities and talents; in effect, a kind of she Louis Quatorze (if the reader will reflect on that royal gentleman, and put him into petticoats in Russia, and change his improper females for improper males)that the czarina, very clearly resolute to keep Poland hers, had determined with herself to do something very handsome in regard to Poland; and to gain glory, both with the enlightened philosophe classes and with her own proud heart, by her treatment of that intricate matter.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit. Aliquam aut tenetur, amet earum quia eligendi obcaecati. Repudiandae id illum, vero iste enim reprehenderit quaerat, harum pariatur ipsa nulla tempora ex ratione illo assumenda libero ea, delectus vitae, expedita optio porro.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit. Aliquam aut tenetur, amet earum quia eligendi obcaecati. Repudiandae id illum, vero iste enim reprehenderit quaerat, harum pariatur ipsa nulla tempora ex ratione illo assumenda libero ea, delectus vitae, expedita optio porro.
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit. Aliquam aut tenetur, amet earum quia eligendi obcaecati. Repudiandae id illum, vero iste enim reprehenderit quaerat, harum pariatur ipsa nulla tempora ex ratione illo assumenda libero ea, delectus vitae, expedita optio porro.
ONE: When the Duke of Lorraine comes I will have thee come. I think the bride will be here then. Adieu; God be with you.Frederick William was very anxious that little Fritz should be trained to warlike tastes and habits; that, like himself, he should scorn all effeminacy; that, wearing homespun clothes, eating frugal food, despising all pursuits of pleasure and all literary tastes, he should be every inch a soldier. But, to the bitter disappointment of the father, the child manifested no taste for soldiering. He was gentle, affectionate, fond of books and music,4 and with an almost feminine love clung to his sister. The29 stern old king was not only disappointed, but angered. These were qualities which he deemed unmanly, and which he thoroughly despised.
ONE:
ONE:Who can imagine the conflicting emotions of joy and wretchedness, of triumph and shame, of relief and chagrin, with which the heart of Frederick must have been rent! The army of Prussia had triumphed, under the leadership of his generals, while he, its young and ambitious sovereign, who had unjustly provoked260 war that he might obtain military glory, a fugitive from the field, was scampering like a coward over the plains at midnight, seeking his own safety. Never, perhaps, was there a more signal instance of a retributive providence. Frederick knew full well that the derision of Europe would be excited by caricatures and lampoons of the chivalric fugitive. Nor was he deceived in his anticipations. There was no end to the ridicule which was heaped upon Frederick, galloping, for dear life, from the battle-field in one direction, while his solid columns were advancing to victory in the other. His sarcastic foes were ungenerous and unjust. But when do foes, wielding the weapons of ridicule, ever pretend even to be just and generous?
