DITTELSTADT, "16th September, 1757.
"MADAM,--Yesterday was a Day I shall never forget; which satisfied a just desire I have had, this long while, to see and hear a Princess whom all Europe admires. I am not surprised, Madam, that you subdue people's hearts; you are made to attract the esteem and the homage of all who have the happiness to know you. But it is incomprehensible to me how you can have enemies; and how men representing Countries that by no means wish to pass for barbarous, can have been so basely (INDIGNEMENT) wanting in the respect they owe you, and in the consideration which is due to all sovereigns [French not famous for their refined demeanor in Saxony this time].
Why could not I fly to prevent such disorders, such indecency!
I can only offer you a great deal of good-will; but I feel well that, in present circumstances, the thing wanted is effective results and reality. May I, Madam, be so happy as to render you some service! May your fortune be equal to your virtues! I am with the highest consideration, Madam, your Highness's faithful Cousin, --F." [ OEuvres de Frederic, xvii. 166.]
To Wilhelmina he says of it, next day, still gratified, though sad news have come in the interim;--death of Winterfeld, for one black item:--... "The day before yesterday I was in Gotha. It was a touching scene to see the partners of one's misfortunes, with like griefs and like complaints. The Duchess is a woman of real merit, whose firmness puts many a man to shame. Madam de Buchwald appears to me a very estimable person, and one who would suit you much:
intelligent, accomplished, without pretensions, and good-humored.
My Brother Henri is gone to see them to-day. I am so oppressed with grief, that I would rather keep my sadness to myself. I have reason to congratulate myself much on account of my Brother Henri; he has behaved like an angel, as a soldier, and well towards me as a Brother. I cannot, unfortunately, say the same of the elder.
He sulks at me (IL ME BODE), and has sulkily retired to Torgau, from whence, I hear, he is gone to Wittenberg. I shall leave him to his caprices and to his bad conduct; and I prophesy nothing good for the future, unless the younger guide him." ["Kirschleben, near Erfurt, 17th September, 1757" ( OEuvres de Frederic, xxvii. i. 306).] ...
This is part of a long sad Letter to Wilhelmina; parts of which we may recur to, as otherwise illustrative. But before going into that tragic budget of bad news, let us give the finale of Gotha, which occurred the next day,--tragi-comic in part,--and is the last bit of action in those dreary four weeks.
GOTHA, 18th SEPTEMBER. "Since Thursday 15th, Major-General Seidlitz," youngest Major-General of the Army, but a rapidly rising man, "has been Commandant in Gotha, under flourishing circumstances; popular and supreme, though only with a force of 1,500, dragoons and hussars. Monday morning early, Seidlitz's scouts bring word that the Soubise-Hildburghausen people are in motion hitherward; French hussars and Austrian, Turpin's, Loudon's, all that are; grenadiers in mass;--total, say, 8,000 horse and foot, with abundance of artillery;--have been on march all night, to retake Gotha; with all the Chief Generals and Dignitaries of the Army following in their carriages, for some hours past, to see it done. Seidlitz, ascertaining these things, has but one course left,--that of clearing himself out, which he does with orderly velocity: and at 9 A.M. the Dignitaries and their 8,000 find open gates, Seidlitz clean off; occupy the posts, with due emphasis and flourish; and proceed to the Schloss in a grand triumphant way,--where privately they are not very welcome, though one puts the best face on it, and a dinner of importance is the first thing imperative to be set in progress. A flurried Court, that of Gotha, and much swashing of French plumes through it, all this morning, since Seidlitz had to flit.
"Seidlitz has not flitted very far. Seidlitz has ranked his small dragoon-hussar force in a hollow, two miles off; has got warning sent to a third regiment within reach of him, 'Come towards me, and in a certain defile, visible from Gotha eastward, spread yourselves so and so!'--and judges by the swashing he hears of up yonder, that perhaps something may still be done. Dinner, up in the Schloss, is just being taken from the spit, and the swashing at its height, when--'Hah what is that, though?' and all plumes pause. For it is Seidlitz, artistically spread into single files, on the prominent points of vision; advancing again, more like 15,000 than 1,500:
'And in the Defile yonder, that regiment, do you mark it; the King's vanguard, I should say?--To horse!'
"That is Seidlitz's fine Bit of Painting, hung out yonder, hooked on the sky itself, as temporary background to Gotha, to be judged of by the connoisseurs. For pictorial effect, breadth of touch, truth to Nature and real power on the connoisseur, I have heard of nothing equal by any artist. The high Generalcy, Soubise, Hildburghausen, Darmstadt, mount in the highest haste; everybody mounts, happy he who has anything to mount; the grenadiers tumble out of the Schloss; dragoons, artillery tumble out; Dauphiness takes wholly to her heels, at an extraordinary pace: so that Seidlitz's hussars could hardly get a stroke at her; caught sixty and odd, nine of them Officers not of mark; did kill thirty; and had such a haul of equipages and valuable effects, cosmetic a good few of them, habilatory, artistic, as caused the hussar heart to sing for joy. Among other plunder, was Loudon's Commission of Major-General, just on its road from Vienna [poor Mannstein's death the suggesting cause, say some];--undoubtedly a shining Loudon;to whom Friedrich, next day, forwarded the Document with a polite Note." [ Helden-Geschichte, iv. 640;Westphalen, ii. 37; OEuvres de Frederic,
iv, 147.]'