But at last Fritz decided not to take longer all that came, and so he prepared for flight. On the 15th of July, 1730, the king of Prussia set out with a small train, accompanied by Fritz, to take a journey to the Rhine. When near Augsburg, Fritz wrote to Lieutenant Katte, one of his profligate friends, stating that he should embrace the first opportunity to escape to the Hague; that there he should assume the name of the Count of Alberville. He wished Katte to join him there, and to bring with him the overcoat and the one thousand ducats which he had left in his hands. Just after midnight the prince stole out to meet his valet, who had been commanded to bring some horses to the village green. But as Keith, the valet, appeared with the horses, he was accosted by one of the king’s guard; and the prince, although disguised with a red overcoat, was recognized and forced to withdraw to his own quarters and give up the attempt for that time. The king was informed of these things, and now the poor prince was put in the care of three of the guard, and they were informed if the prince was allowed to escape, death would be their doom. Upon the king’s arrival at Wesel, he ordered his culprit son to be brought before him. A terrible scene ensued. As the king would give no assurance that his friends who had aided him should be pardoned, the crown prince evaded all attempts to extort from him confessions which would implicate them. “Why,” asked the king, furiously, “did you attempt to desert?” “I wished to escape,” the prince boldly replied, “because you did not treat me like a son, but like an abject slave.” “You are a cowardly deserter,” the father exclaimed, “devoid of all feelings of honor.” “I have as much honor as you have,” the son replied; “and I have only done that which I have heard you say a hundred times you would have done yourself, had you been treated as I have been.” The infuriated king was now beside himself with rage. He drew his sword and seemed upon the point of thrusting it through the heart of his son, when General Mosel threw himself before the king, exclaiming, “Sire, you may kill me, but spare your son.” The prince was then placed in a room where two sentries watched over him with fixed bayonets. As the prince had held the rank of colonel in the army, his unjust father declared he was a deserter, and merited death. Frederick William, whose brutal cruelty exceeds our powers of belief, then sent a courier with the following despatch to his wife:— “I have arrested the rascal Fritz. I shall treat him as his crime and his cowardice merit. He has dishonored me and all my family. So great a wretch is no longer worthy to live.”