e who dwelt in the frontier
countries, mostly of Lower Saxon origin, with a small mixture of
Sclavonian blood, were a hard, rough race, not very pleasing in their
modes of life, of uncommonly sharp understanding and sober judgment. In
the capital they had been, from ancient times, sarcastic and voluble in
speech; but in all the provinces they were capable of great exertion,
laborious, tenacious, and of great power of endurance.

But the character of the princes produced still more effect than even
the situation or character of the people. Their State was constituted
differently from any other since the days of Charles the Great. Many
princely houses have furnished a succession of Sovereigns who have been
the fortunate aggrandisers of their States, as the Bourbons, who have
collected wide territories into one great kingdom; many families of
princes have produced generations of valiant warriors, none more so
than the Vasas and the Protestant Wittelsbacher in Sweden. But there
have been no trainers of the people like the old Hohenzollerns. As
great landed proprietors on the desolated country they brought
about an increase of population, guided the cultivation, for almost
150 years laboured as strict economists, thought, tolerated, dared
and did injustice, in order to create for their State a people like
themselves--hard, parsimonious, discreet, daring, and ambitious.

In this sense one has a right to admire the providential character of
the Prussian State. Of the four princes who have governed it, since the
German War up to the day when the grey-headed Abbot closed his weary
eyes in the monastery of Sans Souci, each one, with his virtues and
failings, has acted as a necessary supplement to his predecessor. The
Elector Frederic William, the greatest statesman from the school of the
German War--the pompous Frederic, the first King--the parsimonious
despot Frederic William I.--and, finally, he in whom were concentrated
almost all the talents and great qualities of his ancestors, were the
flowers of their race.

Life in the King's castle in Berlin was very cheerless when Frederic
grew up; few of the citizens' homes at that rude time were so poor in
love and sunshine. One may doubt whether it was the King his father, or
the Queen, who was most to blame for the disorder of the family life,
both through failings of their nature, which, in the ceaseless rubs of
home, ever became greater;--the King, a wonderful tyrant, with a sof