you, Wilhelmina, draw out, a fit brief Letter for him: send it to Potsdam, he will copy it there! [Wilhelmina, i. 183.] So orders the Mother: Wilhelmina does it, with a terrified heart;Crown-Prince copies without scruple: "I have already given your Majesty my word of honor never to wed any one but the Princess Amelia your Daughter; I here reiterate that Promise, in case your Majesty will consent to my Sister's Marriage,"--should that alone prove possible in the present intricacies. "We are all reduced to such a state that"--Wilhelmina gives the Letter in full; but as it is professedly of her own composition, a loose vague piece, the very date of which you have to grope out for yourself, it cannot even count among the several Letters written by the Crown-Prince, both before and after it, to the same effect, which are now probably all of them lost, [TRACE of one, Copy of ANSWER from Queen Caroline to what seems to have been one, Answer rather of dissuasive tenor, is in State-Paper Office: <italic> Prussian Despatches, <end italic> vol. xl,--dateless; probably some months later in 1780.] without regret to anybody; and we will not reckon it worth transcribing farther. Such Missive, such two Missives (not now found in any archive) speed to England by express;may the winds be favorable. Her Majesty waits anxious at Berlin;ready to take refuge in a bed of sickness, should bad come to worse.
DUBOURGAY STRIKES A LIGHT FOR THE ENGLISH COURT.
In England, in the mean while, they have received a curious little piece of secret information. One Reichenbach, Prussian Envoy at London--Dubourgay has long marvelled at the man and at the news he sends to Berlin. Here, of date 17th January, 1730, is a Letter on that subject from Dubourgay, official but private as yet, for "George Tilson, Esq.:"--Tilson is Under-Secretary in the Foreign Office, whose name often turns up on such occasions in the DUBOURGAY, the ROBINSON and other extinct Paper-heaps of that time. Dubourgay dates doubly, by old and new style; in general we print by the new only, unless the contrary be specified.
"TO GEORGE TILSON, ESQ. (Private.)
"BERLIN, 6th Jan. 1729 (by new style, 17th Jan. 1730).
"SIR,--I believe you may remember that we have for a long time suspected that most of Reichenbach's Despatches were dictated by some people here. About two days ago a Paper fell into my hands,"realized quietly for a consideration, "containing an Account of money charged to the 'Brothers Jourdan and Lautiers,' Merchants here, by their Correspondent in London, for sending Letters from,"properly in, or through, "your City to Reichenbach.
"Jourdan and Lautiers's London Correspondents are Mr. Thomas Greenhill in Little Bell Alley and Mr. John Motteux in St. Mary Axe. Mr. Guerin my Agent knows them very well; having paid them several little bills on my account:"--Better ask Mr. Guerin.
"I know not through the hands of which of those Merchants the above-mentioned Letters have passed; but you have ways enough to find it out, if you think it worth while. I make no manner of doubt but Grumkow and his party make use of this conveyance to (SIC) their instructions to Reichenbach. In the Account which Ihave seen, 'eighteen-pence' is charged for carrying each Letter to Reichenbach: the charge in general is for 'Thirty-two Letters;'
and refers to a former Account." So that they must have been long at it.
"I am, with the greatest truth, "DUBOURGAY."Here is a trail which Tilson will have no difficulty in running down. I forget whether it was in Bell Alley or St. Mary Axe that the nest was found; but found it soon was, and the due springes were set; and game came steadily dropping in,--Letters to and Letters from,--which, when once his Britannic Majesty had, with reluctance, given warrant to open and decipher them, threw light on Prussian Affairs, and yielded fine sport and speculation in the Britannic Majesty's Apartment on an evening.
This is no other than the celebrated "Cipher Correspondence between Grumkow and Reichenbach;" Grumkow covertly instructing his slave Reichenbach what the London news shall be: Reichenbach answering him, To hear is to obey! Correspondence much noised of in the modern Prussian Books; and which was, no doubt, very wonderful to Tilson and Company;--capable of being turned to uses, they thought. The reader shall see specimens by and by; and he will find it unimportant enough, and unspeakably stupid to him.
It does show Grumkow as the extreme of subtle fowlers, and how the dirty-fingered Seckendorf and he cooked their birdlime: but to us that is not new, though at St. James's it was. Perhaps uses may lie in it there? At all events, it is a pretty topic in Queen Caroline's apartment on an evening; and the little Majesty and she, with various laughters and reflections, can discern, a little, How a poor King of Prussia is befooled by his servants, and in what way a fierce Bear is led about by the nose, and dances to Grumkow's piping. Poor soul, much of his late raging and growling, perhaps it was only Grumkow's and not his! Does not hate us, he, perhaps; but only Grumkow through him? This doleful enchantment, and that the Royal Wild Bear dances only to tunes, ought to be held in mind, when we want anything with him.--Those, amid the teheeings, are reflections that cannot escape Queen Caroline and her little George, while the Prussian Express, unknown to them, is on the road.
WILHELMINA TO BE MARRIED OUT OF HAND. CRISIS SECOND:
ENGLAND SHALL HAVE SAID NO.
The Prussian Express, Queen Sophie's Courier to England, made his best speed: but he depends on the winds for even arriving there;and then he depends on the chances for an answer there;an uncertain Courier as to time: and it was not in the power of speed to keep pace with Friedrich Wilhelm's impatience. "No answer yet?" growls Friedrich Wilhelm before a fortnight is gone.