Kladrup is a Country House as well as a Horse-Farm: a square court is the interior, as I gather; the Horse-buildings at a reverent distance forming the fourth side. In the centre of this court,--see what a contrivance the Aulic Councillors have hit upon,--there is a wooden stand built, with three staircases leading up to it, one for each person, and three galleries leading off from it into suites of rooms: no question of precedence here, where each of you has his own staircase and own gallery to his apartment! Friedrich Wilhelm looks down like a rhinoceros on all those cobwebberies.
No sooner are the Kaiser's carriage-wheels heard within the court, than Friedrich Wilhelm rushes down, by what staircase is readiest;forward to the very carriage-door; and flings his arms about the Kaiser, embracing and embraced, like mere human friends glad to see one another. On these terms, they mount the wooden stand, Majesty of Prussia, Kaiser, Kaiserinn, each by his own staircase;see, for a space of two hours, the Kaiser's foals and horses led about,--which at least fills up any gap in conversation that may threaten to occur. The Kaiser, a little man of high and humane air, is not bright in talk; the Empress, a Brunswick Princess of fine carriage, Grand-daughter of old Anton Ulrich who wrote the Novels, is likewise of mute humor in public life; but old Nord-Teutschland, cradle of one's existence; Brunswick reminiscences;news of your Imperial Majesty's serene Father, serene Sister, Brother-in-law the Feldmarschall and Insipid Niece whom we have had the satisfaction to betroth lately,--furnish small-talk where needful.
Dinner being near, you go by your own gallery to dress. From the drawing-room, Friedrich Wilhelm leads out the Kaiserinn;the Kaiser, as Head of the world, walks first, though without any lady. How they drank the healths, gave and received the ewers and towels, is written duly in the old Books, but was as indifferent to Friedrich Wilhelm as it is to us; what their conversation was, let no man presume to ask. Dullish, we should apprehend,--and perhaps BETTER lost to us? But where there are tongues, there are topics: the Loom of Time wags always, and with it the tongues of men. Kaiser and Kaiserinn have both been in Karlsbad lately;Kaiser and Kaiserinn both have sailed to Spain, in old days, and been in sieges and things memorable: Friedrich Wilhelm, solid Squire Western of the North, does not want for topics, and talks as a solid rustic gentleman will. Native politeness he knows on occasion; to etiquette, so far as concerns his own pretensions, he feels callous altogether,--dimly sensible that the Eighteenth Century is setting in, and that solid musketeers and not goldsticks are now the important thing. "I felt mad to see him so humiliate himself," said Grumkow afterwards to Wilhelmina, "J'ENRAGEAIS DANS MA PEAU:" why not?
Dinner lasted two hours; the Empress rising, Friedrich Wilhelm leads her to her room; then retires to his own, and "in a quarter of an hour" is visited there by the Kaiser; "who conducts him," in so many minutes exact by the watch, "back to the Empress,"--for a sip of coffee, as one hopes; which may wind up the Interview well.
The sun is still a good space from setting, when Friedrich Wilhelm, after cordial adieus, neglectful of etiquette, is rolling rapidly towards Nimburg, thirty miles off on the Prag Highway;and Kaiser Karl with his Spouse move deliberately towards Chlumetz to hunt again. In Nimburg Friedrich Wilhelm sleeps, that night;--Imperial Majesties, in a much-tumbled world, of wild horses, ceremonial ewers, and Eugenios of Savoy and Malplaquet, probably peopling his dreams. If it please Heaven, there may be another private meeting, a day or two hence.
Nimburg, ah your Majesty, Son Fritz will have a night in Nimburg too;--riding slowly thither amid the wrecks of Kolin Battle, not to sleep well;--but that happily is hidden from your Majesty.
Kolin, Czaslau (Chotusitz), Elbe Teinitz,--here in this Kladrup region, your Majesty is driving amid poor Villages which will be very famous by and by. And Prag itself will be doubly famed in war, if your Majesty knew it, and the Ziscaberg be of bloodier memory than the Weissenberg itself!--His Majesty, the morrow's sun having risen upon Nimburg, rolls into Prag successfully about eleven A.M., Hill of Zisca not disturbing him; goes to the Klein-Seite Quarter, where an Aulic Councillor with fine Palace is ready; all the cannon thundering from the walls at his Majesty's advent; and Prince Eugenio, the ever-present, being there to receive his Majesty,--and in fact to invite him to dinner this day at half-past twelve. It is Friday, 1st of August, 1732.
By a singular chance, there is preserved for us in Fassmann's Book, what we may call an Excerpt from the old <italic> Morning Post <end italic> of Prag, bringing that extinct Day into clear light again; recalling the vanished Dinner-Party from the realms of Hades, as a thing that once actually WAS. The List of the Dinner-guests is given complete; vanished ghosts, whom, in studying the old History-Books, you can, with a kind of interest, fish up into visibility at will. There is Prince Eugenio von Savoye at the bottom of the table, in the Count-Thun Palace where he lodges; there bodily, the little man, in gold-laced coat of unknown cut; the eyes and the tempers bright and rapid, as usual, or more; nose not unprovided with snuff, and lips in consequence rather open. Be seated, your Majesty, high gentlemen all.
A big chair-of-state stands for his Majesty at the upper end of the table: his Majesty will none of it; sits down close by Prince Eugene at the very bottom, and opposite Prince Alexander of Wurtemberg, whom we had at Berlin lately, a General of note in the Turkish and other wars: here probably there will be better talk;and the big chair may preside over us in vacancy. Which it does.