History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 21Carlyle, Thomas
History
History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 21
Carlyle, Thomas
Frederick II, King of Prussia, 1712-1786; Prussia (Germany) -- History -- Frederick II, 1740-1786; Social problems
I said there were four famed Pulawskis; [Hermann, v. 465.] a father,
once Advocate in Warsaw, with three sons and a nephew; who, though
extremely active people, could do no good whatever. The father Pulawski
had the fine idea of introducing the British Constitution; clothing
Poland wholly in British tailorage, and so making it a new Poland: but
he never could get it done. This poor gentleman died in Turkish
prison, flung into jail at Constantinople, on calumnious accusation and
contrivance by a rival countryman; his sons and nephew, poor fellows,
all had their fame, more or less, in the Cause of Freedom so called; but
no other profit in this world, that I could hear of. Casimir, the eldest
son, went to America; died there, still in the Cause of Freedom so
called; Fort Pulawski, in the harbor of Charleston (which is at present,
on very singular terms, RE-engaged in the same so-called Cause!), was
named in memory of this Casimir. He had defended Czenstochow (if anybody
knew what Czenstochow was, or could find it in the Polish map); and it
was also he that contrived that wonderful plan of suddenly snapping up
King Stanislaus from the streets of Warsaw one night, ["3d November,
1771."] and of locking him away (by no means killing him), as the source
of all our woes. O my Pulawskis, men not without manhood, what a bedlam
of a Time have you and I fallen into, and what Causes of Freedom it has
got in hand!
Bar, a poor place, with no defences but a dry ditch and some miserable
earthworks, the Confederates had not the least chance to maintain;
Kaminiec, the only fortress of the Province, they never even got into,
finding some fraction of royal soldiery who stood for King Stanislaus
there, and who fired on the Confederates when applied to. Bar a small
Russian division, with certain Stanislaus soldieries conjoined, took by
capitulation; and (date not given) entered in a victorious manner. The
War-Epic of the Confederates, which Rulhiere sings at such length, is
blank of meaning.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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