in Germany, as Kur-Brandenburg and
Kaiser's Chamberlain, has been to present ewer and towel to the House of
Austria, should now set up for prescribing rules to it!" A piece of wit,
which could not but provoke Friedrich; and warn him that negotiation on
this matter might as well terminate. Such had been his own thought, from
the first; but in compliance with Schwerin and Podewils he was willing
to try.

Better for Maria Theresa, and for all the world how much better, could
she have accepted this Fifth Proposition! But how could she,--the high
Imperial Lady, keystone of Europe, though by accident with only a few
pounds of ready money at present? Twenty years of bitter fighting, and
agony to herself and all the world, were necessary first; a new Fact of
Nature having turned up, a new European Kingdom with real King to it;
NOT recognizable as such, by the young Queen of Hungary or by any other
person, till it do its proofs.

WHAT BERLIN IS SAYING; WHAT FRIEDRICH IS THINKING.

What Friedrich's own humor is, what Friedrich's own inner man is saying
to him, while all the world so babbles about his Silesian Adventure?
Of this too there are, though in diluted state, some glimmerings to be
had,--chiefly in the Correspondence with Jordan.

Ingenious Jordan, Inspector of the Poor at Berlin,--his thousand old
women at their wheels humming pleasantly in the background of our
imaginations, though he says nothing of that,--writes twice a week to
his Majesty: pleasant gossipy Letters, with an easy respectfulness not
going into sycophancy anywhere; which keep the campaigning King well
abreast of the Berlin news and rumors: something like the essence of
an Old Newspaper; not without worth in our present Enterprise. One
specimen, if we had room!

JORDAN TO THE KING (successively from Berlin,--somewhat abridged.)

No. 1. "BERLIN, 14th DECEMBER, 1740 [day after his Majesty left].
Everybody here is on tiptoe for the Event; of which both origin and end
are a riddle to the most. I am charmed to see a part of your Majesty's
Dominions in a state of Pyrrhonism; the disease is epidemical here at
present. Those who, in the style of theologians, consider themselves
entitled to be certain, maintain That your Majesty is expected with
religious impatience by the Protestants, and that the Catholics hope to
see themselves delivered from a multitude of imposts which cruelly tear
up the beautiful bosom of their Church. You cannot but succ