Prince listened with silent, almost defiant patience, "MIT GROSSERGEDULD." [Seckendorf (in Forster, iii. 4).] At Bonn the Prince contrived to confide to Seckendorf, "That he had in very truth meant to run away: he could not, at the age he was come to, stand such indignities, actual strokes as in the Camp of Radewitz;--and he would have gone long since, had it not been for the Queen and the Princess his Sister's sake. He could not repent what he had done: and if the King did not cease beating him in that manner, &c., he would still do it. For loss of his own life, such a life as his had grown, he cared little; his chief misery was, that those Officers who had known of the thing should come to misfortune by his means. If the King would pardon these poor gentlemen, he would tell him everything. For the rest, begged Seckendorf to help him in this labyrinth;--nothing could ever so oblige him as help now;" and more of the like sort. These things he said, at Bonn, to Seckendorf, the fountain of all his woes.
[Ibid.] What Seckendorf's reflections on this his sad handiwork now were, we do not know. Probably he made none, being a strong-minded case-hardened old stager; but resolved to do what he could for the poor youth. Somewhere on this route, at Bonn more likely than elsewhere, Friedrich wrote in pencil three words to Lieutenant Keith at Wesel, and got it to the Post-Office:
"SAUVEZ-VOUS, TOUT EST DECOUVERT (All is found out;--away)!"[Wilhelmina (i. 265) says it was a Page of the Old Dessauer's, a comrade of Keith's, who, having known in time, gave him warning.
Certain it is, this Note of Friedrich's, which the Books generally assign as cause, could not have done it (infra, p. 275, and the irrefragable date there).]
Clement August, expensive Kurfurst of Koln (Elector of Cologne, as we call it), who does the hospitalities here at Bonn, in a grand way, with "above a hundred and fifty chamberlains" for one item,--glance at him, reader; perhaps we shall meet the man again. He is younger Brother of the elegant ambitious Karl Albert, Kurfurst of Bavaria, whom we have transiently heard of: sons both of them are of that "Elector of Bavaria" who haunts us in the Marlborough Histories,--who joined Louis XIV. in the Succession War, and got hunted about at such a rate, after Blenheim especially. His Boys, prisoners of the Kaiser, were bred up in a confiscated state, as sons of a mere private gentleman; nothing visibly ahead of them, at one time, but an obscure and extremely limited destiny of that kind;--though now again, on French favor, and the turn of Fortune's inconstant wheel, they are mounting very high.
Bavaria came all back to the old Elector of Bavaria;even Marlborough's "Principality of MINDELHEIM" came. [At the Peace of Baden (corollary to UTRECHT), 1714. Elector had been "banned" (GEACHTET, solemnly drummed out), 1706; nothing but French pay to live upon, till he got back: died 26th February, 1726, when Karl Albert succeeded (Michaelis, ii. 255).] And the present Kurfurst, who will not do the Pragmatic Sanction at all,--Kurfurst Karl Albert of Baiern, our old Karl Philip of Mannheim's genealogical "Cousin;"--we heard of abstruse colleaguings there, tendencies to break the Pragmatic Sanction altogether, and reduce it to waste sheepskin! Not impossible Karl Albert will go high enough. And this Clement August the cadet, he is Kurfurst of Koln;by good election-tactics, and favor of the French, he has managed to succeed an Uncle here: has succeeded at Osnabruck in like fashion;--poor old Ernst August of Osnabruck (to whom we once saw George I. galloping to die, and who himself soon after died), his successor is this same Clement August, the turn for a CATHOLICBishop being come at Osnabruck, and the French being kind.
Kurfurst of Koln, Bishop of Osnabruck, ditto of Paderborn and Munster, ditto now of Hildesheim; richest Pluralist of the Church.
Goes about here in a languid expensive manner; "in green coat trimmed with narrow silver-lace, small bag-wig done with French garniture (SCHLEIFE) in front; and has red heels to his shoes."A lanky indolent figure, age now thirty; "tall and slouching of person, long lean face, hook-nose, black beard, mouth somewhat open." [Busching (<italic> Beitrage, <end italic> iv. 201-204:
from a certain Travelling Tutor's MS. DIARY of 1731; where also is detail of the Kurfurst's mode of Dining,--elaborate but dreary, both mode and detail). His Schloss is now the Bonn University.]
Has above one hundred and fifty chamberlains;--and, I doubt not, is inexpressibly wearisome to Friedrich Wilhelm in his Majesty's present mood. Patience for the moment, and politeness above all things!--The Trio of Vigilance had no difficulty with Friedrich;brought him on board safe again next day, and all proceeded on their voyage; the Kurfurst in person politely escorting as far as Koln.
Koln, famed old City of the Three Kings, with its famed Cathedral where those three gentlemen are buried, here the Kurfurst ceases escorting; and the flat old City is left, exciting what reflections it can. The architectural Dilettanti of the world gather here; St. Ursula and her Eleven Thousand Virgins were once massacred here, your Majesty; an English Princess she, it is said.
"NARREN-POSSEN (Pack of nonsense)!" grumbles Majesty.--Pleasant Dusseldorf is much more interesting to his Majesty; the pleasant Capital of Berg, which ought to be ours, if right could be done;if old Pfalz would give up his crotchets; and the bowls, in the big game playing at Seville and elsewhere, would roll fair!
