History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 09Carlyle, Thomas
History
History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 09
Carlyle, Thomas
Frederick II, King of Prussia, 1712-1786; Prussia (Germany) -- History -- Frederick II, 1740-1786; Social problems
Wilhelmina was in low spirits:--weak health; add funeral of the Prince
of Culmbach (killed in the Battle of Parma), illness of Papa, and other
sombre events:--and was by no means content with the Crown-Prince, on
this occasion. Strangely altered since we met him in July last! It may
be, the Crown-Prince, looking, with an airy buoyancy of mind, towards a
certain Event probably near, has got his young head inflated a little,
and carries himself with a height new to this beloved Sister;--but
probably the sad humor of the Princess herself has a good deal to do
with it. Alas, the contrast between a heart knowing secretly its own
bitterness, and a friend's heart conscious of joy and triumph, is harsh
and shocking to the former of the two! Here is the Princess's account;
with the subtrahend, twenty-five or seventy-five per cent, not deducted
from it:--
"My Brother arrived, the 5th of October. He seemed to me put out
(DECONTENANCE); and to break off conversation with me, he said he had to
write to the King and Queen. I ordered him pen and paper. He wrote in my
room; and spent more than a good hour in writing a couple of Letters,
of a line or two each. He then had all the Court, one after the other,
introduced to him; said nothing to any of them, looked merely with a
mocking air at them; after which we went to dinner.
"Here his whole conversation consisted in quizzing (TURLUPINER) whatever
he saw; and repeating to me, above a hundred times over, the words
'little Prince,' 'little Court.' I was shocked; and could not understand
how he had changed so suddenly towards me. The etiquette of all Courts
in the Empire is, that nobody who has not at the least the rank of
Captain can sit at a Prince's table: my Brother put a Lieutenant there,
who was in his suite; saying to me, 'A King's Lieutenants are as good as
a Margraf's Ministers.' I swallowed this incivility, and showed no sign.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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