he returned home, chilled, shivering;, could not, all night, be brought to heat again. It was the last evening-party Friedrich Wilhelm ever went to. [Pollnitz (ii. 538); who gives no date.]
Lieutenant-General Schulenburg: the same who doomed young Friedrich to death, as President of the Court-Martial;and then wrote the Three Letters about him which we once looked into: illuminates himself in this manner in Berlin society,--Carnival season, 1740, weather fiercely cold. Maypole Schulenburg the lean Aunt, Ex-Mistress of George I., over in London,--I think she must now be dead? Or if not dead, why not! Memory, for the tenth time, fails me, of the humanly unmemorable, whom perhaps even flunkies should forget; and I will try it no more.
The stalwart Lieutenant-General will reappear on us once, twice at the utmost, and never again. He gave the last evening-party Friedrich Wilhelm ever went to.
Poor Friedrich Wilhelm is in truth very ill; tosses about all day, in and out of bed,--bed and wheeled-chair drearily alternating;suffers much;--and again, in Diplomatic circles, the rumors are rife and sinister. Ever from this chill at Schulenburg's the medicines did him no good, says Pollnitz: if he rallied, it was the effect of Nature, and only temporary. He does daily, with punctuality, his Official business; perhaps the best two hours he has of the four-and-twenty, for the time hangs heavy on him. His old Generals sit round his bed, talking, smoking, as it was five years ago; his Feekin and his Children much about him, out and in:
the heavy-laden, weary hours roll round as they can. In general there is a kind of constant Tabaks-Collegium, old Flans, Camas, Hacke, Pollnitz, Derschau, and the rest by turns always there;the royal Patient cannot be left alone, without faces he likes:
other Generals, estimable in their way, have a physiognomy displeasing to the sick man; and will smart for it if they enter, --"At sight of HIM every pain grows painfuler!"--the poor King being of poetic temperament, as we often say. Friends are encouraged to smoke, especially to keep up a stream of talk; if at any time he fall into a doze and they cease talking, the silence will awaken him.
He is worst off in the night; sleep very bad: and among his sore bodily pains, ennui falls very heavy to a mind so restless. He can paint, he can whittle, chisel: at last they even mount him a table, in his bed, with joiner's tools, mallets, glue-pots, where he makes small carpentry,--the talk to go on the while;--often at night is the sound of his mallet audible in the Palace Esplanade;and Berlin townsfolk pause to listen, with many thoughts of a sympathetic or at least inarticulate character: "HM, WEH, IHROMAJESTAT: ACH GOTT, pale Death knocks with impartial foot at the huts of poor men and the Palaces of Kings!" [Pollnitz, ii. 539.]
Reverend Herr Roloff, whom they call Provost (PROBST, Chief Clergyman) Roloff, a pious honest man and preacher, he, I could guess, has already been giving spiritual counsel now and then;later interviews with Roloff are expressly on record: for it is the King's private thought, ever and anon borne in upon him, that death itself is in this business.
Queen and Children, mostly hoping hitherto, though fearing too, live in much anxiety and agitation. The Crown-Prince is often over from Reinsberg; must not come too often, nor even inquire too much: his affectionate solicitude might be mistaken for solicitude of another kind! It is certain he is in no haste to be King;to quit the haunts of the Muses, and embark on Kingship.
Certain, too, he loves his Father; shudders at the thought of losing HIM. And yet again there will gleams intrude of a contrary thought; which the filial heart disowns, with a kind of horror, "Down, thou impious thought!"--We perceive he manages in general to push the crisis away from him; to believe that real danger is still distant. His demeanor, so far as we can gather from his Letters or other evidence, is amiable, prudent, natural;altogether that of a human Son in those difficult circumstances.
Poor Papa is heavy-laden: let us help to bear his burdens;--let us hope the crisis is still far off!--Once, on a favorable evening, probably about the beginning of April, when he felt as if improving, Friedrich Wilhelm resolved to dress, and hold Tobacco-Parliament again in a formal manner, Let us look in there, through the eyes of Pollnitz, who was of it, upon the last Tobacco-Parliament:--"A numerous party; Schwerin, Hacke, Derschau, all the chiefs and commandants of the Berlin Garrison are there; the old circle full;social human speech once more, and pipes alight; pleasant to the King. He does not himself smoke on this occasion; but he is unusually lively in talk; much enjoys the returning glimpse of old days; and the Tobacco circle was proceeding through its phases, successful beyond common. All at once the Crown-Prince steps in;direct from Reinsberg: [12th April, 1740? (<italic> OEuvres, <end italic> xxvii. part lst, p. 29); Pollnitz is dateless] an unexpected pleasure. At sight of whom the Tobacco circle, taken on the sudden, simultaneously started up, and made him a bow.
Rule is, in Tobacco-Parliament you do not rise--for anybody;and they have risen. Which struck the sick heart in a strange painful way. 'Hm, the Rising Sun?' thinks he; 'Rules broken through, for the Rising Sun. But I am not dead yet, as you shall know!' ringing for his servants in great wrath; and had himself rolled out, regardless of protestations and excuses.
'Hither, you Hacke!' said he.