History of Friedrich II of Prussia — Volume 21

Schmettau says, "Friedrich, cheated of his Mahren schemes, was still in time; the Austrian position being indeed strong, but not being even yet quite ready." Friedrich himself, however, on reconnoitring, thought differently. A position such as one never saw before, thinks he; contrived by Lacy; masterly use of the ground, of the rivers, of the rocks, woods, swamps; Elbe and his branches, and the intricate shoulders of the Giant Mountains: no man could have done it better than Lacy here, who, they say, is the contriver and practical hand. [OEuvres de Frederic, vi. 147.] From Konigsgratz, northward, by Konigshof, by Arnau, up to Hohenelbe, all heights are crowned, all passes bristling with cannon. Rivers Aupa, Elbe beset with redoubts, with dams in favorable places, and are become inundations, difficult to tap. There are "ditches 8 feet deep by 16 broad." Behind or on the right bank of Elbe, it is mere intrenchment for five-and-twenty miles. With bogs, with thickets full of Croats; and such an amount of artillery,—I believe they have in battery no fewer than 1,500 cannon. A position very considerable indeed:—must have taken time to deliberate, delve and invest; but it is done. Near fifty miles of it: here, clear to your glass, has the head of Lacy visibly emerged on us, as if for survey of phenomena:—head of Lacy sure enough (body of him lying invisible in the heights, passes and points of vantage); and its NECK of fifty miles, like the neck of a war-horse clothed with thunder. On which (thinks Schmettau privately) you may, too late, make your reflections!

Schmettau asserts that the position, though strong, was nothing like so infinitely strong; and that Friedrich in his younger days would very soon have assaulted it, and turned Lacy inside out: but Friedrich, we know, had his reasons against hurry. He reconnoitred diligently; rode out reconnoitring "fifteen miles the first day" (July 6th), ditto the second and following; and was nearly shot by Croats,—by one specific Croat, says Prussian Mythology, supported by Engraving. An old Engraving, which I have never seen; represents Friedrich reconnoitring those five-and-twenty miles of Elbe, which have so many redoubts on their side of it, and swarm with Croat parties on both sides: this is all the truth that is in the Engraving. [Rodenbeck, p. 188.] Fact says: Friedrich ("on the 8th," if that were all the variation) "was a mark for the Austrian sharpshooters for half an hour." Myth says, and engraves it, with the date of "July 7th:" Friedrich, skirting some thicket, suddenly came upon a single Croat with musket levelled at him, wild creature's finger just on the trigger;—and quietly admonishing, Friedrich lifts his finger with a "DU, DU (Ah you!);" upon which, such the divinity that hedges one, the wild creature instantly flings down his murder-weapon, and, kneeling, embraces the King's boot,—with kisses, for anything I know. It is certain, Friedrich, about six times over in this paltry War or Quasi No-War, set his attendants on the tremble; was namely, from Croateries and Artilleries, in imminent peril of life; so careless was he, and dangerous to speak to in his sour humor. Humor very sour, they say, for most part; being in reality altogether backward and loath for grand enterprise; and yet striving to think he was not; ashamed that any War of his should be a No-War. Schmettau says:—

"On the day of getting into Jaromirtz [July 8th], the King, tired of riding about while the Columns were slowly getting in, lay down on the ground with his Adjutants about him. A young Officer came riding past; whom the King beckoned to him;—wrote something with pencil (an Order, not of the least importance), and said: 'Here; that Order to General Lossow, and tell him he is not to take it ill that I trouble him, as I have none in my Suite that can do anything.'" Let the Suite take it as they can! A most pungent, severe old King; quite perverse at times, thinks Schmettau. Thus again, more than once.:—

"On arriving with his Column where the Officer, a perfectly skilful man, had marked out the Camp, the King would lift his spy-glass; gaze to right and left, riding round the place at perhaps a hundred yards' distance; and begin: 'SIEHT ER, HERR, But look, Herr, what a botching you have made of it again (WAS ER DA WIEDER FUR DUMM ZEUG GEMACHT HAT)!' and grumbling and blaming, would alter the Camp, till it was all out of rule; and then say, 'See there, that is the way to mark out Camps.'" [Schmettau, xxv. 30, 24.]

In a week's time, July 13th, came another fine excuse for inaction; Plenipotentiary Thugut, namely, and the Kaiserinn's Letter, which we spoke of. Autograph from Maria Theresa herself, inspired by the terror of Vienna and of her beautiful motherly heart. Negotiation to be private utterly: "My Son, the Kaiser, knows nothing of it; I beg the most absolute secrecy;" which was accordingly kept, while Thugut, with Finkenstein and Hertzberg again, held "Congress of Braunau" in those neighborhoods,—with as little effect as ever. Thugut's Name, it seems, was originally TUNICOTTO (Tyrolese-Italian); which the ignorant Vienna people changed into "THU-NICHT-GUT (Do-no-good)," till Maria Theresa, in very charity, struck out the negative, and made him "Do-good." Do-good and his Congress held Friedrich till August 10th: five more weeks gone; and nothing but reconnoitring,—with of course foraging, and diligently eating the Country, which is a daily employment, and produces fencing and skirmishing enough.

Henri, in the interim, has invaded from the West; seen Leitmeritz, Lobositz;—Prag Nobility all running, and I suppose Prayers to St. Titus going again,—and Loudon in alarm. Loudon, however, saved Prag "by two masterly positions" (not mentionable here); upon which Henri took camp at Niemes; Loudon, the weaker in this part, seizing the Iser as a bulwark, and ranking himself behind it, back-to-back of Lacy. Here for about five weeks sat Henri, nothing on hand but to eat the Country. Over the heads of Loudon and Lacy, as the crow flies, Henri's Camp may be about 70 miles from Jaromirtz, where the King is. Hussar Belling, our old Anti-Swede friend, a brilliant cutting man, broke over the Iser once, perhaps twice; and there was pretty fencing by him and the like of him: "but Prince Henri did nothing," says the King, [OEuvres de Frederic, vi. 154]—was, in fact, helping the King to do nothing. By the 10th of September, as Henri has computed, this Country will be eaten; "Forage, I find, will be quite done here on September 10th," writes Henri, after a week or two's experience.

There was always talk of Henri and the King, who are 100,000 each, joining hands by the post of Arnau, or some weak point of Lacy's well north of Konigsgratz; thus of cutting off the meal-carts of that back-to-back copartnery, and so of tumbling it off the ground (which was perfectly possible, says Schmettau); and small detachments and expeditious were pushed out, General Dahlwig, General Anhalt, partly for that object: but not the least of it ever took effect. "Futile, lost by loitering, as all else was," groans Schmettau. Prince Henri was averse to attempt, intimates the King,—as indeed (though refusing to own it) was I. "September 10th, my forage will be out, your Majesty," says Henri, always a punctual calculating man.

The Austrians, on their side, were equally stagnant; and, except the continual skirmishing with the Prussian foragers, undertook nothing. "Shamefully ill-clone our foraging, too," exclaims Schmettau again and again: "Had we done it with neatness, with regularity, the Country would have lasted us twice as long. Doing it headlong, wastefully and by the rule-of-thumb, the Country was a desert, all its inhabitants fled, all its edibles consumed, before six weeks were over. Friedrich is not now himself at all; in great things or in little; what a changed Friedrich!" exclaims Schmettau, with wearisome iteration.

From about August 6th, or especially August 10th, when the Maria-Theresa Correspondence, or "Congress of Braunau," ended likewise in zero, Friedrich became impatient for actual junction with Prince Henri, actual push of business; and began to hint of an excellent plan he had: "Burst through on their left flank; blow up their post of Hohenelbe yonder: thence is but one march to Iser river; junction with Prince Henri there; and a Lacy and a Loudon tumbled to the winds." "A plan perfectly feasible," says Schmettau; "which solaced the King's humor, but which he never really intended to execute." Possibly not; otherwise, according to old wont, he would have forborne to speak of it beforehand. At all events, August 15th, in the feeling that one ought really to do something, the rather as forage hereabouts was almost or altogether running out, he actually set about this grand scheme.

Got on march to rightward, namely, up the Aupa river, through the gloomy chasms of Kingdom-Wood, memorable in old days: had his bakery shifted to Trautenau; his heavy cannon getting tugged through the mire and the rains, which by this time were abundant, towards Hohenelbe, for the great enterprise: and sat encamped on and about the Battle-ground of Sohr for a week or so, waiting till all were forward; eating Sohr Country, which was painfully easy to do. The Austrians did next to nothing on him; but the rains, the mud and scarcity were doing much. Getting on to Hohenelbe region, after a week's wet waiting, he, on ocular survey of the ground about, was heard to say, "This cannot be done, then!" "Had never meant to do it," sneers Schmettau, "and only wanted some excuse." Which is very likely. Schmettau gives an Anecdote of him here: In regard to a certain Hill, the Key of the Austrian position, which the King was continually reconnoitring, and lamenting the enormous height of, "Impossible, so high!" One of the Adjutants took his theodolite, ascertained the height, and, by way of comforting his Majesty, reported the exact number of feet above their present level. "How do YOU know, Herr?" said the King angrily. "Measured it by Trigonometry, your Majesty."—"Trigonometry! SCHER' ER SICH ZUM TEUFEL (Off with you, Sir, to the Devil, your Trigonometry and you!)"—no believer in mathematics, this King.

He was loath to go; and laid the blame on many things. "Were Prince Henri now but across the Iser. Had that stupid Anhalt, when he was upon it [galloping about, to the ruin of his head], only seized Arnau, Arnau and its Elbe-Bridge; and had it in hand for junction with Prince Henri!" In fine, just as the last batch of heavy cannon—twenty or thirty hungered horses to a gun, at the rate of five miles a day in roads unspeakable—were getting in, he ordered them all to be dragged back, back to the Trautenau road; whither we must now all go. And, SEPTEMBER 8th, in perfect order, for the Austrians little molested him, and got a bad bargain when they did, the great Friedrich with his whole Army got on march homeward, after such a Campaign as we see. Climbed the Trautenau-Landshut Pass, with nothing of effective loss except from the rainy elements, the steep miry ways and the starved horses; draught-horses especially starved,—whom, poor creatures, "you would see spring at the ropes [draught-harness], thirty of them to a gun, when started and gee-ho'd to; tug violently with no effect, and fall down in whole rows."

Prince Henri, forage done, started punctually September 10th, two days after his Brother; and with little or no pursuit, from the Austrians, and with horses unstarved, got home in comparatively tolerable circumstances. Cantoned himself in Dresden neighborhood, and sat waiting: he had never approved this War; and now, I suppose, would not want for reflections. Friedrich's cantonments were round Landshut, and spread out to right and to left, from Glatz Country and the Upper-Silesian Hills, to Silberberg and Schweidnitz;—his own quarter is the same region, where he lay so long in Summer, 1759, talking on learned subjects with the late Quintus Icilius, if readers remember, and wearily waiting till Cunctator Daun (likewise now deceased) took his stand, or his seat, at Mark Lissa, and the King could follow him to Schmottseifen. Friedrich himself on this present occasion stayed at Schatzlar as rear-guard, to see whether the Austrians would not perhaps try to make some Winter Campaign of it, and if so, whether they would attempt on Prince Henri or on him. The Austrians did not attempt on either; showed no such intention,—though mischievous enough in other small ways. Friedrich wrote the ELOGE of Voltaire [OEuvres de Frederic, vii. 50 et seq. ("finished Nov. 26th, 1778").] while he waited here at Schatzlar, among the rainy Mountains. Later on, as prospects altered, he was much at Breslau, or running about on civic errands with Breslau as centre: at Breslau he had many Dialogues with Professor Garve,—in whose good, but oppressively solemn, little Book, more a dull-droning Preachment than a Narrative, no reader need look for them or for him.

As to the EULOGY OF VOLTAIRE, we may say that it is generous, ingenious, succinct; and of dialect now obsolete to us. There was (and is, though suppressed) another EULOGY, brand-new, by a Contemporary of our own,—from which I know not if readers will permit me a sentence or two, in this pause among the rainy Mountains?

"A wonderful talent lay in this man—[in Voltaire, to wit; "such an intellect, the sharpest, swiftest of the world," thinks our Contemporary; "fathoming you the deepest subject, to a depth far beyond most men's soundings, and coming up with victory and something wise and logically speakable to say on it, sooner than any other man,—never doubting but he has been at the bottom, which is from three to ten miles lower!"] wonderful talent; but observe always, if you look closely, it was in essence a mere talent for Speech; which talent Bavius and Maevius and the Jew Apella may admire without looking behind it, but this Eulogist by no means will. Speech, my friend? If your sublime talent of speech consists only in making ignorance appear to be knowledge, and little wisdom appear to be much, I will thank you to walk on with it, and apply at some other shop. The QUANTITY of shops where you can apply with thrice-golden advantage, from the Morning Newspapers to the National Senate, is tremendous at this epoch of the poor world's history;—go, I request you! And while his foot is on the stairs, descending from my garret, I think: O unfortunate fellow-creature in an unfortunate world, why is not there a Friedrich Wilhelm to 'elect' you, as he did Gundling, to his TOBACCO Parliament, and there set Fassmann upon you with the pans of burning peat? It were better even for yourself; wholesomely didactic to your poor self, I cannot doubt; and for the poor multitudes to whom you are now to be sacred VATES, speaking and singing YOUR dismal GUNDLINGIANA as if inspired by Heaven, how infinitely better!—Courage, courage! I discern, across these hideous jargons, the reign of greater silence approaching upon repentant men; reign of greater silence, I say; or else that of annihilation, which will be the most silent of all....

"Voltaire, if not a great man, is a remarkably peculiar one; and did such a work in these Ages as will render him long memorable, more or less. He kindled the infinite dry dung-heap of things; set it blazing heaven-high;—and we all thought, in the French Revolution time, it would burn out rapidly into ashes, and then there would a clear Upper Firmament, if over a blackened Earth, be once more vouchsafed us. The flame is now done, as I once said; and only the dull dung-heap, smokily burning, but not now blazing, remains,—for it was very damp, EXCEPT on the surface, and is by nature slow of combustion:—who knows but it may have to burn for centuries yet, poisoning by its villanous mal-odors the life-atmosphere of all men? Eternal Author of this Universe, whose throne is Truth, to whom all the True are Sons, wilt thou not look down upon us, then!—Till this sad process is complete? Voltaire is like to be very memorable."...

To Friedrich the Winter was in general tranquil; a Friedrich busy preparing all things for his grand Mahren Enterprise, and for "real work next year." By and by there came to be real Peace-prospects instead. Meanwhile, the Austrians do try a little, in the small Pandour way, to dislodge him from the Upper-Silesian or Teschen regions, where the Erbprinz of Brunswick is in command; a man not to be pricked into gratis by Pandours. Erbprinz, accordingly, provoked by their Pandourings, broke out at last; and about Zuckmantel instantly scourged them home, and had peace after. Foiled here, they next tried upon Glatz; "Get into his Glatz Country, then;—a snatch of that will balance the account" (which was one of Newspaper glory only): and a certain Wurmser of theirs, expert in such things, did burn the Town of Habelschwert one morning; ["18th January, 1779" (Rodenbeck, iii. 195; Schmettau, &c.).] and tried farther, not wisely this time, a surprisal of Glatz Fortress itself; but got smitten home by our old friend General Wunsch, without profit there. This was the same Wurmser who came to bad issues in the Napoleon time afterwards; a rising man then; not a dim Old-Newspaper ghost as now.

Most shameful this burning of Habelschwert by way of mere bravura, thinks Friedrich, in a time of actual Treaty for Peace, when our Congress of Teschen was just struggling to get together! It was the chief stroke done by the Austrians in this War; glorious or shameful, we will not think of inquiring. Nor in fact of adding one word more on such a War,—except, what everybody longs for, That, NOVEMBER 27th, 1778, Czarina Catharine, by her Prince Galitzin at Vienna, intervened in the matter, in a lofty way; and ended it. Czarina Catharine,—small thanks to her, it seems, for it was Friedrich that by his industries and world-diplomacies, French and other, had got her Turks, who had been giving trouble again, compesced into peace for her; and indeed, to Friedrich or his interests, though bound by Treaty, she had small regard in taking this step, but wished merely to appear in German Politics as a She-Jove,—Czarina Catharine signified, in high and peremptory though polite Diplomatic terms, at Vienna, "Imperial Madam, how long is such a War to last? Be at Peace, both of you; or—! I shall, however, mediate, if you like, being the hearty friend of both." [Copy of Galitzin's "Declaration," in FISCHER, ii. 406-411.]

"Do," answers Maria Theresa, whose finance is quite out, whose motherly heart is almost broken, though a young Kaiser still prances violently, and kicks against the pricks: "Do, your noble Czarish Majesty; France too is interfering: France and you will decide what is just, and we will end." "Congress of Teschen" met accordingly, MARCH 10th, 1779: Teschen, in Austrian Silesia, where we have been;—Repnin as Russian, Breteuil the Frenchman, Cobentzl and Hertzberg as Austrian and Prussian;—and, MAY 13th (in two months' time, not in two weeks', as had been expected, for there rose unexpected haggles), did close everything, firm as Diplomacy could do it, into equitable, or approximately equitable finis: "Go home, you Austria; quit your stolen Bavaria (all but a rim or paring, Circle of Burghausen, since you must have something!): Saxony, Mecklenburg, these must be satisfied to moderate length; and therewith general AS-YOU-WERE."

Russia and France were agreed on the case; and Friedrich, bitterly longing to have done with it, had said to himself, "In two weeks or so:" but it proved far otherwise. Never were such hagglings, provocations and unreasonable confusions as now rose. The burning of Habelschwert was but a type of them. Haggles on the part of worthless Karl Theodor, kindled by Joseph and his Kaunitz, kicking against the pricks. Haggles on Saxony's part: "I claimed 7,000,000 pounds sterling, and you allow me 600,000 pounds." "Better that than nothing," answered Friedrich. Haggles with Mecklenburg: "Instead of my Leuchtenberg, I get an improvement in my Law-Courts, right of Judging without Appeal; what is that!" Haggles with the once grateful Duke of Zweibruck: "Can't part with my Burghausen." "Suppose you had had to part with your Bavaria altogether?" In short, Friedrich, who had gained nothing for himself, but such infinity of outlay in all kinds, never saw such a coil of human follies and cupidities before; and had to exhaust his utmost patience, submit to new losses of his own, and try all his dexterities in pig-driving: overjoyed, at last, to get out of it on any terms. Outlay of Friedrich is about Two Millions sterling, and above 10,000 men's lives (his own narrowly not included), with censures, criticisms, provocations and botherations without end. In return for which, he has, truly, put a spoke in Austria's proud wheel for this time, and managed to see fair play in the Reich; which had seemed to him, and seems, a considerable thing. By way of codicil, Austria agrees not to chicane him in regard to Anspach-Baireuth,—how generous of Austria, after this experience!—

In reality, the War was an Imaginary War; deserving on its own score little record anywhere; to readers here requiring almost less than it has got. Schmettau, Schoning and others have been abundantly minute upon it; but even to soldiers there is little either of interest or instruction; to us, all it yields is certain Anecdotes of Friedrich's temper and ways in that difficult predicament; which, as coming at first-hand, gathered for us by punctual authentic Schmettau, who was constantly about him, with eyes open and note-book ready, have a kind of worth in the Biographic point of view.

The Prussian Soldiery, of whom we see a type in Schmettau, were disgusted with this War, and called it, in allusion to the foraging, A scramble for potatoes, "DER KARTOFFEL-KRIEG, The Potato War;" which is its common designation to this day. The Austrians, in a like humor, called it "ZWETSCHKEN-RUMMEL" (say "THREE-BUTTON Loo"); a game not worth playing; especially not at such cost. Combined cost counted to have been in sum-total 4,350,000 pounds and 20,000 men. [Preuss, iv. 115.] "The Prussian Army was full of ardor, never abler for fight" (insists Schmettau), which indeed seems to have been the fact on every small occasion;—"but fatally forbidden to try." Not so fatally perhaps, had Schmettau looked beyond his epaulettes: was not the thing, by that slow method, got done? By the swifter method, awakening a new Seven-Years business, how infinitely costlier might it have been!

Schmettau's NARRATIVE, deducting the endless lamentings, especially the extensive didactic digressions, is very clear, ocular, exact; and, in contrast with Friedrich's own, is really amusing to read. A Schmettau giving us, in his haggard light and oblique point of vision, the naked truth, NAKED and all in a shiver; a Friedrich striving to drape it a little, and make it comfortable to himself. Those bits of Anecdotes in SCHMETTAU, clear, credible, as if we had seen them, are so many crevices through which it is curiously worth while to look.

Chapter VII.—MILLER ARNOLD'S LAWSUIT

About the Second Law-Reform, after reading and again reading much dreary detail, I can say next to nothing, except that it is dated as beginning in 1776, near thirty years after Cocceji's; ["In 1748" Cocceji's was completed; "in 1774-1775," on occasion of the Silesian Reviews, Von Carmer, Chancellor of Silesia, knowing of the King's impatience at the state of Law, presented successively Two MEMORIALS on the subject; the Second of which began "4th January, 1776" to have visible fruit.] that evidently, by what causes is not stated, but may be readily enough conjectured (in the absence of Cocceji by death, and of a Friedrich by affairs of War), the abuses of Law had again become more or less unendurable to this King; that said abuses did again get some reform (again temporary, such the Law of Nature, which bids you sweep vigorously your kitchen, though it will next moment recommence the gathering of dirt upon it); and that, in fine, after some reluctance in the Law circles, and debating PRO and CONTRA, oral some of it, and done in the King's presence, who is so intent to be convinced and see his practical way in it, [At Potsdam, "4th January, 1776," Debate, by solemn appointment, in the King's presence (King very unwell), between Silesian-Chancellor von Carmer and Grand-Chancellor von Furst, as to the feasibility of Carmer's ideas; old Furst strong in the negative;—King, after reflection, determining to go on nevertheless. (Rodenbeck, iii. 131, 133.)]—there was, as supplement to the mere Project or Theory of a CODEX FREDERICIANUS in Cocceji's time, an actual PRUSSIAN CODE set about; Von Carmer, the Silesian Chancellor, the chief agent: and a First Folio, or a First and partly a Second of it, were brought out in Friedrich's lifetime, the remainder following in that of his Successor; which Code is ever since the Law of the Prussian Nation to this day. [Not finished and promulgated till "5th February, 1794;" First Volume (containing PROZESS-ORDNUNG, Form of Procedure, in all its important details) had come out "26th April, 1784" (Preuss, iii. 418-422).] Of its worth as a Code I have heard favorable opinions, comparatively favorable; but can myself say nothing: famed Savigny finds it superior in intelligence and law-knowledge to the CODE NAPOLEON,—upon which indeed, and upon all Codes possible to poor hag-ridden and wig-ridden generations like ours, Savigny feels rather desperate. Unfortunate mortals do want to have their bits of lawsuits settled, nevertheless; and have, on trial, found even the ignorant CODE NAPOLEON a mighty benefit in comparison to none!—