Voltaire, who left Berlin 2d or 3d December, seems to have been stopt by overflow of rivers about Cleve, then to have taken boat;and is, about this very time, writing to Friedrich "from a vessel on the Coasts of Zealand, where I am driven mad." (Intends, privately, for Paris before long, to get his MAHOMET acted, if possible.) To Voltaire, here is a Note coming:
KING TO H. DE VOLTAIRE (at Brussels, if once got thither).
"QUARTER OF HERRENDORF IN SILESIA, 23d December, 1740.
"MY DEAR VOLTAIRE,--I have received two of your Letters; but could not answer sooner; I am like Charles Twelfth's Chess-King, who was always kept on the move. For a fortnight past, we have been continually afoot and under way, in such weather as you never saw.
"I am too tired to reply to your charming Verses; and shivering too much with cold to taste all the charm of them: but that will come round again. Do not ask poetry from a man who is actually doing the work of a wagoner, and sometimes even of a wagoner stuck in the mud. Would you like to know my way of life? We march from seven in the morning till four in the afternoon. I dine then; afterwards Iwork, I receive tiresome visits; with these comes a detail of insipid matters of business. 'Tis wrong-headed men, punctiliously difficult, who are to be set right; heads too hot which must be restrained, idle fellows that must be urged, impatient men that must be rendered docile, plunderers to restrain within the bounds of equity, babblers to hear babbling, dumb people to keep in talk:
in fine, one has to drink with those that like it, to eat with those that are hungry; one has to become a Jew with Jews, a Pagan with Pagans.
"Such are my occupations;--which I would willingly make over to another, if the Phantom they call Fame (GLOIRE) did not rise on me too often. In truth, it is a great folly, but a folly difficult to cast away when once you are smitten by it. [Phantom of GLOIREsomewhat rampant in those first weeks; let us see whether it will not lay itself again, forevermore, before long!]
"Adieu, my dear Voltaire; may Heaven preserve from misfortune the man I should so like to sup with at night, after fighting in the morning! The Swan of Padua [Algarotti, with his big hook-nose and dusky solemnly greedy countenance] is going, I think, to Paris, to profit by my absence; the Philosopher Geometer [big Maupertuis, in red wig and yellow frizzles, vainest of human kind] is squaring curves; poor little Jordan [with the kindly hazel eyes, and pen that pleasantly gossips to us] is doing nothing, or probably something near it. Adieu once more, dear Voltaire; do not forget the absent who love you. FREDERIC."[<italic> OEuvres de Frederic, <end italic> xxii. 57.]
SCHWERIN AT LIEGNITZ; FRIEDRICH HUSHES UP THE GLOGAU PROBLEM, AND STARTS WITH HIS BEST SPEED FOR BRESLAU.
Meanwhile, on the Western road, and along the foot of the snowy peaks over yonder, Schwerin with the small Right column is going prosperously forwards. Two columns always, as the reader recollects,--two parallel military currents, flowing steadily on, shooting out estafettes, or horse-parties, on the right and left;steadily submerging all Silesia as they flow forward. Left column or current is in slight pause at Glogau here; but will directly be abreast again. On Tuesday, 27th, Schwerin is within wind of Liegnitz; on Wednesday morning, while the fires are hardly lighted, or the smoke of Liegnitz risen among the Hills, Schwerin has done his feat with the usual deftness: Prussian grenadiers came softly on the sentry, softly as a dream; but with sudden levelling of bayonets, sudden beckoning, "To your Guard-house!"--and there, turn the key upon his poor company and him. Whereupon the whole Prussian column marches in; tramp tramp, without music, through the streets:
in the Market-place they fold themselves into a ranked mass, and explode into wind-harmony and rolling of drums. Liegnitz, mostly in nightcap, looks cautiously out of window: it is a deed done, IHRHERREN; Liegnitz ours, better late than never; and after so many years, the King has his own again. Schwerin is sumptuously lodged in the Jesuits, Palace: Liegnitz, essentially a Protestant Town, has many thoughts upon this event, but as yet will be stingy of speaking them.
Thus is Liegnitz managed. A pleasant Town, amid pleasant hills on the rocky Katzbach; of which swift stream, and other towns and passes on it, we shall yet hear more. Population, silently industrious in weaving and otherwise, is now above 14,000; was then perhaps about half that number. Patiently inarticulate, by no means bright in speech or sentiment; a much-enduring, steady-going, frugal, pious and very desirable people.
The situation of Breslau, all this while, is very critical.
Much bottled emotion in the place; no Austrian Garrison admissible;Authorities dare not again propose such a thing, though Browne is turning every stone for it,--lest the emotion burst bottle, and take fire. I have dim account that Browne has been there, has got 300 Austrian dragoons into the Dom Insel (CATHEDRAL ISLAND; "Not in the City, you perceive!" says General Browne: "no, separated by the Oder, on both sides, from the rest of the City; that stately mass of edifices, and good military post");--and had hoped to get the suburbs burnt, after all. But the bottled emotion was too dangerous. For, underground, there are ANTI-Brownes: one especially; a certain busy Deblin, Shoemaker by craft, whom Friedrich speaks of, but gives no name to; this zealous Cordwainer, Deblin, and he is not the only individual of like humor, operates on the guild-brothers and lower populations: [Preuss, <italic>
Thronbesteigung, <end italic> p. 469; <italic> OEuvres de Frederic, <end italic> ii. 61. ] things seem to be looking worse and worse for the Authorities, in spite of General Browne and his activities and dragoons.