are playing in the background. Unhappy son, unhappy father, once more! "Nay, Friedrich Wilhelm got new lights at Frankfort. Rittmeister Katte had an estafette, waiting for him, there. Estafette with a certain letter, which the Rittmeister had picked up in Erlangen, and has shot across by estafette to wait his majesty here. Majesty has read with open eyes and throat: letter from the Crown Prince to Lieutenant Katte, in Berlin; treasonous flight-project now indisputable as the sun at noon! His majesty stept on board the yacht in such humour as was never seen before. Detestable rebel and deserter-scandal of scandals. It is confidently written everywhere (though Seckendorf diplomatically keeps silence), his majesty hustled and tussled the unfortunate Crown Prince, poked the handle of his cane into his face, and made his nose bleed. Never did a Bradenburgh face suffer the like of this!' cried the poor prince, driven to the edge of mad ignition, and one knows not what; when the Buddenbrocks, at whatever peril, interfered, got the prince brought on board a different yacht, and the conflagration moderated for the moment. The yachts get under way towards Maintz, and down the Rhine stream. The yachts glide swiftly on the favouring current, taking advantage of what wind there may be. Were we once ashore at Wesel, in our own country, wait till then, thinks his majesty." The terms in which Frederick William communicates the arrest of the Crown Prince to the principal lady of the queen's bed-chamber, breathe of anything but savagery of spirit: - 'My dear Frau von Kamecke, "Fritz has attempted to desert. I have been under the necessity to have him arrested. I request you to tell my wife of it in some good way, that the news may not terrify her; and pity an unhappy father.-FRIEDRICH WILHELM." The Prince is consigned to the fortress of Cüstrin, and kept in close custody meanwhile listen to our author's prophetic interpretation of the perplexed father's tangle of thoughts: : "The excellent tutor of the Crown Prince, good Duhan de Jandun, for what fault or complicity we know not, is hurled off to Memel; ordered to live theren what resources is equally unknown. Apparently his fault was the general one, of having miseducated the prince, and introduced these French literatures, foreign poisonous elements of thought and practice into the mind of his pupil which even ruined the young man. For his majesty perceived that there lies the source of it, that only total perversion of the heart and judgment first of all can have brought about these dreadful issues of conduct. And, indeed, his majesty understands on credible information, that Deserter Fritz entertains very heterodox opinions, on predestination for one, which is itself calculated to be the very mother of mischief in a young mind inclined to evil. The heresy about predestination or the "Freie Gnadenwahl (election by free grace)," as his majesty terms it, according to which a man is pre-appointed from all eternity, either to salvation or the opposite (which is Fritz's notion; and, indeed, is Calvin's and that of many benighted creatures, this editor among them), appears to his majesty an altogether shocking one; nor would the whole synod of Dort, or Calvin, or St. Augustine in person, aided by a thirty-editor power reconcile his majesty's practical judgment to such a tenet. What! may Deserter Fritz say to himself even now, or in whatever other deeps of sin he may fall into was foredoomed to it; how could I or how can I help it?' The mind of his majesty shudders as if looking over the edge of an abyss. He is meditating much whether nothing can be done to save the lost Fritz, at least the soul of him from this horrible delusion-hurls forth your fine Duhan with his metaphysics to remote Memel as the first step. And signiand in a speculative way to Finckenfies withal, though as yet only historically stein and Kalkstein themselves, that their method of training up a young soul to do God's will, and accomplish useful work in this world, does by no means appear to the royal mind an admirable one! Finckenstein and Kalkstein were always covertly of the Queen's party, and now stand reprimanded and in marked disfavour. 'I "That the treasonous mystery of this Crown Prince (parricidal, it is likely, and tending to upset the universe), must be investigated to the very bottom, and be condignly punished, probably with death, his majesty perceives too well; and also what terrible difficulties formal and essential there will be. But whatever become of his perishable life, ought not if possible the soul of him to be saved from the claws of Satan! "claws of Satan ; "brand from the burning:" "for Christ our Saviour's sake;" "in the name of the most merciful God, Father, Son,and Holy Ghost, amen"-so Friedrich William phrases it, in these confused old documents and cabinet letters of his, which awaken a strange feeling in the reflective reader, and show us the ruggedest of human creatures melted into blubbering tenderness, and growling huskily something which we perceived to be real prayer. There has a business fallen out such as seldom occurred before." But majesty, now that his prey is caught, is in the predicament of the genius who had the bear by the tail, and found equal peril in letting him go, and in holding on-for Wilhelm was puzzled what to do. This embarrassment might be relieved by the finding of a court-martial, and such was summoned on the 25th October, 1730, in the little town of Copenick, between Cüstrin and Berlin. The verdict of the court is thus given and commented on by our author: "Accomplices of the Crown Prince are two first, Lieutenant Keith, actual deserter, who cannot be caught. To be hanged in effigy, cut in four quarters, and nailed to the gallows at Wesel:good, says his majesty. Secondly, Lieutenant Katte of the gens d'armes, intended deserter, not actually deserting, and much tempted thereto, All things considered, two years of fortress arrest to Lieutenant Katte:-not good this, bad this, thinks majesty. This provokes from his majesty an angry rebuke to the too lax court-martial. Rebuke which can still be read in growling unlucid phraseology; but with a Rhadamanthine idea clear enough in it, and with a practical purpose only too clear: that Katte was a sworn soldier of the gens d'armes even, or body-guard of Prussian majesty; and did, nevertheless, in the teeth of his oath, worship the rising sun.' When minded to desert, did plot and colleague with foreign courts in aid of said rising sun, and of an intended high crime against the Prussian majesty itself on the rising sun's part; far from at once revealing the same as duty ordered Lieutenant Katte to do. That Katte's crime amounts to high treason (crimen laesae majestatis), that the rule is, fiat justitia, et pereat mundus; and that, in brief, Katte's doom is, and is hereby declared to be, death. Death by the gallows and hot pincers is the usual doom of traitors; but his majesty will say in this case, death by the sword and headsınan simply; certain circumstances moving the royal clemency to go so far, no farther. And the court-martial has straightway to apprize Katte of the same; and so doing shall say, that his majesty is sorry for Katte; but that it is better he die than that justice depart out of the world." "On Sunday evening, 5th November, it is intimated to him (Katte), unexpectedly at the moment, that he has to go to Cüstrin, and there die;-carriage now waiting at the gate. Katte masters the sudden flurry; signifies that all is ready then; and so, under charge of his old major and two brother officers, who, and Chaplain Müller, are in the carriage with him, a troop of his own old cavalry regiment escorting, he leaves Berlin, (rather a sudden summons) drives all night towards Cüstrin and immediate death. Words of sympathy were not wanting, to which Katte answered cheerily; grim faces wore a cloud of sorrow for the poor youth that night. Chaplain Müller's exhortations were fervent and continual; and, from time to time, there were heard, hoarsely melodious through the damp darkness, and the noise of wheels, snatches of devotional singing, led by Müller. "It was in the gray of the winter morning, 6th November, 1730, that Katte arrived in Cüstrin garrison. He took kind leave of major and men: 'Adieu, my brothers; good be with you evermore!' and about nine o'clock, he is on the road towards the rampart of the castle, where a scaffold stands. Katte wore, by order, a brown dress, exactly like the prince's. The prince is already brought down into a lower room to see Katte as he passes-(to see Katte die had been the royal order; but they smuggled that into abeyance); and Katte knows he shall see him. Faithful Müller was in the death-car along with Katte; and he had adjoined to himself one Besserer, the chaplain of the garrison, in this sad function, since arriving. "Here is a glimpse from Besserer, which we may take as better than nothing. "His (Katte's) eyes were mostly directed to God; and we (Müller and I), on our part, strove to hold his heart up heavenwards, by presenting the examples of those who had died in the Lordas of God's Son himself, and Stephen, and the thief on the cross-till, under such discoursing, we approached the castle. Here, after long, wistful looking about, he did get sight of his beloved Jonathan, Royal Highness the Crown Prince, at a window in the Castle, from whom he, with the politest and most tender expression, spoken in French, took leave, with no little emotion of sorrow.' "President Münchow and the Commandant were with the Prince, whose emotions one may fancy but not describe. Seldom did any prince or man stand in such a predicament. Vain to say, and again say-In the name of God, I ask you, stop the execution till I write to the King. Impossible that; as easily stop the course of the stars. And so here Katte comes, cheerful loyalty still beaming on his face, death now nigh. Par donnez moi, mon cher Katte!' cried Friedrich, in a tone. 'Pardon me, my dear Katte; O that this should be what I have done for you! Death is sweet for a prince I love so well,' said Katte. La mort est douce pour un si aimable prince; and fared on, round some angle of the fortress, it appears, not in sight of Friedrich, who sank into a faint, and had seen his last glimpse of Katte in this world. "The body lay all day upon the scaffold, by royal order, and was buried at night obscurely, in the common churchyard. Friends in silence took mark of the place against better times; and Katte's dust now lies elsewhere, among that of his own kindred. 666 "Never was such a transaction before or since, in modern history,' cries the angry reader. 'Cruel, like the grinding of human hearts under millstones; like' or, indeed, like the doings of the gods, which are cruel, though not that alone. This is what, after much sorting and sifting, I could get to know about the definite facts of it. Commentary, not likely to be very final at this epoch, the reader himself shall supply at discretion." We could have wished that Katte's fate had been otherwise; but we can scarcely accord to that misguided officer the compassion which Carlyle implies to be his due. In so far as he is made a scape-goat for the Prince's offence we yield him our pity, but personally he has no claim on our regret. He belonged to that class of perverse fools who do more mischief than the deliberately wicked, and whom it is impossible to save from the consequences of their own folly. As the favourite companion of the favourite brother of the Princess Royal, his position gave him opportunities of acquaintance, at second hand, at least, with that august lady, and his imprudence laid Wilhelmina open to unfriendly rumours. He publicly exhibited in Berlin, the princess' portrait, which, nevertheless, he avowed he only copied from one in Prince Friedrich's possession; but when appealed to to give it up, at the instance of the Queen herself, he refused to surrender it. What cared he how he compromised a lady of exalted station, so he gained with the public the eclât of a successful royal amour! The king had heard enough of his escapades to prompt him, on the arrest of Katte, charge his daughter with having ne him several children, a mere slander, but one sufficient to provoke a father and a king to very unusual measures of severity. The provocation of Katte was, therefore, not confined to the single act of complicity in the son's design of flight, but was made up of a long series of impertinences, disloyalties, and presumptions, such as swelled the rage of Wilhelm to bursting, and carried away the offender in its flood. Escape before arrest was possible, too, for the braggart; and he might easily have got off scot free, but the vain fool thing became him in life so much as could not recognise his danger. Nohis departure from it. From Förster's Jugend-jahre we extract the following paragraphs, from a paper addressed from his prison to his young master : "IX. I again implore the Prince Royal most solemnly, in the name of the sufferings of Jesus Christ, to submit himself to his father's will, both on account of the promises contained in the fifth commandment, and also from fear of the law of retaliation, which might some day make him feel the same griefs from his own children. "X. I beseech the Prince Royal to consider the vanity of those designs of men which are concerted without God. The Prince Royal would have wished to serve me, and to raise me to dignities and honours: see how these designs are frustrated! I therefore beseech the Prince Royal to take the law of God for the rule of all his actions, and to try them by the test of his sacred will. "XI. The Prince Royal ought to be certain that he is deceived by those who in view their own interests and not his; flatter his passions, for they have only and he ought, on the other hand, to regard as his true friends those who tell him the truth, and oppose themselves to his inclinations. "XII. I implore the Prince Royal to repent, and to submit his heart to God. XIII. Finally, I implore the Prince Royal not to believe in predestination, but to acknowledge the providence and the hand of God even in the smallest occurrences in the world." This, it will be owned, goes far to cancel the evil of his precedents, and is not given by Carlyle, but referred to thus: "He did heartily repent and submit; left with Chaplain Müller a paper of pious considerations, admonishing the prince to submit." The prince yielded to that counsel ere long, finding resistance in vain, and that the king would be obeyed in his family no less than in his kingdom. In the most appropriate terms of submission he threw himself upon his father's clemency in a week's space after the execution of his friend; and through the good offices of the clergyman Müller, his treatment received an immediate mitigation. Released from confinement, a house and establishment were assigned him at Cistrin, and a share in the superintendence of the royal domains, whence no small part of the royal revenues was derived. After this event-the turning point in his career-by the exercise of ordinary discretion, Friedrich grew in Wilhelm's good graces, and directly he proved himself a son was at no loss in finding a father. His life, as a Crown Prince, onward, is one of scarcely interrupted prosperityhis enforced marriage with the Princess Elizabeth Christina of Brunswick excepted, a lady whom his father chose for him, and to whom no objection on the Prince's part would be listened to. It is but too probable that Friedrich revenged upon the lady the coercion of papa. This princess never had a child. Popular opinion, confirmed by the report of the queen mother, at Berlin, is to the effect that on the first night of marriage an unfounded cry of fire was raised by the Prince's friends, on which he rushed out of his bride's bed-chamber, and never entered it again. They rarely occupied the same residence; and after his accession to the throne, Thiebault says, that Friedrich used to go to see her once a year, on her birth-day, to offer his congratulations. All this, in regard to the express hero of his memoir, Mr. Carlyle suppresses, and applies the varnish of his excessive good-nature most lavishly to the Crown Prince period of Friedrich's married life. Certainly a wedded life spent habitually apart, the lady at Schönhausen, the Prince at Ruppin, and afterwards at Rheinsberg, away from his wife for years, presents a greater incongruity than a casual "If I should dine at Edmonton, And he should dine at Ware," of a luckless London citizen and his loving spouse. Kings are "kittle cattle," but it will take a larger supply of lacquer than even Carlyle's laboratory can furnish to reconcile to our notion of greatness, which includes goodness in a very essential degree, Frederick the Great's treatment of his pretty, unassuming, modest, and entirely respectable lady. There never was furnished so much as a shadow of a pretext for it in the deportment of that most virtuous and exemplary princess. This was something totally unlike the homely virtue of Wilhelm, to whom his wife kept bearing children through a period of thirty years, and to his rigid fidelity to whom through life he bore his own honest testimony on a dying bed. In fact, on scarcely any one point of favourable comparison would the father yield to the son. A brave and enterprising soldier, his siege of Stralsund and Pomeranian campaign, by their prompt success attest his military talent and prowess, yet a Cincinnatus of peace, his policy throughout life was an avoidance of war. Under his paternal rule his country prospered to a singular degree; his wise, vigorous, and most liberal administration turning whole provinces into a garden which had been a desert. By his regulation of affairs Berlin became one of the most splendid capitals of Europe, rising in the sandy waste a city of palaces, like Palmyra in the wilderness. He fostered religion in a soldierly fashion, and fought the battle of toleration successfully against a whole intolerant Germany-as witness, his interference for the oppressed Protestants of Heidelberg, and the expatriated Salzburghers. To protect and establish these he dared every danger, and spared no expenditure of revenues. With him the right of asylum, too, was inviolable; on behalf of unpopular sovereigns and oppressed subjects alike. And finally, he died like a Christian, with these last words upon his lips-" Herr Jesu, to Thee I live; Herr Jesu, to Thee ĺ die. In life and death Thou art my gain (Du bist mein Gewinn)." Years afterwards, when writing his memoirs of the House of Brandenburg, Friedrich the Great, whom time and reflection had taught to appreciate the worth of his stern departed sire, thus spoke of Wilhelm :-"We ought to have some indulgence for the faults of his children, when reflecting on the virtues of such a father;" of all things which Friedrich ever wrote the most commendable and true. On the truth of the penitent son's deliverance our author exhibits a profound reliance, while the pathos of such a life as that of Friedrich Wilhelm finds a full response in the bosom of one who is himself an earnest, misunderstood, and struggling worker. Our thorough belief is, notwithstanding certain random and impatient utterances of this great writer scattered here and there throughout his voluminous works, that Mr. Carlyle is unapproachably the most pathetic writer of the day. In fiction no modern novelist, be he who he may, has produced any thing one-half so moving as the inimitable pathos of the German professor's first, last, only kiss of his beloved; and the present work, like all his biographies, is brimful of sympathy with the sorrows of his species. As he looks out on the tangled maze of man's life from those fiery-lion eyes of his, he seems ever more ready to weep tears of blood over human shames, and tears of distress over human suffering, than to indulge in the scowl of disgust, or the roar of vehement denunciation. The manhood of Carlyle is a shot tissue, a veined marble, a union of opposite qualities: as all true manhood is, it partakes of womanhood, and never forgets that it has had a mother : 66 -Never yet A very woman,-sensitive and quick That meaner souls make mock at. If a man Include not thus a woman, he is less, I hold than man." Making the slightest possible abatement of commendation, on the score of the historian's style, with its unarticulated substantives, verbs without auxiliaries, and abstract nouns used in plural forms a suit which could easily be adopted by an imitator, but which, being a coat of mail hammered out by the skill of Mr. Carlyle, is worn most effectively only by himself; and, taking the greatest exception to his ricochetting with his subject, whereby he pounces down with wearisome iteration upon striking epithet, nickname, or fact, until the matter of a single volume grows in the process tediously into two, we have sincerely to thank our author for his otherwise magnificent production. It is full to overflowing with the fruits of unsparing research-history contributing its annals, and gossip its anecdotes, till the result is, that of no court in Europe is so comprehensive and satisfactory an account in existence as of that of Berlin. Even the French memoirs, with all their freedom of revelation, are left behind by the un-approachable lucidity and completeness-so far as it has gone-of this History of "Friedrich the Great.' We candidly ayow that we know nothing comparable to it. But, while we cheerfully accord all the praise which is due to the master-workman who has done so well, we must repeat our disapproval of the personage whose reign the historian has yet to describe. There is an incongruity between the heroes whom Mr. Carlyle selects for the laurel which is beyond our competency to reconcile. From Cromwell to Frederick the Second;-from the grand old paladin to the French petit-maitre and pedant;-from the Puritan, whose Bible was his law of duty, rigid and imperative as the stone-table of Sinai, to the thinker of unhallowed thoughts, with whom Revelation was but a bogie to frighten anility and childhood, is a great interval; not, indeed, from the sublime to the ridiculous, but an interval as morally wide, namely, from the worthy to the unworthyfrom the admirable to the contemptible. What link of connexion has forged itself in the biographer's mind between extremes so strangely separate, as the Jephtha-judge of the British Israel, and the small unscrupulous Napoleon of Prussia, it were hard to discern, as the limits of the least fastidious Hero-worship scarcely span a space so extensive. There was indubitably something in the present hero of Carlyle's devotion, while the gentlemen of the royal races contemporary with Frederick were marvellously inane, destitute of kingcraft and every other craft, specifically of the craft of "good living"; yet, in this last point of comparison, the monarch of Prussia claimed no superiority over his brother kings; while, on the score of achievement and successful enterprise, his laurels are tarnished to us by the grossness of his life. We can never consent to become such indiscriminate admirers |