Chapter IX: Part 9

On his return to Berlin, Fritz fell suddenly ill, and for a while there seemed to be a chance of reconciliation between him and his father. But this reconciliation did not last, and the prince had, or pretended to have, a relapse, in order to avoid going with his father on a tour through Prussia. But, ill or well, he could not escape from the rules the king laid down for him, and they were as strict now as they had been nine years before. A lesson on tactics was to occupy two hours every morning, after which, at noon, he was to dine in company with his tutors major Senning and Colonel von Kalkstein, and the master of the kitchen as well, which sounds rather strange to us. He might, however, invite six friends of his own, and dine or have supper with them in return; but he was always to sleep in the palace, and 'to go to bed the instant the retreat sounded.' Then the king went away, sure that everything would go on to his liking.

But no sooner had he turned his back on Berlin than a sort of holiday spirit took possession of the palace. 'We were perfectly happy,' writes Wilhelmine, in her memoirs, and there was no reason that they should ever have been anything else, as the 'happiness' mainly consisted in hearing as much music as they wished for, and for Fritz in also playing the flute. From this instrument, which was fated to bring him into so much trouble, the crown prince never parted, and even when hunting with his father he would contrive to lose himself, and hiding behind a large tree or crouching in a thicket, he would play some of the tunes which so delighted his soul. During this memorable month, when the 'days passed quietly,' the queen gave concerts, aided by famous musicians, Bufardin, the flutist, and Quantz, who was not only a performer but a composer, and others who were celebrated at the Saxon court (whence they came at the queen's request) for their skill on spinet or violin. All this, however, ceased on the reappearance of the king at Wustershausen, and matters fell back into their old grooves: on one side there was suspicion and tyranny, on the other lies and intrigues. Fritz tried to break away from it all by persuading Kalkstein to ask his father's permission to travel in foreign countries. But Frederick William absolutely refused to let his son quit Prussia, and things were worse than they need have been, owing to the smallness of the house where they were all shut up together. Certainly never had a father and son more different tastes.

'To-morrow I am obliged to hunt, and on Monday I am obliged to hunt again,' writes Fritz. He is bored by the court jests and jesters, as well as by the king's guests. As for the days, they seemed perfectly endless, and well they might, seeing that it was no uncommon thing for him to get up at five and go to bed at midnight! No wonder he exclaimed 'I had rather beg my bread than live any longer on this footing.' Once again Fritz made an effort after a better state of things, and wrote to his father to apologise for any offence he might unwittingly have committed, and to assure him of his respectful duty. He had perhaps been wiser to have let ill alone, for the king only replied by taunts of his 'girlishness,' and hatred of everything manly—which is all rather funny, when we remember that the object of these reproaches was Frederick the Great—and in general was so unkind and unjust, that both Kalkstein and the other tutor Finkenstein resigned in disgust.

During this same autumn the discussion about the two English marriages was re-opened. As regards the king, he was as anxious as the queen for that of Wilhelmine with the prince of Wales, but, unlike her, he considered Fritz too young and unsteady to take to himself a wife. This did not please king George at all, and in answer to a letter from Sophia Dorothea, queen Caroline wrote that _both_ marriages must take place—or neither. This reply put Frederick William in a towering passion. Wilhelmine should marry _somebody_, he said, and that at once. She was nearly twenty now, and had five younger sisters for whom husbands would have to be found. Indeed, he was not at all sure he should not prefer the margrave of Schwedt for a son-in-law, than the stuck-up English prince! So he stormed; and meanwhile the queen, Wilhelmine, and Fritz kept up a secret correspondence with the court of St. James.

About this same year (1729) the crown prince made friends with one of the king's pages, Keith by name, and also with a certain lieutenant Katte. These two young men had the same tastes as himself, and were with him during all his leisure hours. When Fritz could escape from the hated reviews or hunts, in which he was forced to bear his father company, he would hurry back to his own apartments, throw off his tight uniform, slip on a dressing-gown of scarlet and gold brocade, and begin to play on his beloved flute. In his rooms he often found his teacher Quantz awaiting him, and then for a time his troubles were forgotten in the soothing tones of the great flutist. One day both master and pupil were practising together a difficult passage, when Katte rushed in breathless.

'The king is on the stairs,' he panted, snatching up flutes and music, and hiding them in the wood closet. In an instant Fritz had flung his dressing-gown behind a screen, and put on his coat; but he could not manage to tie his hair, which he had loosened, and which hung about his face, in a way that the king disliked. The confused bearing of all three naturally attracted Frederick William's attention, and, bursting into a fit of rage that rendered him almost speechless, he kicked down the screen in front of him. 'I knew it,' he shouted, catching up the dressing-gown, and thrusting it into the fire where he stamped it down with his heavy boot. Then, sweeping a pile of French novels from a little table, he thrust them into the arms of the gentleman-in-waiting, bidding him send them back at once to the bookseller; for even in his wrath the king did not forget to be economical.

After this affair father and son were on worse terms than ever. It was not at all an uncommon thing for Frederick William to throw plates at the heads of his children when they vexed him, and one evening, after dinner, as he was being pushed about in a wheel-chair during an attack of gout, he aimed a blow with his crutch at Wilhelmine. The girl sprang aside, and it fell harmless, but this only increased the king's fury, and he called to the attendants to push his chair quickly so that he might prevent her reaching the door. They dared not disobey, but contrived to find so many obstacles in the way that the princess was able to escape. As to Fritz, he was struck by his father almost daily, and on one occasion, about a month before the prince's eighteenth birthday, when the young man entered the room, his father leaped at his throat, dragged him by the hair, beat him violently with his stick, and forced him to kneel down and beg his pardon—for what offence the crown prince did not know! Not content with this, the king exulted in his son's misery, and even told him that worse was in store.

It is hardly wonderful that under these circumstances the prince felt that his life was in danger, and began to form plans of escape; but they were so badly laid and so transparent, that everybody could guess what was happening, and three or four times he was forced to give them up. His favourite project was to reach France and go next to London, where he was sure of protection, and in all this his principal confidant was his friend Katte. Early in July the king started for Potsdam, taking the crown prince with him. After remaining there a few days, he announced his intention of making a progress by way of Wesel, and this gave Fritz the idea that from Wesel he could gain Holland and cross to England. He managed to obtain a secret interview with Katte, and it was arranged that they should write to each other through a cousin of Katte's, of the same name, who was recruiting near Anspach, as they knew the king intended to stop at this city and visit his daughter who had married the margrave the year before.

The king spent a week at Anspach, during which time he was busy with the affairs of the young couple, whom it would have been much wiser to have left to themselves. Fritz meanwhile was fuming at the delay, but tried to turn it to account by gaining over the page Keith to his service. It was settled between them that young Keith should take advantage of his position to secure some horses, and the crown prince wrote to Katte that he was to go in a few days to the Hague and there inquire for a certain count d'Alberville—for under this name Fritz proposed to travel. Keith was ordered to join him there also, and from the Hague they would slip across almost before their absence was discovered. Unluckily all the hardships he had suffered had not yet turned Fritz into a man. Passionately though he longed to escape from his father's tyranny, he still expected life to be like the French novels he was so fond of, and from one of which the name of count d'Alberville was taken. So, instead of putting on an old suit of clothes, in which he might have passed unnoticed, he ordered a fine new red cloak for himself, and a blue one for young Keith, to wear on the great occasion.

From Anspach they went to visit the duke of Württemberg, and thence set out for Mannheim, where the elector palatine was awaiting them. Fritz had arranged to make his flight from a place called Sinsheim, but, to his dismay, the king announced that he meant to push on to Steinfurth, which was nearer Mannheim. The whole royal party slept in two barns, and more than once Fritz almost gave up his plan in despair, so impossible it seemed for him to steal away without waking somebody. However, they were very tired after their long day's journey, and slept soundly, all except Fritz's valet, Gummersbach, who, hearing a sound soon after two, awoke with a start to see the crown prince dressing himself.

'But your Royal Highness'——stammered Gummersbach, in surprise, rising to his feet.

'If I choose to get up it is no business of yours,' replied Fritz, in an angry whisper. 'Give me my red cloak, I am going to the king.' And he crept softly from the barn, never hearing Gummersbach's answer that the king intended to start at five instead of three. The valet said nothing, but hastened to wake Rochow, the prince's tutor, who was lying on some straw with all his clothes on.

'What is the matter?' cried he.

'Quick! quick! sir, the prince!' was all Gummersbach could answer, and without wasting time in questions Rochow rushed away in the direction of an open green space in front of the farm. Seeing in the dim light the outline of two heavy carriages, he altered his pace, and strolled carelessly up to young Keith, who was holding two horses.

'Whom are these for?' asked Rochow politely.

'They are for myself and the other page to accompany his Majesty,' answered the boy.

'Ah, yes, of course; but you should have been informed that his Majesty does not intend to start till five to-day, so you had better take them back to the stables.' And, unwilling though he was, Keith was forced to obey, especially as some of the generals in the king's suite had come on the scene, and advanced to one of the carriages against which Fritz was leaning.

'Can we be of any use to your Royal Highness?' asked Rochow respectfully; but, with an oath, the prince brushed him aside, and throwing off the red cloak that covered him, went straight to the place where his father was sleeping. He may have thought that the officers would say nothing in his presence, and indeed they were mostly on his side, and far from anxious to make things worse for him.

'Is it so late?' asked the king, who was still lying on the rough bed, wrapped in a large coat. 'Well, your carriage is heavier than mine, so you had better start early.'

The prince bowed and went out, but contrived to delay on one pretext or another, so that the king's own carriage was brought up first to the gate of the farm, and soon his Majesty was on the road to Mannheim. All the way the king expected to catch up his son, but even when Fritz was not found at Heidelberg he suspected nothing, and his only uneasiness was in the fear that the prince had entered Mannheim without him. When, however, he reached the city himself, at eight in the evening, and there was still no Fritz, he grew seriously disturbed, and to quiet him, the elector sent some of his servants to look for the crown prince. At half-past ten the whole party appeared, Fritz tired and very sulky, but as determined as ever not to remain a moment more than could be helped in his father's power. He had hoped for a chance of flight along the road, but none presented itself, and now he was resolved to begin all over again. Once more a message was sent to young Keith to be ready with the horses as soon as he received a signal, but the page was not cast in the same mould as his master. In mortal terror of his life, he threw himself at the king's feet, confessed the whole plot, and implored forgiveness. For once in his career Frederick William managed to control his temper; he would have his son closely watched, but he should not be arrested till he was on Prussian soil; yet all through the rest of the tour Fritz was well aware that someone had betrayed him. Immediately on their arrival at Wesel, the prince was put under arrest, and sent, without once being allowed to leave the travelling carriage, to the castle of Spandau, whence he was afterwards removed to Cüstrin. General Buddenbrock was appointed his gaoler, and ordered to shoot him dead in case of a rescue.

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And where was Wilhelmine all this time, and what was she doing? Well, she was at Berlin, still very weak and sickly from a bad attack of smallpox the year before, and the severity of the treatment which followed it. The king remained always fixed in his determination to find a husband for her; if not the prince of Wales, then the margrave of Schwedt, the margrave of Baireuth, who was young and agreeable, or, best of all, the duke of Weissenfeld, not so young, and perhaps not so agreeable, but the man most favoured by Frederick William. 'After all, marriage is not of such great importance,' said one of her ladies to the princess, in well-meant consolation. 'Nobody makes such a fuss about it elsewhere. A husband that you can turn and twist as you like is an excellent thing to have, and however angry the queen may be now, when once the thing is over she will make up her mind to it. So take my advice, and accept the hand of the duke of Weissenfeld, and you will please everybody.' But Wilhelmine did not agree with madame la Ramen. She knew too much about marriage to think that the choice of a husband mattered nothing, and she had not the slightest intention of sacrificing her whole life to the whims of her very changeable father. So she gave a vague answer to the earnest entreaties of madame la Ramen, and let the subject drop.

On the evening of August 11, the princess entered the palace from the garden, where she had passed several hours, feeling excited and melancholy by turns; _why_, she could not imagine, as everything was going on as usual. Therefore, she did not, as usual, go straight to her rooms, but instead, ordered a carriage and drove to Montbijou where a concert was taking place. In this way she missed the strange events that were happening in her mother's apartments. Let Wilhelmine tell her own story; it is a very surprising one:—-

'That night the queen was seated before her dressing-table having her hair brushed, with madame von Bülow beside her, when they heard a fearful noise in the next room. This room was used as a kind of museum, and was filled with precious stones and gems, and some very rare and tall Chinese and Japanese vases. Her Majesty thought at first that one of these vases must have been knocked over, and have been broken in pieces on the polished floor, and she bade madame la Ramen go and see who had done it, but, to her amazement, on entering the museum, the lady-in-waiting found everything undisturbed. Scarcely had she rejoined the queen when the noise began afresh, louder than before, and madame la Ramen ran back, accompanied by another of the queen's attendants, only to discover all in perfect order, and the room dark and still. Three times this occurred, and then the noise ceased in the museum altogether, to start again far more loudly in the corridor which led from the queen's apartments to those of the king. At each end of this corridor stood a sentinel, to prevent anyone passing but the servants on duty, so the disturbance was all the more strange.

"Bring lights, and we will pass down the corridor," said the queen to her ladies, and left her room, followed by all but madame la Ramen, who hid herself, in a great fright. But hardly had they stepped across the threshold when fearful groans and cries broke out around them. The ladies trembled at the sound, and the guards at each end were half-dead with fright; but the queen's calmness made them all ashamed, and when she ordered them to try the doors along the corridor, they obeyed in silence. Each door was locked, and when the key was turned and the room entered, it was empty. Her majesty then questioned the guards, who confessed that the groans had sounded close to them, but they had seen nothing, and with that she was forced to be content, and to return to her own apartments, rather angry at having been disturbed in vain. Next morning she told me the story, and though not in the least superstitious, ordered me to write down the date of the occurrence. I am quite sure that there must be some simple explanation, but it is curious that the affair happened during the very night that my brother was arrested, and a most painful scene between the king and queen afterwards took place in this very corridor.'

It was at a ball given by the queen at Montbijou, five days later, that she learned the terrible news. 'It was six years since I had danced,' says Wilhelmine, 'and I flung myself into it without paying attention to anything else, or to the repeated wishes of madame von Bülow, who told me it was time for me to go to bed.

'"Why are you so cross to-night?" I asked, at length; "I don't know what to make of you!"'

'"Look at the queen," she replied, "and you will be answered." I turned and looked, and grew cold and white at the sight of her, standing rigid in a corner of the ball-room between two of her ladies. In a moment more she bent her head and said good-night to her guests, then walked to her carriage, making a sign to me to follow her. Not a word did we utter all the way to the palace; I thought my brother must be dead, and in this terrible silence and uncertainty my heart began to palpitate so furiously that I felt as if I should be suffocated.'

For some time her ladies, under the queen's orders, refused to tell Wilhelmine what had happened, but seeing the poor girl was firmly convinced of the prince's death, madame von Sonsfeld informed her that letters had arrived from the king, stating that the crown prince had been arrested, as he was attempting to escape. Next day they learned that Katte also had been taken prisoner, but Keith cleverly managed to place himself under the protection of the English ambassador to the Hague, lord Chesterfield, and to pass over to England in his suite. When the shock of the news was passed, the first thought of both the queen and Wilhelmine was for the numerous letters they had written to the prince, in which they had said many bitter and imprudent things about the king's behaviour. Wilhelmine hoped they had been burned, as she had always bidden Fritz to do the moment he received them; but the queen feared that they might have been entrusted to Katte (as he was known to have in his care many of the prince's possessions), and in this case they must be got from him at all cost, or the crown prince's head would certainly pay forfeit. The queen was right: the letters were among Katte's papers, with the official seal placed upon them.

In this desperate plight, Sophia Dorothea threw herself upon the generosity of marshal Natzmar, Katte's superior. No direct answer was received, and the queen and Wilhelmine were almost ill with anxiety, when, one day, when the princess was alone with madame von Sonsfeld, the countess von Fink entered bearing a heavy portfolio.

'It is most mysterious,' said she, sinking into a chair with her burden; 'when I went into my room last night I found this great portfolio, with a chain and seals round it, addressed to the queen, and this note for you, madame. As I did not like to disturb her Majesty I have brought them to you.'

Wilhelmine's heart beat with excitement, but she dared not betray herself. She took the note quietly, and read its contents, which were very short. 'Have the goodness, madame, to deliver this portfolio to the queen. It contains the letters which she and the princess have written to the crown prince.'

Carrying the portfolio, and grumbling all the while as to the unknown risks she might be running, countess von Fink followed Wilhelmine and madame von Sonsfeld into the presence of the queen, whose joy was boundless on receiving the precious letters. But in a few minutes her face clouded over again, as she perceived that many difficulties still lay before her. First, there were the spies by whom the king had surrounded them; they would at once detect the absence of so large an object. Then there was the danger that Katte would mention the letters in the cross-examination he would have to undergo, and once their existence was known, and madame von Fink questioned, the prince's cause was lost, and his mother and sister might have to undergo imprisonment for life. What _could_ be done? All day long plan after plan was thought of and rejected, but at length it was Wilhelmine who hit upon one that might do. The portfolio was openly to lie in the queen's apartments as if it had been brought to her for safe custody, and then, with great precautions, the seal could be raised without breaking it, and the chain filed through where it could easily be joined again. Then the letters could be taken out, and others, quite harmless, written and put back in their place. Clever though it all sounded, it would have been impossible to carry out the scheme had it not been for a most lucky accident which had befallen the queen's confidential valet Bock, who was called in to raise the seal. On examining the coat-of-arms on the wax he recognised it as the same engraved on a seal he had picked up four weeks earlier in the garden at Montbijou, and which, he now discovered, belonged to Katte. By this means the wax could be broken and re-sealed without the slightest risk.

The letters were now in the hands of the queen and princess, and were to the full as dangerous as they had expected to find them; but there was no time to spare for lamenting their folly if they were to have others ready to await the king on his return. Of course, there was no need to replace the whole fifteen hundred; but a great deal had to be done, and without delay Wilhelmine and her mother sat down to write a large number, taking care to obtain paper with the proper water-mark of every year. In three days they had seven hundred ready, and in order to give the impression that they wished to conceal the letters, the queen filled up the portfolio with handkerchiefs and various articles of fine linen.

All was now ready for the arrival of the king, and when the day and hour was fixed the queen awaited him in her apartments. As soon as he reached the threshold, he shouted out: 'Well, Madame, your wretched son is dead.'

'Dead!' repeated the queen, clutching at a chair as she spoke. 'Dead! you have had the heart to kill him?'

'Yes, I tell you,' was his answer; 'and I want the portfolio containing his letters.'

Hardly able to walk, the queen went to fetch the portfolio, which the king slashed in pieces and took out the letters. Then, without another word, he walked away.

'Have you heard? Fritz is dead!' said the queen to Wilhelmine, in a terrible voice that seemed dead also. The princess fainted at the horrible news, but when she recovered her senses, madame von Sonsfeld whispered not to be afraid, as she had reason to know that the prince, though strictly guarded, was alive and well. These words put fresh life into the hearts of his mother and sister, and enabled Wilhelmine to bear the blows and kicks which her father showered upon her, till he was dragged off by his other children. Then he confessed that Fritz was still living, and accused Wilhelmine of having been his accomplice in an act of high treason against the king's person. This was more than the poor girl could bear.

'I will marry anyone you like,' she cried, 'if you will only spare my brother's life—the duke of Weissenfeld, or anybody else; it is all the same to me.' But the king was deaf to everything but the sound of his own voice, and did not hear her, and a moment after Katte, pale and calm, passed the window, under the guard of four soldiers, for his examination by the king.

Frederick William behaved with his usual brutality, even kicking the unhappy prisoner, who threw himself at his feet, confessing his own part in the plot, but denying that Wilhelmine had any part in it. He acknowledged, however, that by the prince's orders he had sent the letters to her, and these were closely examined by the minister Grumkow, 'in the hope,' says Wilhelmine, 'of finding something that would condemn us.' But the closest scrutiny revealed nothing of the least importance, though the king was still suspicious, and commanded the princess to keep her room till he had time to question her further.

Meanwhile the crown prince was locked up in the fortress of Cüstrin, and obliged to obey a set of those minute rules which Frederick William loved to draw up. 'Every morning at eight a basin and a little water, to wash himself with, is to be taken to his cell by a scullion'; and this seems to have been the only washing allowed him by the king, who is always reproaching him for his dirty habits. Two meals, one at twelve and the other at six, were all he was allowed, and 'his food is to be cut up before he has it.' Several times a day he was visited by the officers in charge, but they were strictly forbidden to speak to him. By-and-bye the king declared that the prisoner had forfeited his right to the Prussian crown, and ordered him to be spoken of as 'colonel Frederick.'

At last a council was appointed to try both the prince and Katte, and Keith—if they could get him! The trial was long, and at the end of it Katte was condemned to death for intended desertion, but strongly recommended to mercy. With regard to the prince they considered that, as he had been deprived of his military rank and suffered many months of close imprisonment, he was sufficiently punished, especially as he had expressed his willingness 'to do all that His Majesty requires or commands.' Touching the charge of disobedience, the council declined to pass judgment.

The recommendation to mercy was not heeded. Katte's grandfather, field marshal von Alvensleben, wrote a touching letter begging for his life, and recalling the many occasions on which he himself had risked his own in the service of Prussia. He received a reply stating that Katte deserved 'to be torn with red-hot pincers,' as was the law in Prussia, 'but that, "out of consideration" for his father and grandfather, his head should be cut off.' This document is signed 'Your very affectionate king.' Probably nothing that Frederick the Great ever endured in his whole life was as bitter as the scene which his father had prepared for him. Katte was to be beheaded under the windows of the crown prince's prison. If the span was too narrow, another place was to be chosen, 'but so that the prince can see well.' For this purpose the condemned man was to take a two days' journey to Cüstrin, but, perhaps by the mercy of his gaolers, Frederick was told nothing till he was awakened at five o'clock on the morning of November 6, and informed that Katte had been in Cüstrin since the previous day, and was to be executed at seven. The unexpected news upset the prince completely. He wept and wrung his hands, and begged that the execution might be delayed till he could send a courier to the king at Wustershausen. He offered to resign the crown, to suffer perpetual imprisonment, even to sacrifice his own life, if only he might save that of Katte. The officers were full of pity, but they were powerless.

Gently but firmly he was at length forced to the window beneath which the block stood, between the prison and the river Oder. Then Katte appeared, a minister on each side of him, holding his hat under his arm. As he passed the window he looked up, and Frederick flung himself across the bars, crying 'Katte! Katte! forgive me.'

'There is nothing to forgive, my prince,' answered Katte, bowing; and he walked steadily on to his place in the centre of the little group of soldiers, where his sentence was read. He took off his wig, replacing it with a white cap, and opened his shirt collar. A soldier came forward to bind his eyes, but he motioned him away, and knelt quietly on the sand before him, waiting for the sword to fall. But Frederick did not 'see well,' for he had fainted.

In a few days whispers were heard in the court of Berlin that the crown prince had been 'pardoned' by his father for his wickedness in trying to run away—which he never would have thought of doing had he not suffered such abominable treatment. He remained for a little time yet at Cüstrin, but was allowed to have books—and better light to read them by. No doubt the king took for granted that, after the severe lesson his son had received, the 'books' would be works on fortifications or strategy, or something useful of that kind. Had he known that philosophical treatises, Aristotle's 'Poetica' and Molière's plays, were among them, another explosion would probably have occurred. And what would he have said if it had reached his ears that the prince had written a long poem in French called 'Advice to Myself,' dedicated to Grumkow, whom he hated? The poem is really not bad, considering, and one cannot help wondering if Grumkow guessed that the royal prisoner was making fun of him. In a little while he was set free, and even nominated to a seat on the council of war, but he was not yet admitted to Berlin. Poor boy! he was only nineteen even now, but he had learned that if he was ever to live at peace with his father he must give up all his own tastes and pleasures, and submit body and soul to the king's will.

During these dreadful months Wilhelmine had been kept entirely in her room, and if we may believe her own account, which perhaps it is better not to do altogether, she was half starved, and thankful to eat a crust which a crow had left on the window-sill. 'In general,' she says, 'the dinner of myself and my lady-in-waiting consisted of bones without any meat on them, and plain water.' Besides her anxiety about the fate of her brother, the princess had been tormented with fears as to her own marriage, for the king had made up his mind that she should no longer be on his hands. The queen still obstinately clung to the old project of having the prince of Wales as her son-in-law; but the king contrived to break off the negotiations, greatly to the wrath of Sophia Dorothea, as well as of Wilhelmine herself, who shared her mother's opinion that to accept any husband who was not of royal birth would be impossible to one of her rank.

But who the bridegroom was really to be was a question that remained undecided. Sometimes it seemed as if the choice would fall upon a member of the House of Brandenburg, the margrave of Schwedt; but at the very moment when this appeared most likely the king sent a message to Wilhelmine, by his porter, announcing that she was to become the wife of the fat and elderly duke of Weissenfeld, a prince of the Empire. The princess was terribly upset—partly by the news itself and partly by the messenger whom the king had chosen to break it to her; but the next morning her anger was redoubled, on receiving a second visit from the porter, while she was still in bed, informing her that he had been ordered by His Majesty to prepare her trousseau! Wilhelmine was speechless with rage, and refused to send any answer. Then, shutting herself into her boudoir, or _cabinet_, as it was called, she began to play on her spinet, in order to calm herself a little.

'Four gentlemen are below, madame, and beg that you will do them the honour of seeing them alone,' cried madame von Sonsfeld, suddenly opening the door. The princess rose, feeling that something of serious importance was about to happen, and there entered Grumkow, followed by three other ministers. He declared solemnly (what she knew already) that the English marriage was abandoned, and that the king was forced to choose a husband for her from another house; that the fate of the crown prince, now undergoing a strict imprisonment at Cüstrin, depended on the willingness of the princess to obey His Majesty's desire, which Grumkow earnestly hoped she would do, as otherwise it would be his painful duty to carry her off at once to the fortress of Memel. Finally, he announced that the king's choice had fallen on the hereditary prince of Baireuth—rich, young, and a cousin of her own. After begging for a short time for consideration, Wilhelmine agreed to do as her father wished, and on his return to Berlin, a few days later, he behaved to her with much affection—for the first time for many years. The queen, on the contrary, vowed she would no longer look on Wilhelmine as a daughter, and on the sudden appearance at Berlin of the prince of Baireuth, on the eve of a great review, was so rude to him that he told her politely, but with spirit, that if she objected so much to receiving him into her family he would withdraw his request for the hand of her daughter. The queen saw that she had met her match, and accordingly changed her behaviour.

When she had once seen the prince, Wilhelmine's sadness began to disappear, and she began to think that her future life might be tolerably happy. The bridegroom had a pleasant, frank face, and good manners; he was besides tall and well-made, and had a good education. The betrothal took place at seven o'clock on June 3, 1731, in the palace, and the king, who had got his own way, was quite charming and affectionate, and gave his daughter a magnificent toilette service of gold, besides other presents. The marriage itself was not to be till November—for what reason we are not told, but most probably the delay was owing to some underhand schemes of the queen, who hoped that it might still be broken off. However, the prince of Baireuth was appointed colonel of a Prussian regiment, which gave him an excuse for staying in the neighbourhood, and the morning after the betrothal he asked Wilhelmine if he might see her alone. The few words that he spoke did him honour, and must have sounded strange indeed in the ears of the princess. He only wished, he said, for her happiness, and would do all in his power to secure it, and to deserve the trust which she and her father had given him. Affection had hitherto played such a small part in Wilhelmine's life, that she did not know what to answer; but it must have thawed her poor frozen heart a little, for that evening at supper she 'pulled a cracker' with the prince. But this sign of good spirits was more than the queen could bear, and she bade her daughter follow her out of the room, scolding her roundly, as they went, for her want of modesty.

The long months passed somehow, and to the relief of everybody (except the queen) the wedding-day (fixed for November 20) arrived. 'When dinner was over,' says Wilhelmine, 'the king ordered the queen to begin to dress me, for it was already four o'clock, and the ceremony was fixed for seven. The queen declared that she meant to do my hair herself, but she was not clever with her fingers, and could not manage it. Then her ladies tried their hands, but as soon as they had dressed it properly the queen would pull it about, so that it had to be done all over again. At last, however, between them they contrived to make twenty-four large curls, each as thick as your arm, with a royal crown poised on top. The weight was dreadful, and I could hardly hold my head up. Then they put on my dress, which was of cloth of silver, trimmed with Spanish point picked out with gold, my train, twelve yards long, being held up by four ladies.' Hardly able to stir under all this grandeur, the bride moved as best she could through six magnificent galleries, in the last of which the ceremony was performed. A ball then followed, but as Wilhelmine could not possibly have danced to save her life owing to the weight of her clothes, the bridegroom opened it with her sister the margravine of Anspach.

The festivities were kept up for several days, and on the 23rd another ball took place, at which seven hundred people were present. This time Wilhelmine who, as we know, loved dancing, did not allow her dress to interfere, and she was in the middle of a minuet when Grumkow approached her.

'Your feet seem to dance of themselves, madame,' he said roughly; 'don't you see that strangers are present?'

Wilhelmine stopped and stared at a young man whose face was unknown to her.

'Go and embrace the crown prince,' said Grumkow.

And she went.

_UNE REINE MALHEUREUSE_

ON the day that the whole of Lisbon was convulsed by the most terrible earthquake that Europe has ever seen—and by the tidal wave that followed after it—a little daughter was born, far away in Vienna, to the empress Maria Theresa. The baby, who bore the names of Marie Antoinette Josepha Jeanne, was the youngest of several children; and three of her brothers, as well as her father Francis, wore the Imperial crown. From the first she was her father's favourite, and, as far as he was able to find leisure for her, his companion. Of course, being emperor, there were a great many duties which he had to perform, but he was not so clever at business as his wife, who was the heiress of Austria and Hungary.

'We will die for our _king_ Maria Theresa,' shouted the Hungarian parliament, when she first appeared before them; and a 'king' she was till the day of her death.

The empress was a good mother, and was very fond of her children; but she could not have them much with her when they were little. Sometimes a whole week would slip by without her seeing them, but they had an excellent doctor of their own, who visited them daily, and made careful reports about their health. Maria Theresa was also most anxious about their being properly taught, but unluckily she was deceived in their governesses, who were good-natured, lazy people. 'The children were so clever,' these ladies would say one to the other, 'they really could do without learning lessons like other girls. And besides, were they not princesses, and what need had they to be always poring over books?' So Marie Antoinette and her sisters bade fair to grow up in perfect ignorance of everything except Italian, in which Metastasio the poet was their master.

This state of things might have gone on much longer had not Marie Antoinette remarked one day, in her mother's hearing, that her copies were always pencilled for her before she wrote them. This startled the empress, and, in her usual energetic manner, she began making inquiries as to the methods of teaching pursued by her daughter's governesses. The end of it was that these ladies were dismissed, and the Comtesse de Brandès, a clever and trustworthy woman, took charge of the education of the young archduchess. The change was very much for the better, but it came rather late for Marie Antoinette. She had never been forced to fix her attention steadily upon anything, or to do anything that she did not like. The slightest sound would distract her thoughts, and she would break off in the midst of the 'History of the Thirty Years' War,' or the account of the appearance of John Sobieski before the walls of Vienna, to wonder if she would be allowed to appear at the approaching fête, or what operas would be given in the coming week. For Marie Antoinette, like all her family, was extremely fond of music, and though she could never play well herself on any instrument, she had a sweet voice, which was carefully cultivated. When she was nearly seven years old there was great excitement in the palace of Schönbrünn, near Vienna, at the news that a little boy called Mozart, younger even than Marie Antoinette, was coming from Salzburg to play to them. 'What instrument did he play on? Oh! both the harpsichord (a sort of piano), and the violin. And he could _compose_ too! Think of that, at six years old! Would Wednesday never come, that they might hear him!'

Wednesday _did_ come, after long waiting, and there entered a little figure in court dress, with a wig and sword all complete. He was followed by his father and mother, and sister Marianne, who, though five years older than himself, was far more shy than he was. Wolfgang, indeed, was not shy at all: it was his music he was thinking of, not himself; he came forward towards the harpsichord, stopping, when he remembered his manners, to make a funny little bow right and left. The archdukes and their sisters gazed at him as if he was a being from another world, and could hardly contain their delight when the emperor mentioned a short composition which the boy was to play with one finger. It could not have been very interesting, but it was a very difficult thing to do, and Wolfgang did it to perfection. When it was over, he wriggled down off his high stool, and bowed three times, waiting for the emperor to tell him what he wished for next. Francis praised his cleverness, then, taking up a piece of silk from a chair, he said: 'See, I will arrange this over the keys, and you must play me a minuet without looking at the notes.' This was just the sort of thing that pleased Wolfgang; he gave a little laugh of satisfaction, and wriggled on to his stool again. In a moment the notes rang out clear, and the children looked at each other and longed to dance to them.

'Well done, my boy,' cried the emperor; 'now you shall choose.' Then Wolfgang turned to a composer attached to the court who had been eagerly watching his fingers.

'I will play a concerto of yours, and you must turn over for me.' And when the concerto was over, and the Emperor inquired how he had liked the performance, the musician answered in the heartiest tones, that never had it sounded so well.

'I think so, too,' said the empress, and signed to the child to go over to her. In his haste to obey he slipped on the shining floor, and fell down, his sword clattering as if it had been a man's. Marie Antoinette, who was nearest to him, ran to pick him up, and he thanked her with a smile, saying: 'You are very kind; I should like to marry you.' Then, without waiting for a reply, walked with careful steps up to the empress, and jumped on her lap.

Wolfgang was a great man when he returned to Salzburg, and everybody he saw asked the same questions about the imperial family.

'And when you had finished, what did her majesty say to you?'

'She said, "Are you tired?"'

'And what did you answer?'

'I said "No, your majesty."'

'Did she say nothing more?'

'She said "You play very well."'

'And what did you reply to _that_?'

'I said, "Thank you, your majesty."'

---------------------

For some time after little Mozart went away the beautifully painted stool in front of the harpsichord was never empty; but by-and-by the children's zeal wore off, and their mother was too busy to see that they practised daily. They passed most of their time at Schönbrünn, which both the emperor and empress preferred to Vienna, and it was so near the capital that ministers and ambassadors could easily drive out to consult them when needful. In their leisure moments, which were few, it rested them to watch the growth of their flowers, or to plan alterations in their garden, while the empress would sometimes go to see the poor in their cottages, and take Marie Antoinette with her.

But, in the summer of 1765, when the little archduchess was nine years old, a break suddenly occurred in their peaceful, happy life. The emperor was obliged to go to Innsprück, and had already bidden farewell to his family and entered his carriage, when he suddenly ordered the coachman to stop.

'Be kind enough to bring me, the Archduchess Marie Antoinette,' he said to the equerry; and soon the little girl was flying down the road. 'Good-bye, my darling, good-bye,' he whispered, taking her in his arms; 'now run home again.' And as she disappeared round a corner he remarked to his equerry: 'I just wanted to see her once more.'

It was as if he had guessed what would befall him, for, shortly after, news was received that he had died on his journey. The empress had loved her husband dearly, but she was not the sort of person to shut herself up with her grief, and before the year was out an event happened which occupied all her thoughts. This was a hint let fall by Louis XV., king of France, of a marriage, by-and-bye, between his grandson the dauphin and Marie Antoinette. The plan was to be kept entirely secret for the present, but the empress was greatly pleased, unlike the bridegroom's mother, or his aunt the strong-willed madame Adelaide. The dauphine, mother of the young Louis, was a Saxon princess, and wished her son to marry his Saxon cousin. The dauphin, a good-natured, heavy, ill-mannered youth, did not wish to marry anybody, or indeed do anything except hunt—but he was not consulted. Still, out of respect to his daughter-in-law (and perhaps because he was a little afraid of her), the French king kept a profound silence on the matter to all but the empress, till things were suddenly altered by the death of the dauphine in 1767. Then, no one knew how, the marriage began to be spoken of in Paris, and much more openly at Vienna, to the great embarrassment of the French ambassador. Louis XV. had already an Austrian great-granddaughter, for the emperor Joseph II. had some years before married the Infanta Isabel, and they had one little girl, named Maria Theresa, after her grandmother. Unfortunately the young empress was seized with smallpox, which was the scourge of those times, and died, while her sister-in-law, the Archduchess Josepha, likewise fell a victim to the same disease a few days later, just as she was starting off to be married. Joseph, in terror lest his little girl should be the next victim, had her inoculated, as people were before vaccination was introduced, and wrote to tell Louis XV., who was very anxious about her, that she was getting on very well. With his letter went one from the little archduchess herself.

'I know, dear grandpapa, that you love me, so I write to tell you that I am quite well, and that I had only fifty spots, which I am very glad of. How I wish I could show them to you, and hug you, for I am very fond of you.'

Now, although not a word had been said to Marie Antoinette as to the fate that was in store for her, she was quite clever enough to guess a great deal that was happening. In the first place two French actors arrived in Vienna to teach her how to speak clearly and prettily. They were followed by the abbé de Vermond, who instructed her in the history of France and its literature, while the celebrated Noverre gave her lessons in dancing and the French mode of curtseying, which was far more difficult to learn than the curtsey practised in Vienna. Marie Antoinette delighted in the hours she spent over her dancing, and those passed in playing on the clavecin, under Glück, whose opera of 'Orfeo' had just been finished; but her new teachers found the same fault that the old ones had done, that she must have everything told her like a child if it was to dwell in her memory. She never got impatient or cross, in fact she tried to turn everything into a joke; but the abbé discovered her to be ignorant and inattentive, and though she had plenty of good sense, she disliked being made to think. And in all this she was not different from a hundred thousand other little girls!