such, Kaiser's Councillors,
Burggraf Friedrich IV. among them, had to take some thought of
Brandenburg in its new posture. Who these Brandenburg Statthalters were,
is heartily indifferent even to Dryasdust,--except that one of them for
some time was a Hohenzollern: which circumstance Dryasdust marks with
the due note of admiration. "What he did there," Dryasdust admits, "is
not written anywhere;"--good, we will hope, and not evil;--but only the
Diploma nominating him (of date 1346, not in Ludwig's minority, but many
years after that ended [Rentsch, p. 323.]) now exists by way of record.
A difficult problem he, like the other regents and viceregents, must
have had; little dreaming that it was intrinsically for a grandson
of his own, and long line of grandsons. The name of this temporary
Statthalter, the first Hohenzollern who had ever the least concern with
Brandenburg, is Burggraf Johann II., eldest Son of our distinguished
Muhldorf friend Friedrich IV.; and Grandfather (through another
Friedrich) of Burggraf Friedrich VI.,--which last gentleman, as will be
seen, did doubtless reap the sowings, good and bad, of all manner of
men in Brandenburg. The same Johann II. it was who purchased Plassenburg
Castle and Territory (cheap, for money down), where the Family
afterwards had its chief residence. Hof, Town and Territory, had
fallen to his Father in those parts; a gift of gratitude from Kaiser
Ludwig:--most of the Voigtland is now Hohenzollern.

Kaiser Ludwig the Bavarian left his sons Electors of
Brandenburg;--"Electors, KURFURSTS," now becomes the commoner term for
so important a Country;--Electors not in easy circumstances. But no
son of his succeeded Ludwig as Kaiser,--successor in the Reich was that
Pfaffen-Kaiser, Johann of Bohemia's son, a Luxemburger once more. No son
of Ludwig's; nor did any descendant,--except, after four hundred years,
that unfortunate Kaiser Karl VII., in Maria Theresa's time. He was a
descendant. Of whom we shall hear more than enough. The unluckiest of
all Kaisers, that Karl VII.; less a Sovereign Kaiser than a bone thrown
into the ring for certain royal dogs, Louis XV., George II. and others,
to worry about;--watch-dogs of the gods; apt sometimes to run into
hunting instead of warding.--We will say nothing more of Ludwig the
Baier, or his posterity, at present: we will glance across to Preussen,
and see, for one moment, what the Teutsch Ritters are doing in their new
Century. It is the year