In regard to a certain Hill, the Key of the Austrian position, which the King was continually reconnoitring, and lamenting the enormous height of, "Impossible, so high!" One of the Adjutants took his theodolite, ascertained the height, and, by way of comforting his Majesty, reported the exact number of feet above their present level. "How do YOU know, Herr?" said the King angrily. "Measured it by Trigonometry, your Majesty."--"Trigonometry! SCHER' ER SICH ZUM TEUFEL (Off with you, Sir, to the Devil, your Trigonometry and you!)"--no believer in mathematics, this King.
He was loath to go; and laid the blame on many things. "Were Prince Henri now but across the Iser. Had that stupid Anhalt, when he was upon it [galloping about, to the ruin of his head], only seized Arnau, Arnau and its Elbe-Bridge; and had it in hand for junction with Prince Henri!" In fine, just as the last batch of heavy cannon--twenty or thirty hungered horses to a gun, at the rate of five miles a day in roads unspeakable--were getting in, he ordered them all to be dragged back, back to the Trautenau road; whither we must now all go. And, SEPTEMBER 8th, in perfect order, for the Austrians little molested him, and got a bad bargain when they did, the great Friedrich with his whole Army got on march homeward, after such a Campaign as we see. Climbed the Trautenau-Landshut Pass, with nothing of effective loss except from the rainy elements, the steep miry ways and the starved horses;draught-horses especially starved,--whom, poor creatures, "you would see spring at the ropes [draught-harness], thirty of them to a gun, when started and gee-ho'd to; tug violently with no effect, and fall down in whole rows."Prince Henri, forage done, started punctually September 10th, two days after his Brother; and with little or no pursuit, from the Austrians, and with horses unstarved, got home in comparatively tolerable circumstances. Cantoned himself in Dresden neighborhood, and sat waiting: he had never approved this War; and now, Isuppose, would not want for reflections. Friedrich's cantonments were round Landshut, and spread out to right and to left, from Glatz Country and the Upper-Silesian Hills, to Silberberg and Schweidnitz;--his own quarter is the same region, where he lay so long in Summer, 1759, talking on learned subjects with the late Quintus Icilius, if readers remember, and wearily waiting till Cunctator Daun (likewise now deceased) took his stand, or his seat, at Mark Lissa, and the King could follow him to Schmottseifen.
Friedrich himself on this present occasion stayed at Schatzlar as rear-guard, to see whether the Austrians would not perhaps try to make some Winter Campaign of it, and if so, whether they would attempt on Prince Henri or on him. The Austrians did not attempt on either; showed no such intention,--though mischievous enough in other small ways. Friedrich wrote the ELOGE of Voltaire [ OEuvres de Frederic, vii. 50 et seq.
("finished Nov. 26th, 1778").] while he waited here at Schatzlar, among the rainy Mountains. Later on, as prospects altered, he was much at Breslau, or running about on civic errands with Breslau as centre: at Breslau he had many Dialogues with Professor Garve,--in whose good, but oppressively solemn, little Book, more a dull-droning Preachment than a Narrative, no reader need look for them or for him.
As to the EULOGY OF VOLTAIRE, we may say that it is generous, ingenious, succinct; and of dialect now obsolete to us. There was (and is, though suppressed) another EULOGY, brand-new, by a Contemporary of our own,--from which I know not if readers will permit me a sentence or two, in this pause among the rainy Mountains?
... "A wonderful talent lay in this man--[in Voltaire, to wit;"such an intellect, the sharpest, swiftest of the world," thinks our Contemporary; "fathoming you the deepest subject, to a depth far beyond most men's soundings, and coming up with victory and something wise and logically speakable to say on it, sooner than any other man,--never doubting but he has been at the bottom, which is from three to ten miles lower!"] wonderful talent; but observe always, if you look closely, it was in essence a mere talent for Speech; which talent Bavius and Maevius and the Jew Apella may admire without looking behind it, but this Eulogist by no means will. Speech, my friend? If your sublime talent of speech consists only in making ignorance appear to be knowledge, and little wisdom appear to be much, I will thank you to walk on with it, and apply at some other shop. The QUANTITY of shops where you can apply with thrice-golden advantage, from the Morning Newspapers to the National Senate, is tremendous at this epoch of the poor world's history;--go, I request you! And while his foot is on the stairs, descending from my garret, I think: O unfortunate fellow-creature in an unfortunate world, why is not there a Friedrich Wilhelm to 'elect' you, as he did Gundling, to his TOBACCO Parliament, and there set Fassmann upon you with the pans of burning peat? It were better even for yourself; wholesomely didactic to your poor self, Icannot doubt; and for the poor multitudes to whom you are now to be sacred VATES, speaking and singing YOUR dismal GUNDLINGIANA as if inspired by Heaven, how infinitely better!--Courage, courage!
I discern, across these hideous jargons, the reign of greater silence approaching upon repentant men; reign of greater silence, Isay; or else that of annihilation, which will be the most silent of all. ...