This is Letter First; written Friday morning, on the edge of getting into bed, after such fatigue; and it has, as natural in that mood, given up the matter in despair. It did not meet Wilhelmina on the road; and she had left Baireuth;--where it met her, I do not know; probably at home, on her return, when all was over. Let Wilhelmina now speak her own lively experiences of that same Friday:--"I got to Berneck at ten. The heat was excessive; I found myself quite worn out with the little journey I had done. I alighted at the House which had been got ready for my Brother. We waited for him, and in vain waited, till three in the afternoon. At three we lost patience; had dinner served without him. Whilst we were at table, there came on a frightful thunder-storm. I have witnessed nothing so terrible: the thunder roared and reverberated among the rocky cliffs which begirdle Berneck; and it seemed as if the world was going to perish: a deluge of rain succeeded the thunder.
"It was four o'clock; and I could not understand what had become of my Brother. I had sent out several persons on horseback to get tidings of him, and none of them came back. At length, in spite of all my prayers, the Hereditary Prince [my excellent Husband]
himself would go in search. I remained waiting till nine at night, and nobody returned. I was in cruel agitations: these cataracts of rain are very dangerous in the mountain countries; the roads get suddenly overflowed, and there often happen misfortunes. I thought for certain, there had one happened to my Brother or to the Hereditary Prince." Such a 2d of July, to poor Wilhelmina!
"At last, about nine, somebody brought word that my Brother had changed his route, and was gone to Culmbach [a House of ours, lying westward, known to readers]; there to stay overnight. I was for setting out thither,--Culmbach is twenty miles from Berneck;but the roads are frightful," White Mayn, still a young River, dashing through the rock-labyrinths there, "and full of precipices:--everybody rose in opposition, and, whether I would or not, they put me into the carriage for Himmelkron [partly on the road thither], which is only about ten miles off. We had like to have got drowned on the road; the waters were so swoln [White Mayn and its angry brooks], the horses could not cross but by swimming.
"I arrived at last, about one in the morning. I instantly threw myself on a bed. I was like to die with weariness; and in mortal terrors that something had happened to my Brother or the Hereditary Prince. This latter relieved me on his own score;he arrived at last, about four o'clock,--had still no news farther of my Brother. I was beginning to doze a little, when they came to warn me that 'M. von Knobelsdorf wished to speak with me from the Prince-Royal.' I darted out of bed, and ran to him. He," handing me a Letter, "brought word that"--But let us now give Letter Second, which has turned up lately, and which curiously completes the picture here. Friedrich, on rising refreshed with sleep at Hof, had taken a cheerfuler view; and the Generals still lagging rearward, he thinks it possible to see Wilhelmiua after all. Possible; and yet so very dangerous,--perhaps not possible? Here is a second Letter written from Munchberg, some fifteen miles farther on, at an after period of the same Friday: purport still of a perplexed nature, "I will, and I dare not;"--practical outcome, of itself uncertain, is scattered now by torrents and thunderstorms. This is the Letter, which Knobelsdorf now hands to Wilhelmina at that untimely hour of Saturday:--2. TO PRINCESS WILHELMINA (by Knobelsdorf).
"MUNCHBERG, 2d July, 1754.
"MY DEAREST SISTER,--I am in despair that I cannot satisfy my impatience and my duty,--to throw myself at your feet this day.
But alas, dear Sister, it does not depend on me: we poor Princes, "the Margraves and I," are obliged to wait here till our Generals [Bredow, Schulenburg and Company] come up; we dare not go along without them. They broke a wheel in Gera [fifty miles behind us];hearing nothing of them since, we are absolutely forced to wait here. Judge in what a mood I am, and what sorrow must be mine!
Express order not to go by Baireuth or Anspach:--forbear, dear sister, to torment me on things not depending on myself at all.
"I waver between hope and fear of paying my court to you. I hope it might still be at Berneck," this evening,--"if you could contrive a road into the Nurnberg Highway again; avoiding Baireuth: otherwise I dare not go. The Bearer, who is Captain Knobelsdorf [excellent judicious man, old acquaintance from the Custrin time, who attends upon us, actual Captain once, but now titular merely, given to architecture and the fine arts (Seyfarth (Anonymous), Lebens- und Regierungs-Geschichte Friedrichs des Andern (Leipzig, 1786), ii. 200. OEuvres de Frederic, vii. 33. Preuss, Friedrich mit seinen Verwandten (Berlin. 1838), pp. 8, 17.)], will apprise you of every particular: let Knobelsdorf settle something that may be possible. This is how I stand at present; and instead of having to expect some favor from the King [after what I have done by his order], I get nothing but chagrin. But what is crueler upon me than all, is that you are ill. God, in his grace, be pleased to help you, and restore the precious health which I so much wish you! ...FRIEDRICH."[ OEuvres de Frederic, xxvii. part lst, p. 15.]
Judicious Knobelsdorf settles that the meeting is to be this very morning at eight; Wilhelmina (whose memory a little fails her in the insignificant points) does not tell us where: but, by faint indications, I perceive it was in the Lake-House, pleasant Pavilion in the ancient artificial Lake, or big ornamental Fishpond, called BRANDENBURGER WEIHER, a couple of miles to the north of Baireuth: there Friedrich is to stop,--keeping the Paternal Order from the teeth outwards in this manner.
