From this Edict-of-Mantes enviroument, which taught our young Fritz his first lessons of human behavior,--a polite sharp little Boy, we do hope and understand,--he learned also to clothe his bits of notions, emotions, and garrulous utterabilities, in the French dialect. Learned to speak, and likewise, what is more important; to THINK, in French; which was otherwise quite domesticated in the Palace, and became his second mother-tongue.
Not a bad dialect; yet also none of the best. Very lean and shallow, if very clear and convenient; leaving much in poor Fritz unuttered, unthought, unpractised, which might otherwise have come into activity in the course of his life. He learned to read very soon, I presume; but he did not, now or afterwards, ever learn to spell. He spells indeed dreadfully ILL, at his first appearance on the writing stage, as we shall see by and by; and he continued, to the last, one of the bad spellers of his day. A circumstance which I never can fully account for, and will leave to the reader's study.
From all manner of sources,--from inferior valetaille, Prussian Officials, Royal Majesty itself when not in gala,--he learned, not less rootedly, the corrupt Prussian dialect of German; and used the same, all his days, among his soldiers, native officials, common subjects and wherever it was most convenient; speaking it, and writing and misspelling it, with great freedom, though always with a certain aversion and undisguised contempt, which has since brought him blame in some quarters. It is true, the Prussian form of German is but rude; and probably Friedrich, except sometimes in Luther's Bible, never read any German Book. What, if we will think of it, could he know of his first mother-tongue! German, to this day, is a frightful dialect for the stupid, the pedant and dullard sort! Only in the hands of the gifted does it become supremely good. It had not yet been the language of any Goethe, any Lessing;though it stood on the eve of becoming such. It had already been the language of Luther, of Ulrich Hutten, Friedrich Barbarossa, Charlemagne and others. And several extremely important things had been said in it, and some pleasant ones even sung in it, from an old date, in a very appropriate manner,--had Crown-Prince Friedrich known all that. But he could not reasonably be expected to know:--and the wiser Germans now forgive him for not knowing, and are even thankful that he did not.
Chapter II.
THE GERMAN ELEMENT.
So that, as we said, there are two elements for young Fritz, and highly diverse ones, from both of which he is to draw nourishment, and assimilate what he can. Besides that Edict-of-Nantes French element, and in continual contact and contrast with it, which prevails chiefly in the Female Quarters of the Palace,--there is the native German element for young Fritz, of which the centre is Papa, now come to be King, and powerfully manifesting himself as such. An abrupt peremptory young King; and German to the bone.
Along with whom, companions to him in his social hours, and fellow-workers in his business, are a set of very rugged German sons of Nature; differing much from the French sons of Art.
Baron Grumkow, Leopold Prince of Anhalt-Dessau (not yet called the "OLD Dessauer," being under forty yet), General Glasenap, Colonel Derschau, General Flans; these, and the other nameless Generals and Officials, are a curious counterpart to the Camases, the Hautcharmoys and Forcades, with their nimble tongues and rapiers;still more to the Beausobres, Achards, full of ecclesiastical logic, made of Bayle and Calvin kneaded together; and to the high-frizzled ladies rustling in stiff silk, with the shadow of Versailles and of the Dragonnades alike present to them.
Born Hyperboreans these others; rough as hemp, and stout of fibre as hemp; native products of the rigorous North. Of whom, after all our reading, we know little.--O Heaven, they have had long lines of rugged ancestors, cast in the same rude stalwart mould, and leading their rough life there, of whom we know absolutely nothing! Dumb all those preceding busy generations; and this of Friedrich Wilhelm is grown almost dumb. Grim semi-articulate Prussian men; gone all to pipe-clay and mustache for us.
Strange blond-complexioned, not unbeautiful Prussian honorable women, in hoops, brocades, and unintelligible head-gear and hair-towers,--ACH GOTT, they too are gone; and their musical talk, in the French or German language, that also is gone; and the hollow Eternities have swallowed it, as their wont is, in a very surprising manner!--Grumkow, a cunning, greedy-hearted, long-headed fellow, of the old Pomeranian Nobility by birth, has a kind of superficial polish put upon his Hyperboreanisms; he has been in foreign countries, doing legations, diplomacies, for which, at least for the vulpine parts of which, he has a turn. He writes and speaks articulate grammatical French; but neither in that, nor in native Pommerish Platt-Deutsch, does he show us much, except the depths of his own greed, of his own astucities and stealthy audacities. Of which we shall hear more than enough by and by.
OF THE DESSAUER, NOT YET "OLD."
As to the Prince of Anhalt-Dessau, rugged man, whose very face is the color of gunpowder, he also knows French, and can even write in it, if he like,--having duly had a Tutor of that nation, and strange adventures with him on the grand tour and elsewhere;--but does not much practise writing, when it can be helped.