[_Seckendorfs Leben,_ ii. 170-277
pp. 27-59.] One human thing there still is in his lot, the
Feldmarschall's old Grafinn. True old Dame, she, both in the Kohlmarkt
and at Gratz, stands by him, "imprisoned along with him" if it must be
so; ministering, comforting, as only a true Wife can;--and hope has not
quite taken wing.
Rough old Feldmarschall; now turned of sixty: never made such a Campaign
before, as this of 1737 followed by 1738! There sits he; and will not
trouble us any more during the present Kaiser's lifetime. Friedrich
Wilhelm is amazed at these sudden cantings of Fortune's wheel, and
grieves honestly as for an old friend: even the Crown-Prince finds
Seckendorf punished unjustly; and is almost, sorry for him, after all
that has come and gone.
THE EAR OF JENKINS RE-EMERGES.
We must add the following, distilled from the English Newspapers, though
it is now almost four months after date:--
"LONDON, 1st APRIL, 1738. In the English House of Commons, much more
in the English Public, there has been furious debating for a fortnight
past: Committee of the whole House, examining witnesses, hearing
counsel; subject, the Termagant of Spain, and her West-Indian
procedures;--she, by her procedures somewhere, is always cutting out
work for mankind! How English and other strangers, fallen-in with in
those seas, are treated by the Spaniards, readers have heard, nay have
chanced to see; and it is a fact painfully known to all nations. Fact
which England, for one nation, can no longer put up with. Walpole and
the Official Persons would fain smooth the matter; but the West-India
Interest, the City, all Mercantile and Navigation Interests are in dead
earnest: Committee of the whole House, 'Presided by Alderman Perry,' has
not ears enough to hear the immensities of evidence offered; slow Public
is gradually kindling to some sense of it. This had gone on for two
weeks, when--what shall we say?--the EAR OF JENKINS re-emerged for the
second time; and produced important effects!
"Where Jenkins had been all this while,--steadfastly navigating to and
fro, steadfastly eating tough junk with a wetting of rum; not thinking
too much of past labors, yet privately 'always keeping his lost Ear in
cotton' (with a kind of ursine piety, or other dumb feeling),--no mortal
now knows. But to all mortals it is evident he was home in London at
this time; no doubt a noted member of Wapping society, the much-enduring
Jenkins. And witnes
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