It is of high importance to ascertain at the outset of the enquiry how far Frederick was free to act as he pleased and to what extent he was fettered by constitutional or social ties. His whole manner of life, indeed, was such as to suggest the most complete freedom. From the moment of his father’s death he was master of his people and of his policy as few European potentates have ever been. Autocracy as well as diligence is stamped upon even the externals of his everyday existence. Though his stature was not quite five feet seven inches, his ablutions, when performed at all, slight and few, and his dress of the shabbiest, no one ever suggested that his presence lacked kingliness. He usually wore an old grey hat of soft felt, a faded blue uniform smeared with the snuff in which he indulged immoderately, and boots which through neglect were of a reddish colour. But his bearing, stern and caressing by turns, his clarion voice, and his glance which, as a contemporary owned, nothing could resist, made him the cynosure of whatever company he was in. The absence of the customary trappings of royalty rendered the King of Prussia less formidable to the poor, whom he patronised, while it marked his contempt for the official and middle classes, whom he sometimes allowed to kiss the skirts of his dirty coat. Frederick, it need hardly be said, was fully conscious of his own superiority to his subjects in birth, address, and talent. During his incognito visit to Strasburg in 1740, Marshal Broglie remarked the contrast between Frederick and Algarotti on the one hand and the awkward Germans of the party on the other. The vivacity of the King’s circle was almost all imported from abroad. Many years later the French philosopher d’Alembert stated that Frederick himself was the only man in Prussia with whom it was possible to hold conversation as the word was understood in France. The man who by right of birth was absolute ruler of Prussia had some reason to believe that he was also the greatest poet, historian, philosopher, critic, administrator, legislator, statesman, captain, and general in his dominions. [Illustration: SANS-SOUCI. CARYTID FRONT.]