The king looked in amazement at her without attempting to interrupt her. At last he replied, "You are very bold to address me such words, yet I bear you no illwill. Your intentions are good. You speak frankly to me, and that increases my esteem for you. Comfort my wife." tyrant knowing no restraint, an- | able, but it becomes a crime if nounced her son's death to her, we do not endeavour to overcome poured forth the most violent abuse it!" on his daughter Wilhelmina on account of her suspected sympathy with the conduct of her brother, beat her till she became insensible, and would have trampled on her body, had he not been prevented by her sisters, the queen, and others present. Thus Wilhelmina lies senseless on a chair, while the ladies of the court are endeavouring to bring her round with cold water and smelling salts, the queen walks up and down the room, wringing her hands and beside herself with grief at the supposed death of her son, while the other children throw themselves weeping at the feet of the king and implore him to relent. At last he confesses that the Crown Prince is still alive, but fumes and threatens to have him executed; and yet at such a moment the mistress of the robes, Frau von Kamecke, dares to address him in the following words: "Your Majesty has hitherto endeavoured to be a righteous and God-fearing prince, and God has in return heaped blessings on you, but woe to you if you depart from His holy commands. Fear His justice which punished Philip II. and Peter I., who shed the blood of their sons, as you wish to do. Their race became extinct with them, their people were plunged into misery, and they earned for themselves the detestation of mankind. Recollect yourself! A first burst of anger is pardon In The Crown Prince was soon after escorted under a strong guard to Küstrin, where his uniform was exchanged for a common blue coat, and where he was treated with the greatest severity, and in every respect as a state prisoner. accordance with his father's instructions the door of his room was kept constantly shut, being opened not more than three times during the day, and never for more than four minutes at a time. Any one holding conversation with him was threatened with instant death. He was supplied with food twice a day, at noon and at four o'clock, from the cookshop, at an estimated cost of from four to six groschen each meal, and it was always cut up into small pieces, as he was not allowed the use of knife or fork. He was also deprived of pen, ink, and paper, of his flute, and of all books, with the exception of the Bible and a few devotional works. His own books were disposed of by sale, and thus in the full vigour of his youth he was abandoned to solitary confinement in an empty rooni, gloomy by day, and deprived of all light from sunset. Yet he remained constant in his resolution not to yield. It was the king's intention to have him tried by martial law, whereby the succession would be secured to his favourite, Prince William. But it appears that he was induced by his advisers in the first instance to propose to the Crown Prince that he should resign all claim to the succession, an offer which Fritz however emphatically rejected. At last, as soon as all the charges were fully drawn up, the king appointed a court-martial to be held, under the presidency of a lieutenant-general, and to be constituted of three officers of every rank, inclusive of lieutenants, and further, comprising the procuratorgeneral, the fiscal-general, and the judge-advocate, of the regiment of gens d'armes, to which Katte belonged. Their instructions were to pass sentence both on Katte and the prince. But, notwithstanding the repeated instances of the king, the court resolutely refused to condemn the Crown Prince, and limited their judgment to Katte. They were supported in their resolution by the urgent remonstrances which poured in on every side, and especially by the openly-expressed opinion both of the venerable Field-Marshal Natzmer and of Prince Leopold of Dessau, who maintained that the king had no right without a formal process to inflict capital punishment on the heir to the crown. This, together with the representations of all the foreign courts, gradually induced the obdurate king somewhat to relent. Yet it was not without a violent struggle that he brought himself at last to abandon his intention of ensuring the death of his son. On one occasion being excited to a state of frenzy by the persistent refusal of his officers to carry out his views, Field-Marshal Buddenbrock, who had for six years been his daily companion, tore open his vest, and laying bare his breast, exclaimed, "If your Majesty desires blood, take mine. His you shall not have, so long as I can breathe a word in his defence!” The king was so overcome by this scene that he remained for some time absorbed in thought, and henceforth adopted a much more gentle tone in speaking of his son. Even Seckendorf, who had succeeded in his main object of separating Prussia from the House of Hanover, and who thought that the quarrel between father and son had gone quite far enough, now made every effort to induce the king to relent, which he was at last persuaded to do, provided his son acknowledged his past errors in writing, promised in the presence of his generals, officers, and ministers of State, henceforth to yield implicit obedience to the orders of the king, to hold no written correspondence within or without the kingdom, except by his father's consent, and in case he violated any of these conditions, spontaneously to resign for ever all his rights to the succession. On these terms the king consented After the execution of Katte (November 6, 1730), the king ordered the military chaplain, Müller, to wait on the Crown Prince, and inform him that, if he promised before God heartily to repent of his sins and ask pardon of his father, though the crime could not be so soon overlooked or forgotten, yet his Majesty would release him from close confinement, and gradually restore him to favour. He must, however, first take a solemn oath, without mental reservation or equivocation of any sort, in all things to obey his father's commands, like a true and faithful servant, subject, and son; which oath if he in any respect failed to keep, he should forfeit all his rights as heir to the crown, and, under certain circumstances,incur even the extreme penalty of the law. "May God grant His blessing," concluded the king, "and the Saviour his grace, to this wilful son of mine, so that he may repent him of his evil doings, and so be rescued from the claws of Satan." Müller received a full and unreserved promise from the prince henceforth to remain in all things submissive to his father's pleasure, but before taking the oath he wished first to see the form in which it was couched. He was also supplied, by his father's orders, with various devotional works, for which he expressed his sincere thanks, and protested that it was his greatest pleasure to yield obedience to the king's commands, not through compulsion, but through the earnest desire to please him, in the hope of thus recovering his favour. The king replied, in the first letter addressed to his son since his unfortunate attempt at escape: "Would to God you had ever from your youth followed my paternal advice and pleasure. You would not then have fallen into all these troubles, for the cursed people who have inspired you with the idea of becoming wise and clever through profane teachings, have now convinced you that all your wisdom and cleverness is vain and frivolous. May God grant, however, that your false heart be thoroughly cleansed and converted by the punishment you have undergone." He soon after sent a message to the prince, informing him of his intention to visit him in Küstrin, on the occasion of his birthday (August 15, 1731), in order to see with his own eyes whether he had repented or not. The king arrived accordingly, at the stated time, in Küstrin, accompanied by Grumbkow and Derschau only, and immediately sent for the Crown Prince. On his entrance, Fritz fell at the feet of his father, who ordered him to rise, and proceeded to dwell at length on all his crimes and errors, especially complaining that he had committed many unworthy actions, not out of mere heedlessness, but deliberately and of set purpose. "You thought," he added, “by your obstinacy to get the better of me; but you should know, young man, that were you even sixty or seventy years of age, you would still have to yield to my will. As I have | hitherto held my own against every one, you may rest assured that I shall not want for means to bring you to your senses." He showed himself especially irritated that, when paternally admonished about his debts and requested to give a full statement of them, in order that all might be liquidated together, the prince had not acknowledged as many hundreds as there were thousands. This want of confidence had all the more provoked him that all his efforts to uphold and strengthen his house, and to increase the army and state revenues, had been made on behalf of his son alone, should he at any time prove himself worthy of them. He then asked Fritz whether he had not really intended to escape to Enggland; and when the prince confessed as much, he pointed out the disastrous consequences of such a step for the queen, the Princess Wilhelmina, and for Hanover itself, as he expressed his determination, in case of need, to have recourse to the extremest measures, were it to cost him his very life and crown. There were now, he concluded, no other means left of employing the prince in civil and military affairs except by the fullest and most unreserved acknowledgment and reparation of all his errors. Thereupon the Crown Prince, kneeling at the king's feet, begged to be put to the severest trial, protesting that he was ready to undergo everything in order to recover his father's favour and esteem. The king then asked him whether it was he who had seduced Katte, or Katte him, to which Fritz unhesitatingly replied that it was he who had misled Katte. "I am glad," replied the king, "that you have for once spoken the truth." He, however, concluded by granting him full pardon, in the hope and belief that his son was at last thoroughly convinced of all his errors, and determined seriously to reform his life. the The Crown Prince accepted pardon with the sincerest thanks, and, bathed in tears, repentantly kissed his father's feet. On again prostrating himself in order to congratulate his Majesty on his birthday, the king embraced and kissed him. As he stepped into his carriage, the Crown Prince, in the presence of many hundred spectators, once more kissed his feet, whereupon the king embraced him, and declared himself convinced of the sincerity of his son's repentance, promising henceforth to make every provision for his comfort and wellbeing. MARIA THERESA. (Paganel's History of Joseph II.) A.D. 1741. SCARCELY had Charles VI. closed his eyes before this rich inheritance, protected as it was by natural right, by a pragmatic sanction solemnly confirming this right, and by the guarantee of nearly all the powers, was already coveted by different pretenders. There were at stake Hungary and Bohemia, Austrian Swabia or Austria Proper, Upper and Lower Austria, Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, Flanders, Burgau, the four forest towns, Brisgau, Friuli, the Tyrol, Milan, Mantua, and the Duchy of Parma. On one side Augustus, King of Poland and Elector of Saxony, brings forward the rights of his wife, the eldest daughter of the Emperor Joseph I., eldest brother of Charles VI.; he grounds his claim on the laws of primogeniture. On the other side the Elector of Bavaria, Charles Albert, appeals to the will of the Emperor Ferdinand I., brother of Charles V. From beyond the Pyrenees the King of Spain stretches out his pretensions over all the states of the House of Austria. Does not Philip V. descend by the female line from the wife of Philip II., daughter of the Emperor Maximilian II. ? Louis XV., descending in direct line from the eldest male branch of Austria by the wives both of Louis XIII. and of Louis XIV., could put forward pretensions as well as any one. But as a candidate, he would have all Europe to fight; as umpire he could, with half of Europe, decide on the succession and the empire. This latter part suited him best. Could he not play it, and yet not heap on France, through mistakes and unforeseen disasters, all the charges of a war without profit and without glory? But of all these competitors, the most formidable is the most unexpected; it is the young sovereign of that ducal Prussia, so imprudently erected into a kingdom by Austria itself forty years ago. "Frederick I. had by this vain dignity given to his posterity the germ of ambition which sooner |