History of Friedrich II of Prussia V 14
by
Thomas Carlyle
Part 2 out of 3
"Relieve Braunau? Well;--but no fighting farther, mark you!"
answers Broglio. To the disgust of Kaiser and Seckendorf; who were
eager for a combined movement, and hearty attack on Prince Karl,
with perhaps capture of Passau itself. At sight of Broglio and
Seckendorf combined, Prince Karl did at once withdraw from Braunau;
but as to attacking him,--"NON; MILLE FOIS, NON!" answered Broglio
disdainfully bellowing. First grand quarrel of Broglio and
Seckendorf; by no means their last. Prince Karl put his men in
winter-quarters, in those Passau regions; postponing the explosion
of the Broglio-Seckendorf projects, till Spring; and returned to
Vienna for the Winter gayeties and businesses there. How the high
Maria Theresa is contented, I do not hear;--readers may take this
Note, which is authentic, though vague, and straggling over wide
spaces of time still future.
"Does her Majesty still think of 'taking the command of her Armies
on herself,' high Amazon that she is!" Has not yet thought of that,
I should guess. "At one time she did seriously think of it, says a
good witness; which is noteworthy. [Podewils, Der Wiener
Hof (Court of Vienna, in the years 1746, 1747 and
1748; a curious set of REPORTS for Friedrich's information, by
Podewils, his Minister there); printed under that Title, "by the
Imperial Academy of Sciences" (Wien, 1850);--may be worth alluding
to again, if chance offer.] Her Husband has been with the Armies,
once, twice; but never to much purpose (Brother Karl doing the
work, if work were done);--and this is about the last time, or the
last but one, this in Winter 1742. She loves her Husband
thoroughly, all along; but gives him no share in business, finding
he understands nothing except Banking. It is certain she chiefly
was the reformer of her Army," in years coming; "she, athwart many
impediments. An ardent rider, often on horseback, at paces
furiously swift; her beautiful face tanned by the weather.
Very devout too; honest to the bone, athwart all her prejudices.
Since our own Elizabeth! no Woman, and hardly above one Man, is
worth being named beside her as a Sovereign Ruler;--she is 'a
living contradiction of the Salic Law,' say her admirers.
Depends on England for money, All hearts and right hands in Austria
are hers. The loss of Schlesien, pure highway robbery, thrice-
doleful loss and disgrace, rankles incurable in the noble heart,
pious to its Fathers withal, and to their Heritages in the world,
--we shall see with what issues, for the next twenty years, to that
'BOSE MANN,' unpardonably 'wicked man' of Brandenburg. And indeed,
to the end of her life, she never could get over it. To the last,
they say, if a Stranger, getting audience, were graciously asked,
'From what Country, then?' and should answer, 'Schlesien, your
Majesty!' she would burst into tears.--'Patience, high Madam!'
urges the Britannic Majesty: 'Patience; may not there be
compensation, if we hunt well?'" Austrian bears, implacable
badgers, with Britannic mastiffs helping, now that the Belleisle
Pack is down!--
At Berlin it was gay Carnival, while those tragedies went on:
Friedrich was opening his Opera-House, enjoying the first ballets,
while Belleisle filed out of Prag that gloomy evening. Our poor
Kaiser will not "retain Bohemia," then; how far from it! The thing
is not comfortable to Friedrich; but what help?
This is the gayest Carnival yet seen in Berlin, this immediately
following the Peace; everybody saying to himself and others,
"GAUDEAMUS, What a Season!" Not that, in the present hurry of
affairs, I can dwell on operas, assemblies, balls, sledge-parties;
or indeed have the least word to say on such matters, beyond
suggesting them to the imagination of readers. The operas, the
carnival gayeties, the intricate considerations and diplomacies of
this Winter, at Berlin and elsewhere, may be figured: but here is
one little speck, also from the Archives, which is worth saving.
Princess Ulrique is in her twenty-third year, Princess Amelia in
her twentieth; beautiful clever creatures, both; Ulrique the more
staid of the two. "Never saw so gay a Carnival," said everybody;
and in the height of it, with all manner of gayeties going on,--
think where the dainty little shoes have been pinching!
PRINCESSES ULRIQUE AND AMELIA TO THE KING.
BERLIN, "1st March, 1743.
"MY DEAREST BROTHER,--I know not if it is not too bold to trouble
your Majesty on private affairs: but the great confidence which my
Sister [Amelia] and I have in your kindness encourages us to lay
before you a sincere avowal as to the state of our bits of finances
(NOS PETITES FINANCES), which are a good deal deranged just now;
the revenues having, for two years and a half past, been rather
small; amounting to only 400 crowns (60 pounds) a year; which could
not be made to cover all the little expenses required in the
adjustments of ladies. This circumstance, added to our card-
playing, though small, which we could not dispense with, has led us
into debts. Mine amount to 225 pounds (1,500 crowns); my Sister's
to 270 pounds (1,800 crowns).
"We have not spoken of it to the Queen-Mother, though we are well
sure she would have tried to assist us; but as that could not have
been done without some inconvenience to her, and she would have
retrenched in some of her own little entertainments, I thought we
should do better to apply direct to Your Majesty; being persuaded
you would have taken it amiss, had we deprived the Queen of her
smallest pleasure;--and especially, as we consider you, my dear
Brother, the Father of the Family, and hope you will be so gracious
as help us. We shall never forget the kind acts of Your Majesty;
and we beg you to be persuaded of the perfect and tender attachment
with which we are proud to be all our lives,--Your Majesty's most
humble and most obedient Sisters and Servants,
"LOUISE-ULRIQUE; ANNE-AMELIE
[which latter adds anxiously as Postscript, Ulrique having written
hitherto],
"P.S. I most humbly beg Your Majesty not to speak of this to the
Queen-Mother, as perhaps she would not approve of the step we are
now taking." [ OEuvres de Frederic, xxvii.
i. 387.]
Poor little souls; bankruptcy just imminent! I have no doubt
Friedrich came handsomely forward on this grave occasion, though
Dryasdust has not the grace to give me the least information.--
"Frederic Baron Trenck," loud-sounding Phantasm once famous in the
world, now gone to the Nurseries as mythical, was of this Carnival
1742-43; and of the next, and NOT of the next again! A tall
actuality in that time; swaggering about in sumptuous Life-guard
uniform, in his mess-rooms and assembly-rooms; much in love with
himself, the fool. And I rather think, in spite of his dog
insinuations, neither Princess had heard of him till twenty years
hence, in a very different phasis of his life! The empty, noisy,
quasi-tragic fellow;--sounds throughout quasi-tragically, like an
empty barrel; well-built, longing to be FILLED. And it is
scandalously false, what loud Trenck insinuates, what stupid
Thiebault (always stupid, incorrect, and the prey of stupidities)
confirms, as to this matter,--fit only for the Nurseries, till it
cease altogether.
VOLTAIRE, AT PARIS, IS MADE IMMORTAL BY A KISS.
Voltaire and the divine Emilie are home to Cirey again; that of
Brussels, with the Royal Aachen Excursion, has been only an
interlude. They returned, by slow stages, visit after visit, in
October last,--some slake occurring, I suppose, in that
interminable Honsbruck Lawsuit; and much business, not to speak of
ennui, urging them back. They are now latterly in Paris itself,
safe in their own "little palace (PETIT PALAIS) at the point of the
Isle;" little jewel of a house on the Isle St. Louis, which they
are warming again, after long absence in Brussels and the barbarous
countries. They have returned hither, on sufferance, on good
behavior; multitudes of small interests, small to us, great to
them,--death of old Fleury, hopeful changes of Ministry, not to
speak of theatricals and the like,--giving opportunity and
invitation. Madame, we observe, is marrying her Daughter: the happy
man a Duke of Montenero, ill-built Neapolitan, complexion rhubarb,
and face consisting much of nose. [Letter of Voltaire, in
OEuvres, lxxiii 24.] Madame never wants for business;
business enough, were it only in the way of shopping, visiting,
consulting lawyers, doing the Pure Sciences.
As to Voltaire, he has, as usual, Plays to get acted,--if he can.
MAHOMET, no; MORT DE CESAR, yes OR no; for the Authorities are shy,
in spite of the Public. One Play Voltaire did get acted, with a
success,--think of it, reader! The exquisite Tragedy MEROPE,
perhaps now hardly known to you; of which you shall hear anon.
But Plays are not all. Old Pleury being dead, there is again a
Vacancy in the Academy; place among the sacred Forty,--vacant for
Voltaire, if he can get it. Voltaire attaches endless importance to
this place; beautiful as a feather in one's cap; useful also to the
solitary Ishmael of Literature, who will now in a certain sense
have Thirty-nine Comrades, and at least one fixed House-of-Call in
this world. In fine, nothing can be more ardent than the wish of
M. de Voltaire for these supreme felicities. To be of the Forty, to
get his Plays acted,--oh, then were the Saturnian Kingdoms come;
and a man might sing IO TRIUMPHE, and take his ease in the
Creation, more or less! Stealthily, as if on shoes of felt,--as if
on paws of velvet, with eyes luminous, tail bushy,--he walks
warily, all energies compressively summoned, towards that high
goal. Hush, steady! May you soon catch that bit of savory red-
herring, then; worthiest of the human feline tribe!--As to the Play
MEROPE, here is the notable passage:
"PARIS, WEDNESDAY, 20th FEBRUARY, 1743. First night of MEROPE;
which raised the Paris Public into transports, so that they knew
not what to do, to express their feelings. 'Author! M. de Voltaire!
Author!' shouted they; summoning the Author, what is now so common,
but was then an unheard-of originality. 'Author! Author!' Author,
poor blushing creature, lay squatted somewhere, and durst not come;
was ferreted out; produced in the Lady Villars's Box,--Dowager
MARECHALE DE VILLARS, and her Son's Wife DUCHESSE DE VILLARS, being
there; known friends of Voltaire's. Between these Two he stands
ducking some kind of bow; uncertain, embarrassed what to do; with a
Theatre all in rapturous delirium round him,--uncertain it too, but
not embarrassed. 'Kiss him! MADAME LA DUCHESSE DE VILLARS,
EMBRASSEZ VOLTAIRE!' Yes, kiss him, fair Duchess, in the name of
France! shout all mortals;--and the younger Lady has to do it;
does it with a charming grace; urged by Madame la Marechale her
mother-in-law. [Duvernet (T. J. D. V.), Vie de Voltaire,
p. 128; Voltaire himself, OEuvres,
italic> ii. 142; Barbier, ii. 358.] Ah, and Madame la Marechale was
herself an old love of Voltaire's; who had been entirely unkind
to him!
"Thus are you made immortal by a Kiss;--and have not your choice of
the Kiss, Fate having chosen for you. The younger Lady was a
Daughter of Marechal de Noailles [our fine old Marechal, gone to
the Wars against his Britannic Majesty in those very weeks]:
infinitely clever (INFINIMENT D'ESPRIT); beautiful too, I
understand, though towards forty;--hangs to the human memory,
slightly but indissolubly, ever since that Wednesday Night
of 1743."
Old Marechal de Noailles is to the Wars, we said;--it is in a world
all twinkling with watch-fires, and raked coals of War, that these
fine Carnival things go on. Noailles is 70,000 strong; posted in
the Rhine Countries, middle and upper Rhine; vigilantly patrolling
about, to support those staggering Bavarian Affairs; especially to
give account of his Britannic Majesty. Brittanic Majesty is thought
to have got the Dutch hoisted, after all; to have his sword OUT;--
and ere long does actually get on march; up the Rhine hitherward,
as is too evident, to Noailles, to the Kaiser and everybody!
Chapter IV.
AUSTRIAN AFFAIRS MOUNT TO A DANGEROUS HEIGHT.
Led by fond hopes,--and driven also by that sad fear, of a Visit
from his Britannic Majesty,--the poor Kaiser, in the rear of those
late Seckendorf successes, quitted Frankfurt, April 17th; and the
second day after, got to Munchen. Saw himself in Munchen again,
after a space of more than two years; "all ranks of people crowding
out to welcome him;" the joy of all people, for themselves and for
him, being very great. Next day he drove out to Nymphenburg; saw
the Pandour devastations there,--might have seen the window where
the rugged old Unertl set up his ladder, "For God's sake, your
Serenity, have nothing to do with those French!"--and did not want
for sorrowful comparisons of past and present.
It was remarked, he quitted Munchen in a day or two; preferring
Country Palaces still unruined,--for example, Wolnzach, a Schloss
he has, some fifty miles off, down the Iser Valley, not far from
the little Town of Mosburg; which, at any rate, is among the
Broglio-Seckendorf posts, and convenient for business. Broglio and
Seckendorf lie dotted all about, from Braunau up to Ingolstadt and
farther; chiefly in the Iser and Inn Valleys, but on the north side
of the Donau too; over an area, say of 2,000 square miles;
Seckendorf preaching incessantly to Broglio, what is sun-clear to
all eyes but Broglio's, "Let us concentrate, M. le Marechal; let us
march and attack! If Prince Karl come upon us in this scattered
posture, what are we to do?" Broglio continuing deaf; Broglio
answering--in a way to drive one frantic.
The Kaiser himself takes Broglio in hand; has a scene with Broglio;
which, to readers that study it, may be symbolical of much that is
gone and that is coming. It fell "about the middle of May" (prior
to May 17th, as readers will guess before long); and here,
according to report, was the somewhat explosive finale it had.
Prince Conti, the same who ran to join Maillebois, and has proved a
gallant fellow and got command of a Division, attends Broglio in
this important interview at Wolnzach:--
SCHLOSS OF WOLNZACH, MAY, 1743. ... "The Kaiser pressed, in the
most emphatic manner, That the Two Armies [French and Bavarian]
should collect and unite for immediate action. To which Broglio
declared he could by no means assent, not having any order from
Paris of that tenor. The Kaiser thereupon: 'I give you my order for
it; I, by the Most Christian King's appointment, am Commander-in-
Chief of your Army, as of my own; and I now order you!'--taking out
his Patent, and spreading it before Broglio with the sign-manual
visible, Broglio knew the Patent very well; but answered, 'That he
could not, for all that, follow the wish of his Imperial Majesty;
that he, Broglio, had later orders, and must obey them!' Upon which
the Imperial Majesty, nature irrepressibly asserting itself,
towered into Olympian height; flung his Patent on the table,
telling Conti and Broglio, 'You can send that back, then;
Patents like that are of no service to me!' and quitted them in a
blaze." [Adelung, iii. B, 150; cites ETTAT POLITIQUE (Annual
Register of those times), xiii. 16. Nothing of this scene in
Campagnes, which is officially careful to
suppress the like of this.]
The indisputable fact is, Prince Karl is at the door; nay he has
beaten in the door in a frightful manner; and has Braunau, key of
the Inn, again under siege. Not we getting Passau; it is he getting
Braunau! A week ago (9th May) his vanguard, on the sudden, cut to
pieces our poor Bavarian 8,000, and their poor Minuzzi, who were
covering Braunau, and has ended him and them;--Minuzzi himself
prisoner, not to be heard of or beaten more;--and is battering
Braunau ever since. That is the sad fact, whatever the theory may
have been. Prince Karl is rolling in from the east; Lobkowitz (Prag
now ended) is advancing from the northward, Khevenhuller from the
Salzburg southern quarter: Is it in a sprinkle of disconnected
fractions that you will wait Prince Karl? The question of uniting,
and advancing, ought to be a simple one for Broglio. Take this
other symbolic passage, of nearly the same date;--posterior, as we
guessed, to that Interview at Wolnzach.
"DINGELFINGEN, 17th MAY, 1743. At Dingelfingen on the Iser, a
strongish central post of the French, about fifty miles farther
down than that Schloss of Wolnzach, there is a second argument,--
much corroborative of the Kaiser's reasoning. About sunrise of the
17th, the Austrians, in sufficient force, chiefly of Pandours,
appeared on the heights to the south: they had been foreseen the
night before; but the French covering General, luckier than
Minuzzi, did not wait for them; only warned Dingelfingen, and
withdrew across the River, to wait there on the safe left bank.
Leader of the Austrians was one Leopold Graf von Daun, active man
of thirty-five, already of good rank, who will be much heard of
afterwards; Commandant in Dingelfingen is a Brigadier du Chatelet,
Marquis du Chatelet-Lamont; whom--after search (in the interest of
some idle readers)--I discover to be no other than the Husband of a
certain Algebraic Lady! Identity made out, mark what a pass he is
at. Count Daun comes on in a tempest of furious fire; 'very heavy,'
they say, from great guns and small; till close upon the place,
when he summons Du Chatelet: 'No;' and thereupon attempts scalade.
Cannot scalade, Du Chatelet and his people being mettlesome;
takes then to flinging shells, to burning the suburbs; Town itself
catches fire,--Town plainly indefensible. 'Truce for one hour'
proposes Du Chatelet (wishful to consult the covering General
across the River): 'No,' answers Daun. So that Du Chatelet has to
jumble and wriggle himself out of the place; courageous to the
last; but not in a very Parthian fashion,--great difficulty to get
his bridge ruined (very partially ruined), behind him;--and joins
the covering General, in a flustery singed condition! Were not
pursued farther by Daun:--and Prince Conti, Head General in those
parts, called it a fine defence, on examining."
[ Campagnes, viii. 239; Espagnac, i. 187;
Hormayr, iv. 82, 85.] Espagnac continues:--
"On the 19th," after one rest-day, "Graf von Daun set out for
Landau [still on the Iser, farther down; Baiern has ITS "Landau"
too, and its "Landshut," both on this River], to seize Landau;
which is another French place of strength. The Garrison defended
themselves for some time; after which they retired over the River
[left bauk, or wrong side of the Iser, they too]; and set fire to
the Bridge behind them. The fire of the Bridge caught the Town;
Pandours helping it, as our people said; and Landau also was
reduced to ashes."--Poor Landau, poor Dingelfingen, they cannot
have the benefit of Louis XV.'s talent for governing Germany, quite
gratis, it would appear!
But where are the divine Emilie and Voltaire, that morning, while
the Brigadier is in such taking? Sitting safe in "that dainty
little palace of Madame's (PETIT PALAIS) at the point of the Isle
de St. Louis," intent on quite other adventures; disgusted with the
slavish Forty and their methods of Election (of which by and by);
and little thinking of M. le Brigadier and the dangers of war.
--Prince de Conti praised the Brigadier's defence: but very
soon, alas,--
DEGGENDORF, 27th MAY. "Prince de Conti, at Deggendorf [other or
north bank of the Donau, Head-quarters of Conti, which was thought
to be well secured by batteries and defences on the steep heights
to landward], was himself suddenly attacked, the tenth day hence,
'May 27th, at daybreak,' in a still more furious manner; and was
tumbled out of Deggendorf amid whirlwinds of fire, in very flamy
condition indeed. The Austrians, playing on us from the uplands
with their heavy artillery, made a breach in our outmost battery:
'Not tenable!' exclaimed the Captain there: 'This way, my men!'--
and withdrew, like a shot, he and party; sliding down the steep
face of the mountain [feet foremost, I hope], home to Deggendorf in
this peculiar manner; leaving the AUSTRIANS to manage his guns.
Our two lower batteries, ruled by this upper one, had now to be
abandoned; and Conti ran, Bridge of the Town-ditch breaking under
him; baggages, even to his own portmanteaus, all lost; and had a
neck-and-neck race of it in getting to his Donau-Bridge, and across
to the safe side. With loss of everything, we say,--personal
baggage all included; which latter item, Prince Karl politely
returned him next day." [Espagnac, p. 188.]
Broglio, with Prince Karl in his bowels going at such a rate, may
judge now whether it was wise to lie in that loose posture,
scattered over two thousand square miles, and snort on his
judicious Seckendorf's advices and urgencies as he did!
Readers anticipate the issue; and shall not be wearied farther with
detail. There are, as we said, Three Austrian Armies pressing on
this luckless Bavaria and its French Protectors: Khevenhuller, from
Salzburg and the southern quarter, pushing in his Dauns;
Lobkowitz, hanging over us from the Ober-Pfalz (Naab-River Country)
on the north; and Prince Karl, on one or sometimes on both sides of
the Donau, pricking sharply into the rear of us; saying, by
bayonets, burnt bridges, bomb-shells, "Off; swift; it will be
better for you!" And Broglio has lost head, a mere whirlwind of
flaming gases; and your ablest Comte de Saxe in such position, what
can he do? Broglio writes to Versailles, That there will be no
continuing in Bavaria; that he recommends an order to march
homewards;--much to the surprise of Versailles.
"The Court of Versailles was much astonished at the message it got
from Broglio; Court of Versailles had always calculated that
Broglio could keep Bavaria; and had gone into extensive measures
for maintaining him there. Experienced old Marechal de Noailles has
a new French Army, 70,000 or more, assembled in the Upper Rhine for
that and the cognate objects [of whom, more specially, anon]:
Noailles, by order from Court, has detached 12,000, who are now
marching their best, to reinforce Broglio;--and indeed the Court
'had already appointed the Generals and Staff-Officers for
Broglio's Bavarian Army,' and gratified many men by promotions,
which now went to smoke! [Espagnac, i. 190.]
"Versailles, however, has to expedite the order: 'Come home, then.'
Order or no order, Broglio's posts are all crackling off again,
bursting aloft like a chain of powder-mines; Broglio is plunging
head foremost, towards Donauworth, towards Ingolstadt, his place of
arms; Seckendorf now welcome to join him, but unable to do anything
when joined. Blustering Broglio has no steadfastness of mind;
explodes like an inflammable body, in this crackling off of the
posts, and becomes a mere whirlwind of flaming gases. Old snuffling
Seckendorf, born to ill success in his old days, strong only in
caution, how is he to quench or stay this crackling of the posts?
Broglio blusters, reproaches, bullies; Seckendorf quarrels with him
outright, as he may well do: 'JARNI-BLEU, such a delirious
whirlwind of a Marechal; mere bickering flames and soot!'--and
looks out chiefly to keep his own skin and that of his poor
Bavarians whole.
"The unhappy Kaiser has run from Munchen again, to Augsburg for
some brief shelter; cannot stay there either, in the circumstances.
Will he have to hurry back to Frankfurt, to bankruptcy and
furnished lodgings,--nay to the Britannic Majesty's tender mercies,
whose Army is now actually there? Those indignant prophesyings to
Broglio, at the Schloss of Wolnzach, have so soon come true!
And Broglio and the French are--what a staff to lean upon!
Enough, the poor Kaiser, after doleful 'Council of War held at
Augsburg, June 25th,' does on the morrow make off for Frankfurt
again:--whither else? Britannic Majesty's intentions, friends tell
him, friend Wilhelm of Hessen tells him, are magnanimous; eager for
Peace to Teutschland; hostile only to the French. Poor Karl took
the road, June 26th;--and will find news on his arrival, or
before it.
"On which same day, 26th of June, as it chances, Broglio too has
made his packages; left a garrison in Ingolstadt, garrison in Eger;
and is ferrying across at Donauworth,--will see the Marlborough
Schellenberg as he passes,--in full speed for the Rhine Countries,
and the finis of this bad Business. [Adelung, iii. B. 152.] On the
road, I believe at Donauworth itself, Noailles's 12,000, little
foreseeing these retrograde events, met Broglio: 'Right about, you
too!' orders Broglio; and speeds Rhineward not the less. And the
same day of that ferrying at Donauworth, and of the Kaiser's
setting out for Frankfurt, Seckendorf,--at Nieder-Schonfeld [an old
Monastery near the Town of Rain, in those parts], the Kaiser being
now safe away,--is making terms for himself with Khevenhuller and
Prince Karl: 'Will lie quiet as mere REICHS-Army, almost as Troops
of the Swabian Circle, over at Wembdingen there, in said circle,
and be strictly neutral, if we can but get lived at all!' [Ib. iii.
B, 153.] Seckendorf concludes on the morrow, 27th June;--which is
elsewhere a memorable Day of Battle, as will be seen.
"Broglio marched in Five Divisions [Du Chatelet in the Second
Division, poor soul, which was led by Comte de Saxe): [Espagnac,
i. 198.] always in Five Divisions, swiftly, half a march apart;
through the Wurtemberg Country;--lost much baggage, many
stragglers; Tolpatcheries in multitude continually pricking at the
skirts of him; Prince Karl following steadily, Rhine-wards also, a
few marches behind. Here are omens to return with! 'But have you
seen a retreat better managed?' thinks Broglio to himself:" that is
one consoling circumstance.
In this manner, then, has the Problem of Bavaria solved itself.
Hungarian Majesty, in these weeks, was getting crowned in Prag;
"Queen of Bohemia, I, not you; in the sight of Heaven and of
Earth!" [Crowned 12th May, 1743 (Adelung, iii. B, 128); "news of
Prince Karl's having taken Braunau [incipiency of all these
successes] had reached her that very morning."]--and was purifying
her Bohemia: with some rigor (it is said), from foreign
defacements, treasonous compliances and the like, which there had
been. To see your Bavarian Kaiser, false King of Bohemia, your
Broglio with his French, and the Bohemian-Bavarian Question in
whole, all rolling Rhine-wards at their swiftest, with Prince Karl
sticking in the skirts of them:--what a satisfaction to that
high Lady!
BRITANNIC MAJESTY, WITH SWORD ACTUALLY DRAWN, HAS MARCHED
MEANWHILE TO THE FRANKFURT COUNTRIES, AS "PRAGMATIC ARMY;"
READY FOR BATTLE AND TREATY ALIKE.
Add to which fine set of results, simultaneously with them:
His Britannic Majesty, third effort successful, has got his sword
drawn, fairly out at last; and in the air is making horrid circles
with it, ever since March last; nay does, he flatters himself, a
very considerable slash with it, in this current month of June.
Of which, though loath, we must now take some notice.
The fact is, though Stair could not hoist the Dutch, and our
double-quick Britannic heroism had to drop dead in consequence,
Carteret has done it: Carteret himself rushed over in that crisis,
a fiery emphatic man and chief minister, [Arrived at the Hague
"5th October, 1742" (Adelung, iii. A, 294).]--"eager to please his
Master's humor!" said enemies. Yes, doubtless; but acting on his
own turbid belief withal (says fact); and revolving big thoughts in
his head, about bringing Friedrich over to the Cause of Liberty,
giving French Ambition a lesson for once, and the like.
Carteret strongly pulleying, "All hands, heave-oh!"--and, no doubt,
those Maillebois-Broglio events from Prag assisting him,--did bring
the High Mightinesses to their legs; still in a staggering splay-
footed posture, but trying to steady themselves. That is to say,
the High Mightinesses did agree to go with us in the Cause of
Liberty; will now pay actual Subsidies to her Hungarian Majesty (at
the rate of two for our three); and will add, so soon as humanly
possible, 20,000 men to those wind-bound 40,000 of ours;--which
latter shall now therefore, at once, as "Pragmatic Army" (that is
the term fixed on), get on march, Frankfurt way; and strike home
upon the French and other enemies of Pragmatic Sanction. This is
what Noailles has been looking for, this good while, and diligently
adjusting himself, in those Middle-Rhine Countries, to give
account of.
Pragmatic Army lifted itself accordingly,--Stair, and the most of
his English, from Ghent, where the wearisome Head-quarters had
been; Hanoverians, Hessians, from we will forget where;--and in
various streaks and streams, certain Austrians from Luxemburg (with
our old friend Neipperg in company) having joined them, are flowing
Rhine-ward ever since March 1st. ["February 18th," o.s. (Old
Newspapers).] They cross the Rhine at three suitable points;
whence, by the north bank, home upon Frankfurt Country, and the
Noailles-Broglio operations in those parts. The English crossed "at
Neuwied, in the end of April" (if anybody is curious); "Lord Stair
in person superintending them." Lord Stair has been much about, and
a most busy person; General-in-Chief of the Pragmatic Army till his
Britannic Majesty arrive. Generalissimo Lord Stair; and there is
General Clayton, General Ligonier, "General Heywood left with the
Reserve at Brussels:"--and, from the ashes of the Old Newspapers,
the main stages and particulars of this surprising Expedition
(England marching as Pragmatic Army into distant parts) can be
riddled out; though they require mostly to be flung in again.
Shocking weather on the march, mere Boreas and icy tempests;
snow in some places two feet deep; Rhine much swollen, when we come
to it.
The Austrian Chief General--who lies about Wiesbaden, and consults
with Stair, while the English are crossing--is Duke d'Ahremberg
(Father of the Prince de Ligne, or "Prince of Coxcombs" as some
call him): little or nothing of military skill in D'Ahremberg;
but Neipperg is thought to have given much counsel, such as it was.
With the Hessians there was some difficulty; hesitation on Landgraf
Wilhelm's part; who pities the poor Kaiser, and would fain see him
back at Frankfurt, and awaken the Britannic magnanimities for him.
"To Frankfurt, say you? We cannot fight against the Kaiser!"--and
they had to be left behind, for some time; but at length did come
on, though late for business, as it chanced. General of these
Hessians is Prince George of Hessen, worthy stout gentleman, whom
Wilhelmina met at the Frankfurt Gayeties lately. George's elder
Brother Wilhelm is Manager or Vice-Landgraf, this long while back;
and in seven or eight years hence became, as had been expected,
actual Landgraf (old King of Sweden dying childless);--of which
Wilhelm we shall have to hear, at Hanau (a Town of his in those
parts), and perhaps slightly elsewhere, in the course of this
business. A fat, just man, he too; probably somewhat iracund;
not without troubles in his House. His eldest Son, Heir-Apparent of
Hessen, let me remind readers, has an English Princess to Wife;
Princess Mary, King George's Daughter, wedded two years ago.
That, added to the Subsidies, is surely a point of union;--though
again there may such discrepancies rise! A good while after this,
the eldest Son becoming Catholic (foolish wretch), to the horror of
Papa,--there rose still other noises in the world, about Hessen and
its Landgraves. Of good Prince George, who doubtless attended in
War Councils, but probably said little, we hope to hear nothing
more whatever.
From Neuwied to Frankfurt is but a few days' march for the
Pragmatic Army; in a direct line, not sixty miles. Frankfurt
itself, which is a REICHS-STADT (Imperial City), they must not
enter: "Fear not, City or Country!" writes Stair to it: "We come as
saviors, pacificators, hostile to your enemies and disturbers only;
we understand discipline and the Laws of the Reich, and will pay
for everything." [Letter itself, of brief magnanimous strain, in
Campagnes de Noailles, i. 127; date "Neuwied,
26th April, 1743" (Adelung, iii. B, 114).] For the rest, they are
in no hurry. They linger in that Frankfurt-Nainz region, all
through the month of May; not unobservant of Noailles and his
movements, if he made any; but occupied chiefly with gathering
provisions; forming, with difficulty, a Magazine in Hanau.
"What they intended: or intend, by coming hither?" asks the Public
everywhere: "To go into the Donau Countries, and enclose Broglio
between two fires?" That had been, and was still, Stair's fine
idea; but D'Ahremberg had disapproved the methods. D'Ahremberg, it
seems, is rather given to opposing Stair;--and there rise
uncertainties, in this Pragmatic Army: certain only hitherto the
Magazine in Hanau. And in secret, it afterwards appeared, the
immediate real errand of this Pragmatic Army had lain--in the
Chapter of Mainz Cathedral, and an Election that was going
on there.
The old Kur-Mainz, namely, had just died; and there was a new
"Chief Spiritual Kurfurst" to be elected by the Canons there.
Kur-Mainz is Chairman of the Reich, an important personage,
analogous to Speaker of the House of Commons; and ought to be,--by
no means the Kaiser's young Brother, as the French and Kaiser are
proposing; but a man with Austrian leanings;--say, Graf von Ostein,
titular DOM-CUSTOS (Cathedral Keeper) here; lately Ambassador in
London, and known in select society for what he is. Not much of an
Archbishop, of a Spiritual or Chief Spiritual Herr hitherto;
but capable of being made one,--were the Pragmatic Army at his
elbow! It was on this errand that the Pragmatic Army had come
hither, or come so early, and with their plans still unripe.
And truly they succeeded; got their Ostein chosen to their mind:
["21st March, 1743," Mainz vacant; "22d April," Ostein elected
(Adelung, iii. B, 113, 121).] a new Kur-Mainz,--whose leanings and
procedures were very manifest in the sequel, and some of them
important before long. This was always reckoned one result of his
Britannic Majesty's Pragmatic Campaign;--and truly some think it
was, in strict arithmetic, the only one, though that is far from
his Majesty's own opinion.
FRIEDRICH HAS OBJECTIONS TO THE PRAGMATIC ARMY; BUT IN VAIN.
OF FRIEDRICH'S MANY ENDEAVORS TO QUENCH THIS WAR, BY "UNION
OF INDEPENDENT GERMAN PRINCES," BY "MEDIATION OF THE REICH,"
AND OTHERWISE; ALL IN VAIN.
Friedrich, at an early stage, had inquired of his Britannic
Majesty, politely but with emphasis, "What in the world he meant,
then, by invading the German Reich; leading foreign Armies into the
Reich: in this unauthorized manner?" To which the Britannic Majesty
had answered, with what vague argument of words we will not ask,
but with a look that we can fancy,--look that would split a
pitcher, as the Irish say! Friedrich persisted to call it an
Invasion of the German Reich; and spoke, at first, of flatly
opposing it by a Reich's Army (30,000, or even 50,000, for
Brandenburg's contingent, in such case); but as the poor Reich took
no notice, and the Britannic Majesty was positive, Friedrich had to
content himself with protest for the present. [Friedrich's
Remonstrance and George's Response are in Adelung,
italic> iii. B, 132 (date, "March, 1743"); date of Friedrich's
first stirring in the matter is "January, 1743," and earlier
(ib. p. 37, p. 8, &c.).]
The exertions of Friedrich to bring about a Peace, or at least to
diminish, not increase, the disturbance, are forgotten now;
wearisome to think of, as they did not produce the smallest result;
but they have been incessant and zealous, as those of a man to
quench the fire which is still raging in his street, and from which
he himself is just saved. "Cannot the Reich be roused for
settlement of this Bavarian-Austrian quarrel?" thought Friedrich
always. And spent a great deal of earnest endeavor in that
direction; wished a Reich's ARMY OF MEDIATION; "to which I will
myself furnish 30,000; 50,000, if needed." Reich, alas! The Reich
is a horse fallen down to die,--no use spurring at the Reich;
it cannot, for many months, on Friedrich's Proposal (though the
question was far from new, and "had been two years on hand"), come
to the decision, "Well then, yes; the Reich WILL try to moderate
and mediate:" and as for a Reich's Mediation-ARMY, or any practical
step at all [The question had been started, "in August, 1741," by
the Kaiser himself; "11th March, 1743," again urged by him, after
Friedrich's offer; "10th May, 1743," "Yes, then, we will try;
but--" and the result continued zero.]--!
"Is not Germany, are not all the German Princes, interested to have
Peace?" thinks Friedrich. "A union of the independent German
Princes to recommend Peace, and even with hand on sword-hilt to
command it; that would be the method of producing Treaty of Peace!"
thinks he always. And is greatly set on that method; which, we
find, has been, and continues to be, the soul of his many efforts
in this matter. A fact to be noted. Long poring in those mournful
imbroglios of Dryasdust, where the fraction of living and important
welters overwhelmed by wildernesses of the dead and nugatory, one
at length disengages this fact; and readers may take it along with
them, for it proves illuminative of Friedrich's procedures now and
afterwards. A fixed notion of Friedrich's, this of German Princes
"uniting," when the common dangers become flagrant; a very lively
notion with him at present. He will himself cheerfully take the
lead in such Union, but he must not venture alone. [See Adelung,
iii. A and B, passim; Valori, i. 178; &c. &c.]
The Reich, when appealed to, with such degree of emphasis, in this
matter,--we see how the Reich has responded! Later on, Friedrich
tried "the Swabian Circle" (chief scene of these Austrian-Bavarian
tusslings); which has, like the other Circles, a kind of
parliament, and pretends to be a political unity of some sort.
"Cannot the Swabian Circle, or Swabian and Frankish joined (to
which one might declare oneself PROTECTOR, in such case), order
their own Captains, with military force of their own, say 20,000
men, to rank on the Frontier; and to inform peremptorily all
belligerents and tumultuous persons, French, Bavarian, English,
Austrian: 'No thoroughfare; we tell you, No admittance here!'"
Friedrich, disappointed of the Reich, had taken up that smaller
notion: and he spent a good deal of endeavor on that too,--of which
we may see some glimpse, as we proceed. But it proves all futile.
The Swabian Circle too is a moribund horse; all these horses dead
or moribund.
Friedrich, of course, has thought much what kind of Peace could be
offered by a mediating party. The Kaiser has lost his Bavaria:
yet he is the Kaiser, and must have a living granted him as such.
Compensations, aspirations, claims of territory; these will be
manifold! These are a world of floating vapor, of greed, of anger,
idle pretension: but within all these there are the real
necessities; what the case does require, if it is ever to be
settled! Friedrich discerns this Austrian-Bavarian necessity of
compensation; of new land to cut upon. And where is that to
come from!
In January last, Friedrich, intensely meditating this business, had
in private a bright-enough idea: That of secularizing those
so-called Sovereign Bishoprics, Austrian-Bavarian by locality and
nature, Passau, Salzburg, Regensburg, idle opulent territories,
with functions absurd not useful;--and of therefrom cutting
compensation to right and to left. This notion he, by obscure
channels, put into the head of Baron von Haslang, Bavarian
Ambassador at London; where it germinated rapidly, and came to
fruit;--was officially submitted to Lord Carteret in his own house,
in two highly artistic forms, one evening;--and sets the Diplomatic
Heads all wagging upon it. [Adelung, iii. B, 84, 90, "January-
March, 1743."] With great hope, at one time; till rumor of it got
abroad into the Orthodox imagination, into the Gazetteer world;
and raised such a clamor, in those months, as seldom was.
"Secularize, Hah! One sees the devilish heathen spirit of you;
and what kind of Kaiser, on the religious side, we now have the
happiness of having!" So that Kaiser Karl had to deny utterly,
"Never heard of such a thing!" Carteret himself had, in politeness,
to deny; much more, and for dire cause, had Haslang himself, over
the belly of facts, "Never in my dreams, I tell you!"--and to get
ambiguous certificate from Carteret, which the simple could
interpret to that effect. [Carteret's Letter (ibid. iii, B, 190).]
It was only in whispers that the name of Friedrich was connected
with this fine scheme; and all parties were glad to get it soon
buried again. A bright idea; but had come a century too soon.
Of another Carteret Negotiation with Kaiser Karl, famed as
"Conferences of Hanau," which had almost come to be a Treaty, but
did not; and then, failing that, of a famous Carteret "Treaty of
Worms," which did come to perfection, in these same localities
shortly afterwards; and which were infinitely interesting to our
Friedrich, both the Treaty and the Failure of the Treaty,--we
propose to speak elsewhere, in due time.
As to Friedrich's own endeavors and industries, at Regensburg and
elsewhere, for effective mediation of Peace; for the Reich to
mediate, and have "Army of Mediation;" for a "Union of Swabian
Circles" to do it; for this and then for that to do it;--as to
Friedrich's own efforts and strugglings that way, in all likely and
in some unlikely quarters,--they were, and continued to be,
earnest, incessant; but without result. Like the spurring of horses
really DEAD some time ago! Of which no reader wishes the details,
though the fact has to be remembered. And so, with slight
indication for Friedrich's sake,--being intent on the stage of
events,--we must leave that shadowy hypothetic region, as a wood in
the background; the much foliage and many twigs and boughs of which
do authentically TAKE the trouble to be there, though we have to
paint it in this summary manner.
Chapter V.
BRITANNIC MAJESTY FIGHTS HIS BATTLE OF DETTINGEN; AND
BECOMES SUPREME JOVE OF GERMANY, IN A MANNER.
Brittanic Majesty with his Yarmouth, and martial Prince of
Cumberland, arrived at Hanover May 15th; soon followed by Carteret
from the Hague: [ Biographia Britannica
(Kippin's,? Carteret), iii. 277.] a Majesty prepared now for battle
and for treaty alike; kind of earthly Jove, Arbiter of Nations, or
victorious Hercules of the Pragmatic, the sublime little man.
At Herrenhausen he has a fine time; grandly fugling about;
negotiating with Wilhelm of Hessen and others; commanding his
Pragmatic Army from the distance: and then at last, dashing off
rather in haste, he-- It is well known what enigmatic Exploit he
did, at least the Name of it is well known! Here, from the
Imbroglios, is a rough Account; parts of which are introducible for
the sake of English readers.
BATTLE OF DETTINGEN.
"After some five leisurely weeks in Herrenhausen, George II. (now
an old gentleman of sixty), with his martial Fat Boy the Duke of
Cumberland, and Lord Carteret his Diplomatist-in-Chief, quitted
that pleasant sojourn, rather on a sudden, for the actual Seat of
War. By speedy journeys they got to Frankfurt Country; to Hanau,
June 19th; whence, still up the Mayn, twenty or thirty miles
farther up, to Aschaffenburg,--where the Pragmatic Army, after some
dangerous manoeuvring on the opposite or south bank of the River,
has lain encamped some days, and is in questionable posture.
Whither his Majesty in person has hastened up. And truly, if his
Majesty's head contain any good counsel, there is great need of it
here just now.
"Captains and men were impatient of that long loitering, hanging
idle about Frankfurt all through May; and they have at length
started real business,--with more valor than discretion, it is
feared. They are some 40 or 44,000 strong: English 16,000;
Hanoverians the like number; and of Austrians [by theory 20,000],
say, in effect, 12,000 or even 8,000: all paid by England.
They have Hanau for Magazine; they have rearguard of 12,000 [the
6,000 Hessians, and 6,000 new Hanoverians], who at last are
actually on march thither, near arriving there: 'Forward!' said the
Captaincy [said Stair, chiefly, it was thought]: 'Shall the whole
summer waste itself to no purpose?'--and are up the River thus far,
not on the most considerate terms.
"What this Pragmatic Army means to do? That is, and has been, a
great question for all the world; especially for Noailles and the
French,--not to say, for the Pragmatic itself! 'Get into Lorraine?'
think the French: 'Get into Alsace, and wrest it from us, for
behoof of her Hungarian Majesty,'--plundered goods, which indeed
belong to the Reich and her, in a sense! ELS-SASS (Alsace, OUTER-
seat), with its ROAD-Fortress (STRASburg) plundered from the Holy
Romish Reich by Louis XIV., in a way no one can forget;
actually plundered, as if by highway robbery, or by highway robbery
and attorneyism combined, on the part of that great Sovereign.
'To Strasburg? To Lorraine perhaps? Or to the Three Bishoprics'"
(Metz, Toul, Verdun:--readers recollect that Siege of Metz, which
broke the great heart of Karl V.? Who raged and fired as man seldom
did, with 50,000 men, against Guise and the intrusive French, for
six weeks; sound of his cannon heard at Strasburg on winter nights,
300 years ago: to no purpose; for his Captains of the Siege, after
trial and second trial, solemnly shook their heads; and the great
Kaiser, breaking into tears, had to raise the Siege of Metz; and
went his way, never to smile more in this world: and Metz, and
Toul, and Verdun, remain with the French ever since):--"To the
Three Bishoprics, possibly enough!"
"'Or they may purpose for the Donau Countries, where Broglio is
crackling off like trains of gunpowder; and lend hand to Prince
Karl, thereby enclosing Broglio fires?' This, according to present
aspects, is between two the likeliest. And perhaps, had provenders
and arrangements been made beforehand for such a march, this had
been the feasiblest: and, to my own notion, it was some wild hope
of doing this without provenders or prearrangements that had
brought the Pragmatic into its present quarters at Aschaffenburg,
which are for the military mind a mystery to this day.
"Early in the Spring, the French Governmeut had equipped Noailles
with 70,000 men, to keep watch, and patrol about, in the Rhine-Mayn
Countries, and look into those points. Which he has been vigilantly
doing,--posted of late on the south or left bank of the Mayn;--and
is especially vigilant, since June 14th, when the Pragmatic Army
got on march, across the Mayn at Hochst; and took to offering him
battle, on his own south side of the River. Noailles--though his
Force [still 58,000, after that Broglio Detachment of 12,000] was
greatly the stronger--would not fight; preferred cutting off the
Enemy's supplies, capturing his river-boats, provision-convoys from
Hanau, and settling him by hunger, as the cheaper method.
Impetuous Stair was thwarted, by flat protest of his German
colleagues, especially by D'Ahremberg, in FORCING battle on those
rash terms: 'We Austrians absolutely will not!' said D'Ahremberg at
last, and withdrew, or was withdrawing, he for his part, across the
River again. So that Stair also was obliged to recross the River,
in indignant humor; and now lies at Aschaffenburg, suffering the
sad alternative, short diet namely, which will end in famine soon,
if these counsels prevail.
"Stair and D'Ahremberg do not well accord in their opinions;
nor, it seems, is anybody in particular absolute Chief; there are
likewise heats and jealousies between the Hanoverian and the
English troops ('Are not we come for all your goods?' 'Yes, damn
you, and for all our chattels too!')--and withal it is frightfully
uncertain whether a high degree of intellect presides over these
44,000 fighting men, which may lead them to something, or a low
degree, which can only lead them to nothing!--The blame is all laid
on Stair; 'too rash,' they say. Possibly enough, too rash.
And possibly enough withal, even to a sound military judgment, in
such unutterable puddle of jarring imbecilities, 'rashness,'
headlong courage, offered the one chance there was of success?
Who knows, had all the 44,000 been as rash as Stair and his
English, but luck, and sheer hard fighting, might have favored him,
as skill could not, in those sad circumstances! Stair's plan was,
'Beat Noailles, and you have done everything: provisions, opulent
new regions, and all else shall be added to you!' Stair's plan
might have answered,--had Stair been the master to execute it;
which he was not. D'Ahremberg's also, who protested, 'Wait till
your 12,000 join, and you have your provisions,' was the orthodox
plan, and might have much to say for itself. But the two plans
collapsing into one,--that was the clearly fatal method!
Magnanimous Stair never made the least explanation, to an
undiscerning Public or Parliament; wrapt himself in strict silence,
and accepted in a grand way what had come to him. [His Papers, to
voluminous extent, are still in the Family Archives;--not
inaccessible, I think, were the right student of them (who would be
a rare article among us!) to turn up.] Clear it is, the Pragmatic
Army had come across again, at Aschaffenburg, Sunday, June 16th;
and was found there by his Majesty on the Wednesday following, with
its two internecine plans fallen into mutual death; a Pragmatic
Army in truly dangerous circumstances.
"The English who were in and round Aschaffenburg itself,
Hanoverians and Austrians encamping farther down, had put a battery
on the Bridge of Aschaffenburg; hoping to be able to forage thereby
on the other side of the Mayn. Whereupon Noailles had instantly
clapt a redoubt, under due cover of a Wood, at his end of the
Bridge, 'No passage this way, gentlemen, except into the cannon's
throat!'--so that Marshal Stair, reconnoitring that way, 'had his
hat shot off,' and rapidly drew back again. Nay, before long,
Noailles, at the Village of Seligenstadt, some eight miles farther
down, throws two wooden or pontoon bridges over; [Sketch of Plan at
p. 257.] can bring his whole Army across at Seligenstadt;
prohibits all manner of supply to us from Hanau or our Magazines by
his arrangement there:"--(Notable little Seligenstadt, "City of the
Blessed;" where Eginhart and Emma, ever since Charlemagne's time,
lie waiting the Resurrection; that is the place of these Noailles
contrivances!)--"Furthermore, we learn, Noailles has seized a post
twenty miles farther up the river (Miltenberg the name of it);
and will prevent supplies from coming down to us out of Branken or
the Neckar Country. We had forgotten, or our COLLAPSE of plans had
done it, that 'an army moves on its stomach' (as the King of
Prussia says), and that we have nothing to live upon in
these parts!
"Such has the unfortunate fact turned out to be, when Britannic
Majesty arrives; and it can now be discovered clearly, by any eyes,
however flat to the head. And a terrible fact it is. Discordant
Generals accuse one another; hungry soldiers cannot be kept from
plundering: for the horses there is unripe rye in quantity;
but what is there for the men? My poor traditionary friends, of the
Grey Dragoons, were wont (I have heard) to be heart-rending on this
point, in after years! Famine being urgent, discipline is not
possible, nor existence itself. For a week longer, George, rather
in obstinate hope than with any reasonable plan or exertion, still
tries it; finds, after repeated Councils of War, that he will have
to give it up, and go back to Hanau where his living is.
Wednesday night, 26th June, 1743, that is the final resolution,
inevitably come upon, without argument: and about one on Thursday
morning, the Army (in two columns, Austrians to vanward well away
from the River, English as rear-guard close on it) gets in motion
to execute said resolution,--if the Army can.
"If the Army can: but that is like to be a formidably difficult
business; with a Noailles watching every step of you, to-day and
for ten days back, in these sad circumstances. Eyes in him like a
lynx, they say; and great skill in war, only too cautious.
Hardly is the Army gone from Aschaffenburg, when Noailles, pushing
across by the Bridge, seizes that post,--no retreat now for us
thitherward. His Majesty, who marches in the rear division, has
happily some artillery with him; repels the assaults from behind,
which might have been more serious otherwise. As it is, there play
cannon across the River upon him:--Why not bend to right, and get
out of range, asks the reader? The Spessart Hills rise, high and
woody, on the right; and there is in many places no marching except
within range. Noailles has Five effective Batteries, at the various
good points, on his side of the River:--and that is nothing to what
he has got ready for us, were we once at Dettingen, within wind of
his Two Bridges a little beyond! Noailles has us in a perfect
mouse-trap, SOURICIERE as he felinely calls it; and calculates on
having annihilation ready for us at Dettingen.
"Dettingen, short way above those Pontoons at Seligenstadt, is near
eight miles westward [NORTHwestward, but let us use the briefer
term] from Aschaffenburg: Dettingen is a poor peasant Village, of
some size, close on the Mayn, and on our side of it. A Brook,
coming down from the Spessart Mountains, falls into the Mayn there;
having formed for itself, there and upwards, a considerable dell or
hollow way; chiefly on the western or right bank of which stands
the Village with its barnyards and piggeries: on both sides of the
great High-road, which here crosses the Brook, and will lead you to
Hanau twenty miles off,--or back to Aschaffenburg, and even to
Nurnberg and the Donau Countries, if you persevere. Except that of
the high-road, Dettingen Brook has no bridge. Above the Village,
after coming from the Mountains, the banks of it are boggy;
especially the western bank, which spreads out into a scrubby waste
of moor, for some good space. In which scrubby moor, as elsewhere
in this dell or hollow way itself, where the Village hangs, with
its hedges, piggeries, colegarths,--there is like to be bad enough
marching for a column of men! Noailles, as we said, has Two Bridges
thrown across the Mayn, just below; and the last of his Five
Batteries, from the other side, will command Dettingen. His plan of
operation is this:--
"By these Bridges he has passed 24,000 horse and foot across the
River, under his Nephew the chivalrous Duke of Grammont:
these, with due artillery and equipment, are to occupy the Village;
and to rank themselves in battle-order to leftward of it, on the
moor just mentioned,--well behind that hollow way, with its brook
and bogs;--and, one thing they must note well, Not to stir from
that position, till the English columns have got fairly into said
hollow way and brook of Dettingen, and are plunging more or less
distractedly across the entanglements there. With cannon on their
left flank, and such a gullet to pass through, one may hope they
will be in rather an attackable condition. Across that gullet it is
our intention they shall never get. How can they, if Grammont do
his duty?
"This is Noailles's plan; one of the prettiest imaginable, say
military men,--had the execution but corresponded. Noailles had
seized Aschaffenburg, so soon as the English were out of it;
Noailles, from his batteries beyond the River, salutes the English
march with continuous shot and thunder, which is very discomposing:
he sees confidently a really fair likelihood of capturing the
Britannic Majesty and his Pragmatic Army, unless they prefer to die
on the ground. Seldom, since that of the Caudine Forks, did any
Army, by ill-luck and ill-guidance, get into such a pinfold,--death
or flat surrender seemingly their one alternative.
"Thus march these English, that dewy morning, Thursday, June 27th,
1743, with cannon playing on their left flank; and such a fate
ahead of them, had they known it;--very short of breakfast, too,
for most part. But they have one fine quality, and Britannic
George, like all his Welf race from Henry the Lion down to these
days, has it in an eminent degree: they are not easily put into
flurry, into fear. In all Welf Sovereigns, and generally in Teuton
Populations, on that side of the Channel or on this, there is the
requisite unconscious substratum of taciturn inexpugnability, with
depths of potential rage almost unquenchable, to be found when you
apply for it. Which quality will much stead them on the present
occasion: and, indeed, it is perhaps strengthened by their
'stupidity' itself, what neighbors call their 'stupidity;'--want of
idle imagining, idle flurrying, nay want even of knowing, is not
one of the worst qualities just now! They tramp on, paying a
minimum of attention to the cannon; ignorant of what is ahead;
hoping only it may be breakfast, in some form, before the day quite
terminate. The day is still young, hardly 8 o'clock, when their
advanced parties find Dettingen beset; find a whole French Army
drawn up, on the scrubby moor there; and come galloping back with
this interesting bit of news! Pause hereupon; much consulting;
in fact, endless hithering and thithering, the affair being knotty:
'Fight, YES, now at last! But how?' Impetuous Stair was not wanting
to himself; Neipperg too, they say, was useful with advice;
D'Ahremberg, I should imagine, good for little.
"Some six hours followed of thrice-intricate deploying, planting of
field-pieces, counter-batteries; ranking, re-ranking, shuffling
hither and then thither of horse and foot; Noailles's cannonade
proceeding all the while; the English, still considerably exposed
to it, and standing it like stones; chivalrous Grammont, and with
better reason the English, much wishing these preliminaries were
done. A difficult business, that of deploying here. The Pragmatic
had no room, jammed so against the Spessart Hills, and obliged to
lean FROM the River and Noailles's cannon; had to rank itself in
six, some say in eight lines; horse behind foot, as well as on
flank; unsatisfactory to the military mind: and I think had not
done shuffling and re-shuffling at 2 P.M.,--when the Enemy came
bursting on, with a peremptory finish to it, 'Enough of that,
MESSIEUR'S LES ANGLAIS!' 'Too much of it, a great deal!' thought
Messieurs grimly, in response. And there ensued a really furious
clash of host against host; French chivalry (MAISON DU ROI, Black
Mousquetaires, the Flower of their Horse regiments) dashing, in
right Gallic frenzy, on their natural enemies,--on the English,
that is; who, I find, were mainly on the left wing there, horse and
foot; and had mainly (the Austrians and they, very mainly) the work
to do;--and did, with an effort, and luck helping, manage to do it.
"'Grammont breaks orders! Thrice-blamable Grammont!' exclaim
Noailles and others, sorrowfully wringing their hands. Even so!
Grammont had waited seven mortal hours; one's courage burning all
the while, courage perhaps rather burning down,--and not the least
use coming of if. Grammont had, in natural impatience, gradually
edged forward; and, in the end, was being cannonaded and pricked
into by the Enemy;-- and did at last, with his MAISON-DU-ROI, dash
across that essential Hollow Way, and plunge in upon them on their
own side of it. And 'the, English foot gave their volley too soon;'
ad Grammont did, in effect, partly repulse and disorder the front
ranks of them; and, blazing up uncontrollable, at sight of those
first ranks in disorder, did press home upon them more and more;
get wholly into the affair, bringing on his Infantry as well:
'Let us finish it wholly, now that our hand is in!'--and took one
cannon from the Enemy; and did other feats.
"So furious was that first charge of his; 'MAISON-DU-ROI covering
itself with glory,'--for a short while. MAISON-DU-ROI broke three
lines of the Enemy [three, not "Five"]; did in some places actually
break through; in others 'could not, but galloped along the front.'
Three of their lines: but the fourth line would not break; much the
contrary, it advanced (Austrians and English) with steady fire,
hotter and hotter: upon this fourth line MAISON-DU-ROI had, itself,
to break, pretty much altogether, and rush home again, in ruinous
condition. 'Our front lines made lanes for them; terribly
maltreating them with musketry on right and left, as they galloped
through.' And this was the end of Grammont's successes, this charge
of horse; for his infantry had no luck anywhere; and the essential
crisis of the Battle had been here. It continued still a good
while; plenty of cannonading, fusillading, but in sporadic detached
form; a confused series of small shocks and knocks; which were
mostly, or all, unfortunate for Grammont; and which at length
knocked him quite off the field. 'He was now interlaced with the
English,' moans Noailles; 'so that my cannon, not to shoot Grammont
as well as the English, had to cease firing!' Well, yes, that is
true, M. le Marechal; but that is not so important as you would
have it. The English had stood nine hours in this fire of yours;
by degrees, leaning well away from it; answering it with counter-
batteries;--and were not yet ruined by it, when the Grammont crisis
came! Noailles should have dashed fresh troops across his Bridges,
and tried to handle them well. Noailles did not do that; or do
anything but wring his hands.
"The Fight lasted four hours; ever hotter on the English part, ever
less hot on the French [fire of anthracite-coal VERSUS flame of dry
wood, which latter at last sinks ASHY!]--and ended in total defeat
of the French. The French Infantry by no means behaved as their
Cavalry had done. The GARDES FRANCAISES [fire burning ashy, after
seven hours of flaming], when Grammont ordered them up to take the
English in flank, would hardly come on at all, or stand one push.
They threw away their arms, and plunged into the River, like a
drove of swimmers; getting drowned in great numbers. So that their
comrades nicknamed them 'CANARDS DU MEIN (Ducks of the Mayn):'
and in English mess-rooms, there went afterwards a saying:
'The French had, in reality, Three Bridges; one of them NOT wooden,
and carpeted with blue cloth!' Such the wit of military mankind.
"... The English, it appears, did something by mere shouting.
Partial huzzas and counter-huzzas between the Infantries were going
on at one time, when Stair happened to gallop up: 'Stop that,' said
Stair; 'let us do it right. Silence; then, One and all, when I give
you signal!' And Stair, at the right moment, lifting his hat, there
burst out such a thunder-growl, edged with melodious ire in alt, as
quite seemed to strike a damp into the French, says my authority,
'and they never shouted more. ... Our ground in many parts was
under rye,' hedgeless fields of rye, chief grain-crop of that sandy
country. 'We had already wasted above 120,000 acres of it,' still
in the unripe state, so hungry were we, man and horse, 'since
crossing to Aschaffenburg;'--fighting for your Cause of Liberty, ye
benighted ones!
"King Friedrich's private accounts, deformed by ridicule, are, That
the Britannic Majesty, his respectable old Uncle, finding the
French there barring his way to breakfast, understood simply that
there must and should be fighting, of the toughest; but had no plan
or counsel farther: that he did at first ride up, to see what was
what with his own eyes; but that his horse ran away with him,
frightened at the cannon; upon which he hastily got down; drew
sword; put himself at the head of his Hanoverian Infantry [on the
right wing], and stood,--left foot drawn back, sword pushed out, in
the form of a fencing-master doing lunge,--steadily in that
defensive attitude, inexpugnable like the rocks, till all was over,
and victory gained. This is defaced by the spirit of ridicule, and
not quite correct. Britannic Majesty's horse [one of those 500 fine
animals] did, it is certain, at last dangerously run away with him;
upon which he took to his feet and his Hanoverians. But he had been
repeatedly on horseback, in the earlier stages; galloping about, to
look with his own eyes, could they have availed him; and was heard
encouraging his people, and speaking even in the English language,
'Steady, my boys; fire, my brave boys, give them fire; they will
soon run!' [ OEuvres de Frederic, (iii. 14):
compare Anonymous, Life of the Duke of Cumberland
italic> (p. 64 n.); Henderson's LIFE of ditto; &c.] Latterly, there
can be no doubt, he stands [and to our imagination, he may fitly
stand throughout] in the above attitude of lunge; no fear in him,
and no plan; 'SANS PEUR ET SANS AVIS,' as me might term it. Like a
real Hanoverian Sovereign of England; like England itself, and its
ways in those German Wars. A typical epitome of long sections of
English History, that attitude of lunge!--
"The English Officers also, it is evident, behaved in their usual
way:--without knowledge of war, without fear of death, or regard to
utmost peril or difficulty; cheering their men, and keeping them
steady upon the throats of the French, so far as might be.
And always, after that first stumble with the French Horse was
mended, they kept gaining ground, thrusting back the Enemy, not
over the Dettingen Brook and Moor-ground only, but, knock after
knock, out of his woody or other coverts, back and ever back,
towards Welzheim, Kahl, and those Two Bridges of his. The flamy
French [ligneous fire burning lower and lower, VERSUS anthracitic
glowing brighter and brighter] found that they had a bad time of
it;--found, in fact, that they could not stand it; and tumbled
finally, in great torrents, across their Bridges on the Mayn, many
leaping into the River, the English sitting dreadfully on the
skirts of them. So that had the English had their Cavalry in
readiness to pursue, Noailles's Army, in the humor it had sunk to,
was ruined, and the Victory would have been conspicuously great.
But they had, as too common, nothing ready. Impetuous Stair strove
to get ready; "pushed out the Grey Dragoons" for one item. But the
Authorities refused Stair's counsel, as rash again; and made no
effectual pursuit at all;--too glad that they had brushed their
Battle-field triumphantly clear, and got out of that fatal pinfold
in an honorable manner.
MAP: BOOK XIV, Chap V, page 257 GOES HERE--------------------------
"They stayed on the ground till 10 at night; settling, or trying to
settle, many things. The Surgeons were busy as bees, but able for
Officers only;--'Dress HIM first!' said the glorious Duke of
Cumberland, pointing to a young Frenchman [Excellency Fenelon's
Son, grand-nephew of TELEMAQUE] who was worse wounded than his
Highness. Quite in the Philip-Sydney fashion; which was much taken
notice of. 'All this while, we had next to nothing to eat' (says
one informant).--Ten P.M.: after which, leaving a polite Letter to
Noailles, 'That he would take care of our Wounded, and bury our
Slain as well as his own,' we march [through a pour of rain] to
Hanau, where our victuals are, and 12,000 new Hessians and
Hanoverians by this time.
"Noailles politely bandaged the Wounded, buried the Dead. Noailles,
gathering his scattered battalions, found that he had lost 2,659
men; no ruinous loss to him,--the Enemy's being at least equal, and
all his Wounded fallen Prisoners of War. No ruinous loss to
Noailles, had it not been the loss of Victory,--which was a sore
blow to French feeling; and, adding itself to those Broglio
disgraces, a new discouragement to Most Christian Majesty.
Victory indisputably lost:--but is it not Grammont's blame
altogether? Grammont bears it, as we saw; and it is heavily laid on
him. But my own conjecture is, forty thousand enraged people, of
English and other Platt-Teutsch type, would have been very
difficult to pin up, into captivity or death instead of breakfast,
in that manner: and it is possible if poor Grammont had not
mistaken, some other would have done so, and the hungry Baresarks
(their blood fairly up, as is evident) would have ended in getting
through." [Espagnac, i. 193; Guerre de Boheme,
italic> i. 231.-- Gentleman's Magazine, vol.
xiii. (for 1743), pp. 328-481;--containing Carteret's Despatch from
the field; followed by many other Letters and indistinct Narrations
from Officers present (p. 434, "Plan of the Battle," blotchy,
indecipherable in parts, but essentially rather true),--is worth
examining. See likewise Anonymous, Memoirs of the late
Duke of Cumberland (Lond. 1767; the Author an
ignorant, much-adoring military-man, who has made some study, and
is not so stupid as he looks), pp. 56-78; and Henderson (ignorant
he too, much-adoring, and not military), Life of the Duke
of Cumberland (Lond. 1766), pp. 32-48. Noailles's
Official Account (ingenuously at a loss what to say), in
Campagnes, ii. B, 242-253, 306-310. OEuvres
de Frederic, iii. 11-14 (incorrect in many of
the DETAILS).
This was all the Fighting that King George got of his Pragmatic
Army; the gain from conquest made by it was, That it victoriously
struggled back to its bread-cupboard. Stair, about two months
hence, in the mere loitering and higgling that there was, quitted
the Pragmatic; magnanimously silent on his many wrongs and
disgusts, desirous only of "returning to the plough," as he
expressed himself. The lofty man; wanted several requisites for
being a Marlborough; wanted a Sarah Jennings, as the preliminary of
all!--We will not attend the lazy movements and procedures of the
Pragmatic Army farther; which were of altogether futile character,
even in the temporary Gazetteer estimate; and are to be valued at
zero, and left charitably in oblivion by a pious posterity. Stair,
the one brightish-looking man in it, being gone, there remain
Majesty with his D'Ahrembergs, Neippergs, and the Martial Boy;
Generals Cope, Hawley, Wade, and many of leaden character, remain:
--let the leaden be wrapped in lead.
It was not a successful Army, this Pragmatic. Dettingen itself, in
spite of the rumoring of Gazetteers and temporary persons, had no
result,--except the extremely bad one, That it inflated to an
alarming height the pride and belligerent humor of his Britannic,
especially of her Hungarian Majesty; and made Peace more difficult
than ever. That of getting Ostein, with his Austrian leanings,
chosen Kur-Mainz,--that too turned out ill: and perhaps, in the
course of the next few months, we shall judge that, had Ostein
leant AGAINST Austria, it had been better for Austria and Ostein.
Of the Pragmatic Army, silence henceforth, rather than speech!--
One thing we have to mark, his Britannic Majesty, commander of such
an Army,--and of such a Purse, which is still more stupendous,--has
risen, in the Gazetteer estimate and his own, to a high pitch of
importance. To be Supreme Jove of Teutschland, in a manner; and
acts, for the present Summer, in that sublime capacity.
Two Diplomatic feats of his,--one a Treaty done and tumbled down
again, the other a Treaty done and let stand ("Treaty of Worms,"
and "Conferences," or NON-Treaty "of Hanau"),--are of moment in
this History and that of the then World. Of these two Transactions,
due both of them to such an Army and such a Purse, we shall have to
take some notice by and by; the rest shall belong to Night and her
leaden sceptre--much good may they do her!
Some ten days after Dettingen, Broglio (who was crackling off from
Donauwurth, in view of the Lines of Schellenberg, that very 27th of
June) ended his retreat to the Rhine Countries; "glorious," though
rather swift, and eaten into by the Tolpatcheries of Prince Karl.
"July 8th, at Wimpfen" (in the Neckar Region, some way South of
Dettingen), Broglio delivers his troops to Marechal de Noailles's
care; and, next morning, rushes off towards Strasburg, and quiet
Official life, as Governor there.
"The day after his arrival," says Friedrich, "he gave a grand ball
in Strasburg:" [ OEuvres de Frederic,
iii. 10.] "Behold your conquering hero safe again, my friends!"
An ungrateful Court judged otherwise of the hero. Took his
Strasburg Government from him, gave it to Marechal de Coigny;
ordered the hero to his Estates in the Country, Normandy, if I
remember;--where he soon died of apoplexy, poor man; and will
trouble none of us again. "A man born for surprises," said
Friedrich long since, in the Strasburg Doggerel. Lost his
indispensable garnitures, at the Ford of Secchia once; and now, in
these last twelve months, is considered to have done a series of
blustery explosions, derogatory to the glory of France, and ruinous
to that sublime Belleisle Enterprise for oue thing.
A ruined Enterprise that, at any rate; seldom was Enterprise better
ruined. Here, under Broglio, amid the titterings of mankind, has
the tail of the Oriflamme gone the same bad road as its head did;--
into zero and outer darkness; leaving the expenses to pay. Like a
mad tavern-brawl of one's own raising, the biggest that ever was.
Has cost already, I should guess, some 80,000 French drilled Men,
paid down, on the nail, to the inexorable Fates: and of coined
Millions,--how many? In subsidies, in equipments, in waste, in loss
and wreck: Dryasdust could not have told me, had he tried. And then
the breakages, damages still chargeable; the probable afterclap?
For you cannot quite gratuitously tweak people by the nose, in your
wanton humor, over your wine!--One willing man, or Most Christian
Majesty, can at any time begin a quarrel; but there need always two
or more to end it again.
Most Christian Majesty is not so sensible of this fact as he
afterwards became; but what with Broglio and the extinct Oriflamme,
what with Dettingen and the incipient Pragmatic, he is heartily
disgusted and discouraged; and wishes he had not thought of cutting
Germany in Four. July 26th, Most Christian Majesty applies to the
German Diet; signifying "That he did indeed undertake to help the
Kaiser, according to treaties; but was the farthest in the world
from meaning to invade Germany, on his own score. That he had and
has no quarrel, except with Austria as Kaiser's enemy; and is ready
to be friends even with Austria. And now indeed intends to withdraw
his troops wholly from the German territory. And can therefore hope
that all unpleasantness will cease, between the German Nation and
him; and that perhaps the Kaiser will be able to make peace with
her Majesty of Hungary on softer terms than at one time seemed
likely. If only the animosities of sovereign persons would assuage
themselves, and each of us would look without passion at the issue
really desirable for him!" [Espagnac, i. 200. Adelung, iii. B, 199
(26th July); Ib. 201 (the Answer to it, 16th August).]
That is now, 26th July, 1743, King Louis's story for himself to the
Diet of the Holy Roman Empire, Teutsch by Nation, sitting at
Frankfurt in rather disconsolate circumstances. The Diet naturally
answered, "JA WOHL, JA WOHL," in intricate official language,--
nobody need know what the Diet answered. But what the Hungarian
Majesty answered, strong and high in such Britannic backing,--this
was of such unexpected tone, that it fixed everybody's attention;
and will very specially require to be noted by us, in the course of
a week or two.
We said, her Hungarian Majesty was getting crowned in Bohemia,
getting personally homaged in Upper Austria, about to get vice-
homaged in Bavaria itself,--nothing but glorious pomp, but loyalty
loudly vocal, in Prag, in Linz and the once-afflicted Countries;
at her return to Vienna, she has met the news of Dettingen; and is
ready to strike the stars with her sublime head. "My little Paladin
become Supreme Jove, too: aha!"
BRITANNIC MAJESTY HOLDS HIS CONFERENCES OF HANAU.
Britannic Majesty stayed two whole months in Hanau, brushing
himself up again after that fierce bout; and considering, with much
dubitation, What is the next thing? "Go in upon Noailles [who is
still hanging about here, with Broglio coming on in the exploded
state]; wreck Broglio and him! Go in upon the French!" so urges
Stair always: rash Stair, urgent to the edge of importunity;
English Officers and Martial Boy urgently backing Stair; while the
Hanoverian Officers and Martial Parent are steady to the other
view. So that, in respect of War, the next thing, for two months
coming, was absolutely nothing, and to the end of the Campaign was
nothing worth a moment's notice from us. But on the Diplomatic
side, there were two somethings, CONFERENCES AT HANAU with poor
Kaiser Karl, and TREATY AT WORMS with the King of Sardinia;
which--as minus quantities, or things less than nothing--turned out
to be highly considerable for his Britannic Majesty and us.
HANAU, 7th July-1st AUGUST, 1743. "Poor Kaiser Karl had left
Augsburg June 26th,--while his Broglio was ferrying at Donauworth,
and his Seckendorf treatying for Armistice at Nieder-Schonfeld,--
the very day before Dettingen. What a piece of news to him, that
Dettingen, on his return to Frankfurt!
"A few days after Dettingen, July 3d, Noailles, who is still within
call, came across to see this poor stepson of Fortune;
gives piteous account of him, if any one were now curious on that
head: How he bitterly complains of Broglio, of the no-subsidies
sent, and is driven nearly desperate;--not a penny in his pocket,
beyond all. Upon which latter clause Noailles munificently advanced
him a $6,000. 'Draught of 40,000 crowns, in my own name; which
doubtless the King, in his compassion, will see good to sanction.'
[ Campagnes de Noailles (Amsterdam, 1760:
this is a Sequel, or rather VICE VERSA, to that which we have
called DES TROIS MARECHAUX, being of the same Collection),
i. 316-328.] His feelings on the loss of Dettingen may be pictured.
But he had laid his account with such things;--prepared for the
worst, since that Interview with Broglio and Conti; one plan now
left, 'Peace, cost what it will!'
"The poor Kaiser had already, as we saw, got into hopes of
bargaining with his Britannic Majesty; and now he instantly sets
about it, while Hanau is victorious head-quarters. Britannic
Majesty is not himself very forward; but Carteret, I rather judge,
had taken up the notion; and on his Majesty's and Carteret's part,
there is actually the wish and attempt to pacificate the Reich;
to do something tolerable for the poor Kaiser, as well as
satisfactory to the Hungarian Majesty,--satisfactory, or capable of
being (by the Purse-holder) insisted on as such.
"And so the Landgraf of Hessen, excellent Wilhelm, King George's
friend and gossip, is come over to that little Town of Hanau, which
is his own, in the Schloss of which King George is lodged:
and there, between Carteret and our Landgraf,--the King of
Prussia's Ambassador (Herr Klinggraf), and one or two selectly
zealous Official persons, assisting or watching,--we have
'Conferences of Hanau' going on; in a zealous fashion; all parties
eager for Peace to Kaiser and Reich, and in good hope of bringing
it about. The wish, ardent to a degree, had been the Kaiser's first
of all. The scheme, I guess, was chiefly of Carteret's devising;
who, in his magnificent mind, regardless of expense, thinks it may
be possible, and discerns well what a stroke it will be for the
Cause of Liberty, and how glorious for a Britannic Majesty's
Adviser in such circumstances. July 7th, the Conferences began;
and, so frank and loyal were the parties, in a week's time matters
were advanced almost to completion, the fundamental outlines of a
bargain settled, and almost ready for signing.
"'Give me my Bavaria again!' the Kaiser had always said: 'I am Head
of the Reich, and have nothing to live upon!' On one preliminary,
Carteret had always been inexorable: 'Have done with your French
auxiliaries; send every soul of them home; the German soil once
cleared of them, much will be possible; till then nothing.'
KAISER: 'Well, give me back my Bavaria; my Bavaria, and something
suitable to live upon, as Head of the Reich: some decent Annual
Pension, till Bavaria come into paying condition,--cannot you, who
are so wealthy? And Bavaria might be made a Kingdom, if you wished
to do the handsome thing. I will renounce my Austrian Pretensions,
quit utterly my French Alliances; consent to have her Hungarian
Majesty's august Consort made King of the Romans [which means
Kaiser after me], and in fact be very safe to the House of Austria
and the Cause of Liberty.' To all this the thrice-unfortunate
gentleman, titular Emperor of the World, and unable now to pay his
milk-scores, is eager to consent. To continue crossing the Abysses
on bridges of French rainbow? Nothing but French subsidies to
subsist on; and these how paid,--Noailles's private pocket knows
how! 'I consent,' said the Kaiser; 'will forgive and forget, and
bygones shall be bygones all round!' 'Fair on his Imperial
Majesty's part,' admits Carteret; 'we will try to be persuasive at
Vienna. Difficult, but we will try.' In a meek matters had come to
this point; and the morrow, July 15th, was appointed for signing.
Most important of Protocols, foundation-stone of Peace to
Teutschland; King Friedrich and the impartial Powers approving,
with Britannic George and drawn sword presiding.
"King Friedrich approves heartily; and hopes it will do.
Landgraf Wilhelm is proud to have saved his Kaiser,--who so glad as
the Landgraf and his Kaiser? Carteret, too, is very glad;
exulting, as he well may, to have composed these world-deliriums,
or concentrated them upon peccant France, he with his single head,
and to have got a value out of that absurd Pragmatic Army, after
all. A man of magnificent ideas; who hopes 'to bring Friedrich over
to his mind;' to unite poor Teutschland against such Oriflamme
Invasions and intolerable interferences, and to settle the account
of France for a long while. He is the only English Minister who
speaks German, knows German situations, interests, ways; or has the
least real understanding of this huge German Imbroglio in which
England is voluntarily weltering. And truly, had Carteret been King
of England, which he was not,--nay, had King Friedrich ever got to
understand, instead of misunderstand, what Carteret WAS,--here
might have been a considerable affair!
"But it now, at the eleventh hour, came upon magnificent Carteret,
now seemingly for the first time in its full force, That he
Carteret was not the master; that there was a bewildered Parliament
at home, a poor peddling Duke of Newcastle leader of the same, with
his Lords of the Regency, who could fatally put a negative on all
this, unless they were first gained over. On the morrow, July 15th,
Carteret, instead of signing, as expected, has to--purpose a
fortnight's delay till he consult in England! Absolutely would not
and could not sign, till a Courier to England went and returned.
To Landgraf Wilhelm's, to Klinggraf's and the Kaiser's very great
surprise, disappointment and suspicion. But Carteret was
inflexible: 'will only take a fortnight,' said he; 'and I can hope
all will yet be well!'
"The Courier came back punctually in a fortnight. His Message was
presented at Hanau, August 1st,--and ran conclusively to the
effect: 'No! We, Noodle of Newcastle, and my other Lords of
Regency, do not consent; much less, will undertake to carry the
thing through Parliament: By no manner of means!' So that
Carteret's lately towering Affair had to collapse ignominiously, in
that manner; poor Carteret protesting his sorrow, his unalterable
individual wishes and future endeavors, not to speak of his
Britannic Majesty's,--and politely pressing on the poor Kaiser a
gift of 15,000 pounds (first weekly instalment of the 'Annual
Pension' that HAD, in theory, been set apart for him); which the
Kaiser, though indigent, declined. [Adelung, iii. B, 206, 209-212;
see Coxe, Memoirs of Pelham (London, 1829),
i. 75, 469.]'
"The disgust of Landgraf Wilhelm was infinite; who, honest man, saw
in all this merely an artifice of Carteret's, To undo the Kaiser
with his French Allies, to quirk him out of his poor help from the
French, and have him at their mercy. 'Shame on it!' cried Landgraf
Wilhelm aloud, and many others less aloud, Klinggraf and King
Friedrich among them: 'What a Carteret!' The Landgraf turned away
with indignation from perfidious England; and began forming quite
opposite connections. 'You shall not even have my hired 6,000, you
perfidious! Thing done with such dexterity of art, too!' thought
the Landgraf,--and continued to think, till evidence turned up,
after many months. [CARTERET PAPERS (in British Museum), Additional
MSS. No. 22,529 (May, 1743-January, 1745); in No. 22,527 (January-
September, 1742) are other Landgraf-Wilhelm pieces of
Correspondence.] This was Friedrich's opinion too,-- permanently, I
believe;--and that of nearly all the world, till the thing and the
Doer of the thing were contemptuously forgotten. A piece of
Machiavelism on the part of Carteret and perfidious Albion,--equal
in refined cunning to that of the Ships with foul bottom, which
vanished from Cadiz two years ago, and were admired with a shudder
by Continental mankind who could see into millstones!
"This is the second stroke of Machiavellian Art by those Islanders,
in their truly vulpine method. Stroke of Art important for this
History; and worth the attention of English readers,--being almost
of pathetic nature, when one comes to understand it! Carteret, for
this Hanau business, had clangor enough to undergo, poor man, from
Germans and from English; which was wholly unjust. 'His trade,' say
the English--(or used to say, till they forgot their considerable
Carteret altogether)--'was that of rising in the world by feeding
the mad German humors of little George; a miserable trade.' Yes, my
friends;--but it was not quite Carteret's, if you will please to
examine! And none say, Carteret did not do his trade, whatever it
was, with a certain greatness,--at least till habits of drinking
rather took him, Poor man: impatient, probably, of such fortune
long continued! For he was thrown out, next Session of Parliament,
by Noodle of Newcastle, on those strange terms; and never could get
in again, and is now forgotten; and there succeeded him still more
mournful phenomena,--said Noodle or the poor Pelhams, namely,--of
whom, as of strauge minus quantities set to manage our affairs,
there is still some dreary remembrance in England. Well!"--
Carteret, though there had been no Duke of Newcastle to run athwart
this fine scheme, would have had his difficulties in making her
Hungarian Majesty comply. Her Majesty's great heart, incurably
grieved about Silesia, is bent on having, if not restoration one
day, which is a hope she never quits, at any rate some ample
(cannot be too ample) equivalent elsewhere. On the Hanau scheme,
united Teutschland, with England for soul to it, would have fallen
vigorously on the throat of France, and made France disgorge:
Lorraine, Elsass, the Three Bishoprics,--not to think of Burgundy,
and earlier plunders from the Reich,--here would have been "cut and
come again" for her Hungarian Majesty and everybody!--But Diana, in
the shape of his Grace of Newcastle, intervenes; and all this has
become chimerical and worse.
It was while Carteret's courier was gone to England and not come
back, that King Louis made the above-mentioned mild, almost
penitent, Declaration to the Reich, "Good people, let us have
Peace; and all be as we were! I, for my share, wish to be out of
it; I am for home!" And, in effect, was already home;
every Frenchman in arms being, by this time, on his own side of the
Rhine, as we shall presently observe.
For, the same day, July 26th, while that was going on at Frankfurt,
and Carteret's return-courier was due in five days, his Britannic
Majesty at Hanau had a splendid visit,--tending not towards Peace
with France, but quite the opposite way. Visit from Prince Karl,
with Khevenhuller and other dignitaries; doing us that honor "till
the evening of the 28th." Quitting their Army,--which is now in
these neighborhoods (Broglio well gone to air ahead of it;
Noailles too, at the first sure sniff of it, having rushed double-
quick across the Rhine),--these high Gentlemen have run over to us,
for a couple of days, to "congratulate on Dettingen;" or, better
still, to consult, face to face, about ulterior movements. "Follow
Noailles; transfer the seat of war to France itself? These are my
orders, your Majesty. Combined Invasion of Elsass: what a slash may
be made into France [right handselling of your Carteret Scheme]
this very year!" "Proper, in every case!" answers the Britannic
Majesty; and engages to co-operate. Upon which Prince Karl--after
the due reviewing, dinnering, ceremonial blaring, which was
splendid to witness [Anonymous, Duke of Cumberland,
italic> pp. 65, 86.]--hastens back to his Army (now lying about
Baden Durlach, 70,000 strong); and ought to be swift, while the
chance lasts.
HUNGARIAN MAJESTY ANSWERS, IN THE DIET, THAT FRENCH DECLARATION,
"MAKE PEACE, GOOD PEOPLE; I WISH TO BE OUT OF IT!"--IN AN OMINOUS MANNER.
These are fine prospects, in the French quarter, of an equivalent
for Schlesien;--very fine, unless Diana intervene! Diana or not,
French prospects or not, her Hungarian Majesty fastens on Bavaria
with uncommon tightness of fist, now that Bavaria is swept clear;
well resolved to keep Bavaria for equivalent, till better come.
Exacts, by her deputy, Homage from the Population there;
strict Oath of Fealty to HER; poor Kaiser protesting his uttermost,
to no purpose; Kaiser's poor Printer (at Regensburg, which is in
Bavaria) getting "tried and hanged" for printing such Protest!
"She draughts forcibly the Bavarian militias into her Italian
Army;" is high and merciless on all hands;--in a word, throttles
poor Bavaria, as if to the choking of it outright. So that the very
Gazetteers in foreign places gave voice, though Bavaria itself,
such a grasp on the throat of it, was voiceless. Seckendorf's poor
Bargain for neutrality as a Bavarian Reich-Army, her Hungarian
Majesty disdains to confirm; to confirm, or even to reject;
treats Seckendorf and his Bavarian Army little otherwise than as a
stray dog which she has not yet shot. And truly the old
Feldmarschall lies at Wembdingen, in most disconsolate moulting
condition; little or nothing to live upon;--the English, generous
creatures, had at one time flung him something, fancying the
Armistice might be useful; but now it must be the French that do
it, if anybody! [Adelung, iii. B, 204 ("22d Angust"), 206, &c.]
Hanau Conferences having failed, these things do not fail.
Kaiser Karl is become tragical to think of. A spectacle of pity to
Landgraf Wilhelm, to King Friedrich, and serious on-lookers;--and
perhaps not of pity only, but of "pity and fear" to some of them!--
sullen Austria taking its sweet revenges, in this fashion.
Readers who will look through these small chinks, may guess what a
world-welter this was; and how Friedrich, gazing into phase on
phase of it, as into Oracles of Fate, which to him they were, had a
History, in these months, that will now never be known.
August 16th came out her Hungarian Majesty's Response to that mild
quasi-penitent Declaration of King Louis to the Reich; and much
astonished King Louis and others, and the very Reich itself.
"Out of it?" says her Hungarian Majesty (whom we with regret, for
brevity's sake, translate from Official into vulgate): "His Most
Christian Majesty wishes to be out of it:--Does not he, the (what
shall I call him) Crowned Housebreaker taken in the fact? You shall
get out of it, please Heaven, when you have made compensation for
the damage done; and till then not, if it please Heaven!" And in
this strain (lengthily Official, though indignant to a degree)
enumerates the wanton unspeakable mischiefs and outrages which
Austria, a kind of sacred entity guaranteed by Law of Nature and
Eleven Signatures of Potentates, has suffered from the Most
Christian Majesty,--and will have compensation for, Heaven now
pointing the way! [IN EXTENSO in Adelung, iii. B, 201 et seqq.]
A most portentous Document; full of sombre emphasis, in sonorous
snuffling tone of voice; enunciating, with inflexible purpose, a
number of unexpected things: very portentous to his Prussian
Majesty among others. Forms a turning-point or crisis both in the
French War, and in his Prussian Majesty's History; and ought to be
particularly noted and dated by the careful reader. It is here that
we first publicly hear tell of Compensation, the necessity Austria
will have of Compensation,--Austria does not say expressly for
Silesia, but she says and means for loss of territory, and for all
other losses whatsoever: "Compensation for the past, and security
for the future; that is my full intention," snuffles she, in that
slow metallic tone of hers, irrevocable except by the gods.
"Compensation for the past, Security for the future:" Compensation?
what does her Hungarian Majesty mean? asked all the world;
asked Friedrich, the now Proprietor of Silesia, with peculiar
curiosity! It is the first time her Hungarian Majesty steps
articulately forward with such extraordinary Claim of Damages, as
if she alone had suffered damage;--but it is a fixed point at
Vienna, and is an agitating topic to mankind in the coming months
and years. Lorraine and the Three Bishoprics; there would be a fine
compensation. Then again, what say you to Bavaria, in lieu of the
Silesia lost? You have Bavaria by the throat; keep Bavaria, you.
Give "Kur-Baiern, Kaiser as they call him," something in the
Netherlands to live upon? Will be better out of Germany altogether,
with his French leanings. Or, give him the Kingdom of Naples,--if
once we had conquered it again? These were actual schemes,
successive, simultaneous, much occupying Carteret and the high
Heads at Vienna now and afterwards; which came all to nothing;
but should were it not impossible, be held in some remembrance
by readers.
Another still more unexpected point comes out here, in this
singular Document, publicly for the first time: Austria's feelings
in regard to the Imperial Election itself. Namely, That Austria,
considers, and has all along considered, the said Election to be
fatally vitiated by that Exclusion of the Bohemian Vote; to be in
fact nullified thereby; and that, to her clear view, the present
so-called Kaiser is an imaginary quantity, and a mere Kaiser of
French shreds and patches! "DER SEYN-SOLLENDE KAISER," snuffles
Austria in one passage, "Your Kaiser as you call him;" and in
another passage, instead of "Kaiser," puts flatly "Kur-Baiern."
This is a most extraordinary doctrine to an Electoral Romish Reich!
Is the Holy Romish Reich to DECLARE itself an "Enchanted Wiggery,"
then, and do suicide, for behoof of Austria?--
"August 16th, this extraordinary Document was delivered to the
Chancery of Mainz; and September 23d, it was, contrary to
expectation, brought to DICTATUR by said Chancery,"--of which
latter phrase, and phenomenon, here is the explanation to
English readers.
Had the late Kur-Mainz (general Arch-Chairman, Speaker of the Diet)
been still in office and existence, certainly so shocking a
Document had never been allowed "to come to DICTATUR,"--to be
dictated to the Reich's Clerks; to have a first reading, as we
should call it; or even to lie on the table, with a theoretic
chance that way. But Austria, thanks to our little George and his
Pragmatic Armament, had got a new Kur-Mainz;--by whom, in open
contempt of impartiality, and in open leaning for Austria with all
his weight, it was duly forwarded to Dictature; brought before an
astonished Diet (REICHSTAG), and endlessly argued of in Reichstag
and Reich,--with small benefit to Austria, or the new Kur-Mainz.
Wise kindness to Austria had been suppression of this Piece, not
bringing of it to Dictature at all: but the new Kur-Mainz, called
upon, and conscious of face sufficient, had not scrupled.
"Shame on you, partial Arch-Chancellor!" exclaims all the world.--
"Revoke such shamefully partial Dictature?" this was the next
question brought before the Reich. In which, Kur-Hanover (Britannic
George) was the one Elector that opined, No. Majority conclusive;
though, as usual, no settle- ment attainable. This is the famous
"DICTATUR-SACHE (Dictature Question)," which rages on us, for about
eleven months to come, in those distracted old Books; and seems as
if it would never end. Nor is there any saying when it would have
ended;--had not, in August, 1744, something else ended, the King of
Prussia's patience, namely; which enabled it to end, on the
Kaiser's then order! [Adelung, iii. B, 201, iv. 198, &c.]
It must be owned, in general, the conduct of Maria Theresa to the
Reich, ever since the Reich had ventured to reject her Husband as
Kaiser, and prefer another, was all along of a high nature; till
now it has grown into absolute contumacy, and a treating of the
Reich's elected Kaiser as a merely chimerical personage. No law of
the Reich had been violated against her Hungarian Majesty or
Husband: "What law?" asked all judges. Vicarius Kur-Sachsen sat, in
committee, hatching for many months that Question of the Kur-Bohmen
Vote; and by the prescribed methods, brought it out in the
negative,--every formality and regularity observed, and nobody but
your Austrian Deputy protesting upon it, when requested to go home.
But, the high Maria had a notion that the Reich belonged to her
august Family and her; and that all Elections to the contrary were
an inconclusive thing, fundamentally void every one of them.
Thus too, long before this, in regard to the REICHS-ARCHIV
Question. The Archives and indispensablest Official Records and
Papers of the Reich,--these had lain so long at Vienna, the high
Maria could not think of giving them up. "So difficult to extricate
what Papers are Austrian specially, from what are Austrian-
Imperial;--must have time!" answered she always. And neither the
Kaiser's more and more pressing demands, nor those of the late
Kur-Mainz, backed by the Reich, and reiterated month after month
and year after year, could avail in the matter. Mere angry
correspondences, growing ever angrier;--the Archives of the Reich
lay irrecoverable at Vienna, detained on this pretext and on that:
nor were they ever given up; but lay there till the Reich itself
had ended, much more the Kaiser Karl VII.! These are
high procedures.
As if the Reich had been one's own chattel; as if a Non-Austrian
Kaiser mere impossible, and the Reich and its laws had, even
Officially, become phantasmal! That, in fact, was Maria Theresa's
inarticulate inborn notion; and gradually, as her successes on the
field rose higher, it became ever more articulate: till this of
"the SEYN-SOLLENDE Kaiser" put a crown on it. Justifiable, if the
Reich with its Laws were a chattel, or rebellious vassal, of
Austria; not justifiable otherwise. "Hear ye?" answered almost all
the Reich (eight Kurfursts, with the one exception of Kur-Hanover:
as we observed): "Our solemnly elected Kaiser, Karl VII., is a
thing of quirks and quiddities, of French shreds and patches;
at present, it seems, the Reich has no Kaiser at all; and will go
ever deeper into anarchies and unnamabilities, till it proceed anew
to get one,--of the right Austrian type!"--The Reich is a talking
entity: King Friedrich is bound rather to silence, so long as
possible. His thoughts on these matters are not given; but sure
enough they were continual, too intense they could hardly be.
"Compensation;" "The Reich as good as mine:" Whither is all this
tending? Walrave and those Silesian Fortifyings,--let Walrave mind
his work, and get it perfected!
BRITANNIC MAJESTY GOES HOME.
The "Combined Invasion of Elsass"--let us say briefly, overstepping
the order of date, and still for a moment leaving Friedrich--came
to nothing, this year. Prince Karl was 70,000; Britannic George
(when once those Dutch, crawling on all summer, had actually come
up) was 66,000,--nay 70,000; Karl having lent him that beautiful
cannibal gentleman, "Colonel Mentzel and 4,000 Tolpatches," by way
of edge-trimming. Karl was to cross in Upper Elsass, in the
Strasburg parts; Karl once across, Britannic Majesty was to cross
about Mainz, and co-operate from Lower Elsass. And they should have
been swift about it; and were not! All the world expected a severe
slash to France; and France itself had the due apprehension of it:
but France and all the world were mistaken, this time.
Prince Karl was slow with his preparations; Noailles and Coigny
(Broglio's successor) were not slow; "raising batteries
everywhere," raising lines, "10,000 Elsass Peasants," and what not;
--so that, by the time Prince Karl was ready (middle of August),
they lay intrenched and minatory at all passable points; and Karl
could nowhere, in that Upper-Rhine Country, by any method, get
across. Nothing got across; except once or twice for perhaps a day,
Butcher Trenck and his loose kennel of Pandours; who went about,
plundering and rioting, with loud rodomontade, to the admiration of
the Gazetteers, if of no one else.
Nor was George's seconding of important nature; most dubitative,
wholly passive, you would rather say, though the River, in his
quarter, lay undefended. He did, at last, cross the Rhine about
Mainz; went languidly to Worms,--did an ever-memorable TREATY OF
WORMS there, if no fighting there or elsewhere. Went to Speyer,
where the Dutch joined him (sadly short of numbers stipulated, had
it been the least matter);--was at Germersheim, at what other
places I forget; manoeuvring about in a languid and as if in an
aimless manner, at least it was in a perfectly ineffectual one.
Mentzel rode gloriously to Trarbach, into Lorraine; stuck up
Proclamation, "Hungarian Majesty come, by God's help, for her own
again," and the like;--of which Document, now fallen rare, we give
textually the last line: "And if any of you DON'T [don't sit quiet
at least], I will," to be brief, "first cut off your ears and
noses, and then hang you out of hand." The singular Champion of
Christendom, famous to the then Gazetteers! [In Adelung (iii. B,
193) the Proclamation at large. I have, or once had, a
Life of Mentzel (Dublin, I think, 1744), "price
twopence,"--dear at the money.] Nothing farther could George, with
his Dutch now adjoined, do in those parts, but wriggle slightly to
and fro without aim; or stand absolutely still, and eat provision
(great uncertainty and discrepancy among the Generals, and Stair
gone in a huff [Went, "August 27th, by Worms" (Henderson,
Life of Cumberlund, p. 48), just while his Majesty was
beginning to cross.]),--till at length the "Combined Pragmatic
Troops" returned to Mainz (October 11th); and thence, dreadfully in
ill-humor with each other, separated into their winter-quarters in
the Netherlands and adjacent regions.
Prince Karl tried hard in several places; hardest at, Alt-Breisach,
far up the River, with Swabian Freiburg for his place of arms;--an
Austrian Country all that, "Hithcr Austria," Swabian Austria.
There, at Alt-Breisach, lay Prince Karl (24th August-3d September),
his left leaning on that venerable sugar-loaf Hill, with the towers
and ramparts on the top of it; looking wistfully into Alsace, if
there were no way of getting at it. He did get once half-way across
the River, lodging himself in an Island called Rheinmark; but could
get no farther, owing to the Noailles-Coigny preparations for him.
Called a Council of War; decided that he had not Magazines, that it
was too late in the season; and marched home again (October 12th)
through the Schwabenland; leaving, besides the strong Garrison of
Freiburg, only Trenck with 12,000 Pandours to keep the Country open
for us, against next year. Britannic Majesty, as we observed, did
then, almost simultaneously, in like manner march home; [Adelung,
iii. B, 192, 215; Anonymous, Cumberland,
p. 121.]--one goal is always clear when the day sinks: Make for
your quarters, for your bed.
Prince Karl was gloriously wedded, this Winter, to her Hungarian
Majesty's young Sister;--glorious meed of War; and, they say, a
union of hearts withal;--Wife and he to have Brussels for
residence, and be "Joint-Governors of the Netherlands" henceforth.
Stout Khevenhuller, almost during the rejoicings, took fever, and
suddenly died; to the great sorrow of her Majesty, for loss of such
a soldier and man. [ Maria Theresiens Leben,
pp. 94, 45.] Britannic Majesty has not been successful with his
Pragmatic Army. He did get his new Kur-Mainz, who has brought the
Austrian Exorbitancy to a first reading, and into general view.
He did get out of the Dettingen mouse-trap; and, to the admiration
of the Gazetteer mind, and (we hope) envy of Most Christian
Majesty, he has, regardless of expense, played Supreme Jove on the
German boards for above three months running. But as to Settlement
of the German Quarrel, he has done nothing at all, and even a good
deal less! Let me commend to readers this little scrap of Note;
headed, "METHODS OF PACIFICATING GERMANY:--
1. There is one ready method of pacificating Germany: That his
Britannic Majesty should firmly button his breeches-pocket, 'Not
one sixpence more, Madam!'--and go home to his bed, if he find no
business waiting him at home. Has not he always the EAR-OF-JENKINS
Question, and the Cause of Liberty in that succinct form. But, in
Germany, sinews of war being cut, law of gravitation would at once
act; and exorbitant Hungarian Majesty, tired France, and all else,
would in a brief space of time lapse into equilibrium, probably of
the more stable kind.
2. Or, if you want to save the Cause of Liberty on a grand scale,
there are those HANAU CONFERENCES,--Carteret's magnificent scheme:
A united Teutschland (England inspiring it), to rush on the throat
of France, for 'Compensation,' for universal salving of sores.
This second method, Diana having intervened, is gone to water, and
even to poisoned water. So that,
3". There was nothing left for poor Carteret but a TREATY OF
WORMS (concerning which, something more explicit by and by):
A Teutschland (the English, doubly and trebly inspiring it, as
surely they will now need!) to rush as aforesaid, in the DISunited
and indeed nearly internecine state. Which third method--unless
Carteret can conquer Naples for the Kaiser, stuff the Kaiser into
some satisfactory 'Netherlands' or the like, and miraculously do
the unfeasible (Fortune perhaps favoring the brave)--may be called
the unlikely one! As poor Carteret probably guesses, or dreads;--
had he now any choice left. But it was love's last shift! And, by
aid of Diana and otherwise, that is the posture in which, at Mainz,
11th October, 1743, we leave the German Question."
"Compensation," from France in particular, is not to be had gratis,
it appears. Somewhere or other it must be had! Complaining once, as
she very often does, to her Supreme Jove, Hungarian Majesty had
written: "Why, oh, why did you force me to give up Silesia!"--
Supreme Jove answers (at what date I never knew, though Friedrich
knows it, and "has copy of the Letter"): "Madam, what was good to
give is good to take back (CC QUI EST BON A PRENDRE EST BON A
RENDRE)!" [ OEuvres de Frederic, iii. 27.]
Chapter VI.
VOLTAIRE VISITS FRIEDRICH FOR THE FOURTH TIME.
In the last days of August, there appears at Berlin M. de Voltaire,
on his Fourth Visit:--thrice and four times welcome; though this
time, privately, in a somewhat unexpected capacity. Come to try his
hand in the diplomatic line; to sound Friedrich a little, on behalf
of the distressed French Ministry. That, very privately indeed, is
Voltaire's errand at present; and great hopes hang by it for
Voltaire, if he prove adroit enough.
Poor man, it had turned out he could not get his Academy Diploma,
after all,--owing again to intricacies and heterodoxies. King Louis
was at first willing, indifferent; nay the Chateauroux was willing:
but orthodox parties persuaded his Majesty; wicked Maurepas (the
same who lasted till the Revolution time) set his face against it;
Maurepas, and ANC. de Mirepoix (whom they wittily call "ANE" or Ass
of Mirepoix, that sour opaque creature, lately monk), were
industrious exceedingly; and put veto on Voltaire. A stupid Bishop
was preferred to him for filling up the Forty. Two Bishops
magnanimously refused; but one was found with ambitious stupidity
enough: Voltaire, for the third time, failed in this small matter,
to him great. Nay, in spite of that kiss in MEROPE, he could not
get his MORT DE CESAR acted; cabals rising; ANCIEN de Mirepoix
rising; Orthodoxy, sour Opacity prevailing again. To Madame and him
(though finely caressed in the Parisian circles) these were
provoking months;--enough to make a man forswear Literature, and
try some other Jacob's-Ladder in this world. Which Voltaire had
actual thoughts of, now and then. We may ask, Are these things of a
nature to create love of the Hierarchy in M. de Voltaire?
"Your Academy is going to be a Seminary of Priests," says
Friedrich. The lynx-eyed animal,--anxiously asking itself,
"Whitherward, then, out of such a mess?"--walks warily about, with
its paws of velvet; but has, IN POSSE, claws under them, for
certain individuals and fraternities.
Nor, alas, is the Du Chatelet relation itself so celestial as it
once was. Madame has discovered, think only with what feelings,
that this great man does not love her as formerly! The great man
denies, ready to deny on the Gospels, to her and to himself;
and yet, at bottom, if we read with the microscope, there are
symptoms, and it is not deniable. How should it? Leafy May, hot
June, by degrees comes October, sere, yellow; and at last, a quite
leafless condition,--not Favonius, but gray Northeast, with its
hail-storms (jealousies, barren cankered gusts), your main wind
blowing. "EMILIE FAIT DE L'ALGEBRE," sneers he once, in an
inadvertent moment, to some Lady-friend: "Emilie doing? Emilie is
doing Algebra; that is Emilie's employment,--which will be of great
use to her in the affairs of Life, and of great charm in Society."
[Letter of Voltaire "To Madame Chambonin," end of 1742
( OEuvres, Edition in 40 vols., Paris, 1818,
xxxii. 148);--is MISSED in the later Edition (97 vols., Paris,
1837), to which our habitual reference is.] Voltaire (if you read
with the microscope) has, on this side also, thoughts of being off.
"Off on this side?" Madame flies mad, becomes Megaera, at the
mention or suspicion of it! A jealous, high-tempered Algebraic
Lady. They have had to tell her of this secret Mission to Berlin;
and she insists on being the conduit, all the papers to pass
through her hands here at Paris, during the great man's absence.
Fixed northeast; that is, to appearance, the domestic wind blowing!
And I rather judge, the great man is glad to get away for a time.
This Quasi-Diplomatic Speculation, one perceives, is much more
serious, on the part both of Voltaire and of the Ministry, than any
of the former had been. And, on Voltaire's part, there glitter
prospects now and then of something positively Diplomatic, of a
real career in that kind, lying ahead for him. Fond hopes these!
But among the new Ministers, since Fleury's death, are Amelot, the
D'Argensons, personal friends, old school-fellows of the poor
hunted man, who are willing he should have shelter from such a
pack; and all French Ministers, clutching at every floating spar,
in this their general shipwreck in Germany, are aware of the uses
there might be in him, in such crisis. "Knows Friedrich;
might perhaps have some power in persuading him,--power in spying
him at any rate. Unless Friedrich do step forward again, what is to
become of us!"--The mutual hintings, negotiatings, express
interviews, bargainings and secret-instructions, dimly traceable in
Voltaire's LETTERS, had been going on perhaps since May last, time
of those ACADEMY failures, of those Broglio Despatches from the
Donau Countries, "No staying here, your Majesty!"--and I think it
was, in fact, about the time when Broglio blew up like gunpowder
and tumbled home on the winds, that Voltaire set out on his
mission. "Visit to Friedrich," they call it;--"invitation" from
Friedrich there is, or can, on the first hint, at any point of the
Journey be.
Voltaire has lingered long on the road; left Paris, middle of June;
[His Letters ( OEuvres, lxxiii. 42, 48).] but
has been exceedingly exerting himself, in the Hague, at Brussels,
and wherever else present, in the way of forwarding his errand,
Spying, contriving, persuading; corresponding to right and left,--
corresponding, especially much, with the King of Prussia himself,
and then with "M. Amelot, Secretary of State," to report progress
to the best advantage. There are curious elucidative sparks, in
those Voltaire Letters, chaotic as they are; small sparks,
elucidative, confirmatory of your dull History Books, and adding
traits, here and there, to the Image you have formed from them.
Yielding you a poor momentary comfort; like reading some riddle of
no use; like light got incidentally, by rubbing dark upon dark (say
Voltaire flint upon Dryasdust gritstone), in those labyrinthic
catacombs, if you are doomed to travel there. A mere weariness,
otherwise, to the outside reader, hurrying forward,--to the light
French Editor, who can pass comfortably on wings or balloons!
[ OEuvres, lxxiii. pp. 40-138. Clogenson, a
Dane (whose Notes, signed "Clog.," are in all tolerable recent
Editions), has, alone among the Commentators of Voltaire's LETTERS,
made some real attempt towards explaining the many passages that
are fallen unintelligible. "Clog.," travelling on foot, with his
eyes open, is--especially on German-History points--incomparable
and unique, among his French comrades going by balloon; and drops a
rational or half-rational hint now and then, which is meritoriously
helpful. Unhappily he is by no means well-read in that German
matter, by no means always exact; nor indeed ever quite to be
trusted without trial had.] Voltaire's assiduous finessings with
the Hague Diplomatist People, or with their Secretaries if
bribable; nay, with the Dutch Government itself ("through channels
which I have opened,"--with infinitesimally small result); his
spyings ("young Podewils," Minister here, Nephew of the Podewils we
have known, "young Podewils in intrigue with a Dutch Lady of rank:"
think of that, your Excellency); his preparatory subtle
correspondings with Friedrich: his exquisite manoeuvrings, and
really great industries in the small way:--all this, and much else,
we will omit. Impatient of these preludings, which have been many!
Thus, at one point, Voltaire "took a FLUXION" (catarrhal, from the
nose only), when Friedrich was quite ready; then, again, when
Voltaire was ready, and the fluxion off, Friedrich had gone upon
his Silesian Reviews: in short, there had been such cross-purposes,
tedious delays, as are distressing to think of;--and we will say
only, that M. de Voltaire did actually, after the conceivable
adventures, alight in the Berlin Schloss (last day of August, as I
count); welcomed, like no other man, by the Royal Landlord there;
--and that this is the Fourth Visit; and has (in strict privacy)
weightier intentions than any of the foregoing, on M. de
Voltaire's part.
Voltaire had a glorious reception; apartment near the King's;
King gliding in, at odd moments, in the beautifulest way; and for
seven or eight days, there was, at Berlin and then at Potsdam, a
fine awakening of the sphere-harmonies between them, with touches
of practicality thrown in as suited. Of course it was not long
till, on some touch of that latter kind, Friedrich discerned what
the celestial messenger had come upon withal;--a dangerous moment
for M. de Voltaire, "King visibly irritated," admits he, with the
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