ther's
Protestantism.

When the war was over, Frederick looked an old man though he was but
fifty-one. He was a shabby figure, this "old Fritz," in threadbare
blue uniform with red facings. His three-cornered hat, black breeches
and {154} long boots showed signs of an economical spirit, inculcated
in his youth when he had only eighteen pence a week to spend. He
walked about among the country people talking familiarly with the
farmers. He made it a rule to go round the country once a year to see
how things had prospered.

The King hated idleness, and, like the first Frederick, scolded his
subjects if they were not industrious. "It is not necessary that I
should live, but it is necessary that whilst I live I be busy," he
would remark severely. Frugality won praise from him and he always
noted it among his subjects. One day he asked the time of an officer
he met in the streets and was startled to see a leaden bullet pulled up
by a golden chain. "My watch points to but one hour, that in which I
am ready to die for your Majesty," was the patriotic answer to his
question. He rewarded the officer with his own gold watch, and
reflected that his methods had been as successful as those of his
father. That prudent monarch put loose sleeves over his uniform
whenever he wrote that he might not spoil the expensive cloth which was
then the fashion.

In 1786, Frederick II died, leaving Germany to mourn him. The
best-disciplined army in Europe and a treasury full of gold were the
good gifts he left to his successor. The population of the realm
numbered six million souls, in itself another fortune. "If the country
is thickly populated, that is true wealth" had been a wise maxim of the
first Frederick.

Father and son cut homely figures on the stage of eighteenth-century
Europe. The brilliant Louis XIV, and his stately Versailles, seemed to
far outshine them. But Germany owed to Frederick I and Frederick II,
known as the Great, her unity and national spirit. {155} They built on
solid ground and their work remained to bring power to their
successors, while the Grand Monarch left misery behind, which was to
find expression in that crying of the oppressed, known throughout
history as the French Revolution.

{156}

Chapter XIV

Spirits of the Age

It was the aim of Frederick the Great to shake down the old political
order in Europe, which had been Catholic and unenlightened. To that
end he exalted Prussia,