ONE:Frederick exclaimed, in astonishment, What an infernal fire! Did you ever hear such a cannonade before? I never did.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.
It Is very likely that your best photograph has not yet been captured
- imperdiet doming
THREE:Frederick was very fond of dogs. This was one of his earliest passions, and it continued until the end of his life. He almost invariably had five or six Italian greyhounds about him, leaping upon the chairs, and sleeping upon the sofas in his room. Dr. Zimmermann describes them as placed on blue satin chairs and couches near the kings arm-chair, and says that when Frederick, during his last illness, used to sit on his terrace at Sans Souci in order to enjoy the sun, a chair was always placed by his side, which was occupied by one of his dogs. He fed them himself, took the greatest possible care of them when they were sick, and when they died buried them in the gardens of Sans Souci. The568 traveler may still see their tombsflat stones with the names of the dogs beneath engraved upon themat each end of the terrace of Sans Souci, in front of the palace.It seems strange, said the Austrian minister of war, that his Prussian majesty, whose official post in Germany, as chamberlain of the emperor, is to present the basin and towel to the house of Austria, should now presume to prescribe rules to it.
THREE: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.The weal or woe of a single human polyp was, in the view of Frederick, entirely unimportant in comparison with the great enterprises he was ambitious of achieving. For this dismemberment of Poland Frederick was severely assailed in a book entitled Polish Dialogues. In answer to a letter from Voltaire, he wrote, under date of March 2, 1775:
THREE:The next morning Frederick hastened to greet his sister. Wilhelmina was not pleased with his appearance. The cares of his new reign entirely engrossed his mind. The dignity of an absolute king did not sit gracefully upon him. Though ostentatiously demonstrative in his greeting, the delicate instincts of Wilhelmina taught her that her brothers caresses were heartless. He was just recovering from a fit of the ague, and looked emaciate and sallow. The court was in mourning. During those funereal days no festivities could be indulged in. The queen-mother was decorously melancholy; she seems to have been not only disappointed, but excessively chagrined, to find that she was excluded by her son from the slightest influence in public affairs. The distant, arrogant, and assuming airs of the young king soon rendered him unpopular.
