TWO:The King of Prussia had an army of two hundred thousand men under perfect discipline. The Old Dessauer was dead, but many veteran generals were in command. It was manifest that war would soon burst forth. In addition to the personal pique of the Duchess of Pompadour, who really ruled France, Louis XV. was greatly exasperated by the secret alliance into which Frederick had entered with England. The brother of the Prussian king, Augustus William, the heir-apparent to the throne, disapproved of this alliance. He said to the French minister, Valori, I would give a finger from my hand had it never been concluded.
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TWO:Queen Sophie, who still clung pertinaciously to the idea of the English match, was, of course, bitterly hostile to the nuptial alliance with Elizabeth. Indeed, the queen still adhered to the idea of the double English marriage, and exhausted all the arts of diplomacy and intrigue in the endeavor to secure the Princess Amelia for the Crown Prince, and to unite the Prince of Wales to a younger sister of Wilhelmina. Very naturally she cherished feelings of strong antipathy toward Elizabeth, who seemed to be the cause, though the innocent cause, of the frustration of her plans. She consequently spoke of the princess in the most contemptuous manner, and did every thing in her power to induce her son to regard her with repugnance. But nothing could change the inexorable will of the king. Early in March the doomed Princess Elizabeth, a beautiful, artless child of seventeen years, who had seen but little of society, and was frightened in view of the scenes before her, was brought to Berlin to be betrothed to the Crown Prince, whom she had never seen, of whom she could not have heard any very favorable reports, and from142 whom she had never received one word of tenderness. The wreck of happiness of this young princess, which was borne so meekly and uncomplainingly, is one of the saddest which history records. Just before her arrival, Fritz wrote to his sister as follows. The letter was dated Berlin, March 6, 1732:
FORE:Wilhelmina was appalled in view of the difficulty and danger of the enterprise. It was a long distance from Dresden to the coast. Head winds might detain the vessel. The suspicious king would not long remain ignorant that he was missing. He would be pursued with energy almost demoniac. Being captured,80 no one could tell how fearful would be his doom. The sagacious sister was right. Fritz could not but perceive the strength of her arguments, and gave her his word of honor that he would not attempt, on the present occasion, to effect his flight. Fritz accordingly went to Dresden with his father, and returned.George Ludwig, Count of Berg, who at this time was Bishop of Liege, was a feeble old man, tottering beneath the infirmities of eighty-two years. He did not venture upon physical resistance to the power of Prussia, but confined himself to protests, remonstrances, and to the continued exercise of his own governmental authority. As Herstal was many leagues distant from Berlin, was of comparatively little value, and could only be reached by traversing foreign states, Frederick William offered to sell all his claims to it for about eighty thousand dollars. The proposal not being either accepted or rejected by the bishop, the king, anxious to settle the question before his death, sent an embassador to Liege, with full powers to arrange the difficulty by treaty. For three days the embassador endeavored in vain to obtain an audience. He then returned indignantly to Berlin. The king, of course, regarded this treatment as an insult. The bishop subsequently averred that the audience was prevented by his own sickness. Such was the posture of affairs when Frederick William died.
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FORE:Weissenfels was a small duchy in Saxony. The duke, so called by courtesy, had visited Berlin before in the train of his sovereign, King Augustus, when his majesty returned the visit of Frederick William. He was then quite captivated by the beauty and vivacity of Wilhelmina. He was titular duke merely, his brother being the real duke; and he was then living on his pay as officer in the army, and was addicted to deep potations. Carlyle describes him as a mere betitled, betasseled, elderly military gentleman of no special qualities, evil or good. Sophie Dorothee, noticing his attentions to Wilhelmina, deemed it the extreme of impudence for so humble a man to aspire to the hand of her illustrious child. She reproved him so severely that he retired from the court in deep chagrin. He never would have presumed to renew the suit but for the encouragement given by Frederick William.Two Silesian barons called upon him, and presented a protest from the authorities they represented against his meditated invasion, the design of which was now manifest to all. The king received them very courteously, tossed the protest to a secretary223 to file away or to cast into the waste-paper basket, and invited the two gentlemen to dine with him.
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FORE:Frederick, who was then in the zenith of his admiration for Voltaire, describes as follows, in a letter to his friend M. Jordan, his impressions of the interview:
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FORE:A comfortable house, with garden and summer-house, was provided for the Crown Prince. He occasionally gave a dinner-party to his brother officers; and from the summer-house rockets were thrown into the sky, to the great gratification of the rustic peasantry.
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FORE:
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FORE:Seckendorf (the embassador of the emperor) sometimes sends me money, of which I have great need. I have already taken measures that he should procure some for you. My galleons arrived yesterday, and I will divide their contents with you.
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FORE:
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FORE:Still it is evident that the serpent was in this Eden. Carlyle writes: An ardent, aerial, gracefully predominant, and, in the end, somewhat termagant female, this divine Emilie. Her temper, radiant rather than bland, was none of the patientest on occasion. Nor was M. De Voltaire the least of a Job if you came athwart him in a wrong way. I have heard that their domestic symphony was liable to furious flaws; that plates, in presence of the lackeys, actual crockery or metal, have been known to fly from end to end of the dinner-table; nay, they mention knives, though only in the way of oratorical action; and Voltaire has been heard to exclaim, Dont fix those haggard, sidelong eyes on me in that way!mere shrillness of pale rage presiding over the scene.
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