But no sooner did Frederick get an intimation that Austria was contemplating this enlargement of her domains than he roused himself to prevent it with all the vigor of his earlier years. It was a very delicate matter; for Charles Theodore, the elector, and his nephew August Christian, heir to the electorate, a young gentleman of very illustrious pedigree, but of a very slender purse, had both been bribed by Austria secretly to co-operate in the movement. The reader will be interested in Carlyles account, slightly abbreviated, of Fredericks skill in diplomacy:
The king, upon receiving these strange and unexpected tidings, immediately rode into Lowen. It was an early hour in the261 morning. He entered the place, not as a king and a conqueror, but as a starving fugitive, exhausted with fatigue, anxiety, and sleeplessness. It is said that his hunger was so great that he stopped at a little shop on the corner of the market-place, where widow Panzern served him with a cup of coffee and a cold roast fowl. Thus slightly refreshed, the intensely humiliated young king galloped back to his victorious army at Mollwitz, having been absent from it, in his terror-stricken flight, for sixteen hours.THE MARCH INTO SILESIA.And if the hussar took me into the palace, it was now the secretary took me out again. And there, yoked with six horses, stood a royal wagon, which, having led me to, the secretary said, You people, the king has given order that you are to take this stranger to Berlin, and you are to accept no drink-money from him. I again testified my thankfulness for the royal kindness, took my place, and rolled away.
FORE:The more you have proved that you were acquainted with452 the intentions of Saxony, the more odious have you rendered its invasion. In order to procure this knowledge, your minister has degraded his character. By means proscribed in society, you have discovered only that the King Elector of Saxony did not love the power of Prussia, that he feared it, and that he even dared to form projects to defend himself against it. Documents which are stolen make against the accuser who produces them, if they do not prove the crime which they impute.116
ONE:While Frederick William was confined to his room, tormented by the gout, he endeavored to beguile the hours in painting in oil. Some of these paintings still exist, with the epigraph, Painted by Frederick William in his torments. Wilhelmina writes:
TWO:I depend with complete confidence on your soldierly and patriotic zeal, which is already well and gloriously known to me, and which, while I live, I will acknowledge with the heartiest satisfaction. Before all things I recommend to you, and prescribe as your most sacred duty, that in every situation you exercise humanity on unarmed enemies. In this respect, let there be the strictest discipline kept among those under you.Voltaire embraced the opportunity of giving vent to his malice in epigrams and lampoons. Frederick was by no means insensible to public opinion, but he was ever willing to brave that opinion if by so doing he could accomplish his ambitious ends.
THREE:I flatter myself that now nothing will be wanting of that valor which the state has a right to expect of you. The hour is436 at hand. I should feel that I had accomplished nothing were I to leave Silesia in the hands of Austria. Let me then apprise you that I intend to attack Prince Charless army, which is nearly thrice the strength of our own, wherever I can find it. It matters not what are his numbers, or what the strength of his position. All this by courage and by skill we will try to overcome. This step I must risk, or all is lost. We must beat the enemy, or perish before his batteries. If there be any one who shrinks from sharing these dangers with me, he can have his discharge this evening.
FORE:BATTLE OF MAXEN, NOVEMBER 20, 1759.
In this tremor of my heart, writes Linsenbarth, there came a valet out of the palace and asked, Where is the man that was with my king in the garden? I answered, Here. He led me into the palace to a large room, where pages, lackeys, and soldier valets were about. My valet took me to a little table excellently furnished with soup, beef; likewise carp, dressed with garden salad; likewise game, with cucumber salad; bread, knife, fork, plate, spoon were all there. My valet set me a chair, and said,The king, who was devotedly attached to his sister, and who was very fond, on all occasions, of composing rhymes which he called poetry, wrote a very tender ode, bidding her adieu. It commenced with the wordsMonday morning the storm ceased. There was a perfect calm. For leagues the spotless snow, nearly two feet deep, covered all the extended plains. The anxiety of Frederick had been so great that for two nights he had not been able to get any sleep. He had plunged into this war with the full assurance that he was to gain victory and glory. It now seemed inevitable that he was to encounter but defeat and shame.Leopold, in early youth, fell deeply in love with a beautiful young lady, Mademoiselle Fos. She was the daughter of an apothecary. His aristocratic friends were shocked at the idea of so unequal a marriage. The sturdy will of Leopold was unyielding. They sent him away, under a French tutor, to take the grand tour of Europe. After an absence of fourteen months he returned. The first thing he did was to call upon Mademoiselle Fos. After that, he called upon his widowed mother. It was in vain to resist the will of such a man. In 1698 he married her, and soon, by his splendid military services, so ennobled his bride that all were ready to do her homage. For half a century she was his loved and honored spouse, attending him in all his campaigns.
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