ng Mamsell; to go and see his
Mother, was the second thing. Not even his grand passion for war could
eradicate those; he went to his grand passion for Dutch William's wars;
the wise mother still counselling, who was own aunt to Dutch William,
and liked the scheme. He besieged Namur; fought and besieged up and
down,--with insatiable appetite for fighting and sieging; with great
honor, too, and ambitions awakening in him;--campaign after campaign:
but along with the flamy-thundery ideal bride, figuratively called
Bellona, there was always a soft real one, Mamsell Fos of Dessau, to
whom he continued constant. The Government of his Dominions he left
cheerfully to his Mother, even when he came of age: "I am for learning
War, as the one right trade; do with all things as you please, Mamma,--
only not with Mamsell, not with her!"--

Readers may figure this scene too, and shudder over it. Some rather
handsome male Cousin of Mamsell, Medical Graduate or whatever he was,
had appeared in Dessau:--"Seems, to admire Mamsell much; of course, in a
Platonic way," said rumor:--"He? Admire?" thinks Leopold;--thinks a
good deal of it, not in the philosophic mood. As he was one day passing
Fos's, Mamsell and the Medical Graduate are visible, standing together
at the window inside. Pleasantly looking out upon Nature,--of course
quite casually, say some Histories with a sneer. In fact, it seems
possible this Medical Graduate may have been set to act shoeing-horn;
but he had better not. Leopold storms into the House, "Draw, scandalous
canaille, and defend yourself!"--And in this, or some such way, a
confident tradition says, he killed the poor Medical Graduate there and
then. One tries always to hope not: but Varnhagen is positive, though
the other Histories say nothing of it. God knows. The man was a Prince;
no Reichshofrath, Speyer-Wetzlar KAMMER, or other Supreme Court, would
much trouble itself, except with formal shakings of the wig, about such
a peccadillo. In fine, it was better for Leopold to marry the Miss
Fos; which he actually did (1698, in his twenty-second year), "with
the left-hand,"--and then with the right and both hands; having got her
properly ennobled before long, by his splendid military services. She
made, as we have hinted, an excellent Wife to him, for the fifty or
sixty ensuing years.

This is a strange rugged specimen, this inarticulate Leopold; already
getting mythic, as we can perceive, to the polished vocal ages;