"Bought by Austria, that old villain!" cry the French. Friedrich does not think the Austrians bought Seckendorf, having no money at present; but guesses they may have given him to understand that a certain large arrear of payment due ever since those Turkish Wars,--when Seckendorf, instead of payment, was lodged in the Fortress of Gratz, and almost got his head cut off,--should now be paid down in cash, or authentic Paper-money, if matters become amicable. [ _OEuvres de Frederic,_ iii. 22; _Seckendorfs Leben,_ pp. 367-376.] As they have done, in Friedrich's despite;--who seems angrier at the old stager for this particular ill-turn than for all the other many; and long remembers it, as will appear. Chapter VII.--FRIEDRICH IN SILESIA; UNUSUALLY BUSY. Here, sure enough, are sad new intricacies in the Diplomatic, hypothetic sphere of things; and clouds piling themselves ahead, in a very minatory manner to King Friedrich. Let King Friedrich, all the more, get his Fighting Arrangements made perfect. Diplomacy is clouds; beating of your enemies is sea and land. Austria and the Gazetteer world consider Friedrich to be as good as finished: but that is privately far from being Friedrich's own opinion;--though these occurrences are heavy and dismal to him, as none of us can now fancy. Herr Ranke has got access, in the Archives, to a series of private utterances by Friedrich,--Letters from him, of a franker nature than usual, and letting us far deeper into his mind;--which must have been well worth reading in the original, in their fully dated and developed condition. From Herr Ranke's Fragmentary Excerpts, let us, thankful for what we have got, select one or two. The Letters are to Minister Podewils at Berlin; written from Silesia (Neisse and neighborhood), where, since the middle of March, Friedrich has been, personally pushing on his Army Preparations, while the above sinister things befell. KING FRIEDRICH TO PODEWILS, IN BERLIN (under various dates, March-April, 1745). NEISSE, 29th MARCH.... "We find ourselves in a great crisis. If we don't, by mediation of England, get Peace, our enemies from different sides [Saxony, Austria, who knows if not Russia withal!] will come plunging in against me. Peace I cannot force them to. But if they must have War, we will either beat them, or none of us will see Berlin again." [Ranke, iii. 236 et seqq.] APRIL (no day given).... "In any case, I have my troops well together. The sicknesses are ceasing; the recruitments are coming in: shortly all will be complete. That does not hinder us from making Peace, if it will only come; but, in the contrary case, nobody can accuse me of neglecting what was necessary."