And being persuaded that such miseries are not in store to overwhelm me, I here repeat how much I love you, and with what respect and sincere veneration,--I am and shall be till death, my dearest Sister,--Your most humble and faithful Brother and Valet, FRIDERICH."[ OEuvres de Frederic, xxvii. part 1st, p. 5]
That was on the Thursday; Betrothal is on the Monday following.
Document SECOND is from poor old Fassmann, and quite of external nature; which we much abridge:--"Monday evening, all creatures are in gala, and the Royal Apartments upstairs are brilliantly alight; Duke of Lorraine with the other high strangers are requested to take their place up there, and wait for a short while. Prussian Majesty, Queen and Crown-Prince with him, proceeds then, in a solemn official manner, to the Durchlaucht of Bevern's Apartment, in a lower floor of the Palace; where the Bevern Party, Duke, Duchess, Son and intended Charmer are. Prussian Majesty asks the Durchlaucht and Spouse, 'Whether the Marriage, some time treated of, between that their Princess here present, and this his Crown-Prince likewise here, is really a thing to their mind?' Serene Spouses answer, to the effect, 'Yea, surely, very much!' Upon which they all solemnly ascend to the Royal Apartments [upstairs where we have seen Wilhelmina dancing before now], where Lorraine, Wurtemberg and the other sublimities are in waiting. Lorraine and the sublimities form a semicircle; with the two Majesties, and pair of young creatures, in the centre. You young creatures, you are of one intention with your parents in this matter? Alas, there is no doubt of it. Pledge yourselves, then, by exchange of rings! said his Majesty with due business brevity. The rings are exchanged:
Majesty embraces the two young creatures with great tenderness;"as do Queen and Serenities; and then all the world takes to embracing and congratulating; and so the betrothal is a finished thing. Bassoons and violins, striking up, whirl it off in universal dancing,--in "supper of above two hundred and sixty persons," princely or otherwise sublime in rank, with "spouses and noble ladies there" in the due proportion.
[Fassmann, pp. 432, 433.]
Here is fraction of another Note from the Crown-Prince to his Sister at Baireuth, a fortnight after that event:--BERLIN, 24th MARCH, 1732 (to Princess Wilhelmina).--... "God be praised that you are better, dearest Sister! For nobody can love you more tenderly than I do.--As to the Princess of Bevern [my Betrothed], the Queen [Mamma, whom you have been consulting on these etiquettes] bids me answer, That you need not style her `Highness,' and that you may write to her quite as to an indifferent Princess. As to 'kissing of the hands,' I assure you Ihave not kissed them, nor will kiss them; they are not pretty enough to tempt one that way. God long preserve you in perfect health! And you, preserve for me always the honor of your good graces; and believe, my charming Sister, that never brother in the world loved with such tenderness a sister so charming as mine;in short, believe, dear Sister, that without compliments, and in literal truth, I am yours wholly (TOUT A VOUS), "FRIDERICH."[Ib. xxvii. part 1st, p. 5.]
This is the Betrothal of the Crown-Prince to an Insipidity of Brunswick. Insipidity's private feelings, perhaps of a languidly glad sort, are not known to us; Crown-Prince's we have in part seen. He has decided to accept his fate without a murmur farther.
Against his poor Bride or her qualities not a word more. In the Schloss of Berlin, amid such tempests of female gossip (Mamma still secretly corresponding with England), he has to be very reserved, on this head especially. It is understood he did not, in his heart, nearly so much dislike the insipid Princess as he wished Papa to think he did.
Duke Franz of Lorraine went off above a week ago, on the Saturday following the Betrothal; an amiable serene young gentleman, well liked by the Crown-Prince and everybody. "He avoided the Saxon Court, though passing near it," on his way to old Kur-Mainz;"which is a sign," thinks Fassmann, "that mutual matters are on a weak footing in that quarter;"--Pragmatic Sanction never accepted there, and plenty of intricacies existing. Crown-Prince Friedrich may now go to Ruppin and the Regiment Goltz; his business and destinies being now all reduced to a steady condition;--steady sky, rather leaden, instead of the tempestuous thunder-and-lightning weather which there heretofore was. Leaden sky, he, if left well to himself, will perhaps brighten a little. Study will be possible to him; improvement of his own faculties, at any rate.
It is much his determination. Outwardly, besides drilling the Regiment Goltz, he will have a steady correspondence to keep up with his Brunswick Charmer;--let him see that he be not slack in that.
Chapter II.
SMALL INCIDENTS AT RUPPIN.
Friedrich, after some farther pause in Berlin, till things were got ready for him, went to Ruppin. This is in the Spring of 1732;[Still in Berlin, 6th March; dates from NAUEN (in the Ruppin neighborhood) for the first time, 25th April, 1732, among his LETTERS yet extant: Preuss, OEuvres de Frederic, xxvii. part lst, p. 4; xvi. 49.] and he continued to have his residence there till August, 1736. Four important years of young life; of which we must endeavor to give, in some intelligible condition, what traces go hovering about in such records as there are.
