ment, to put his Son in the wrong, and I know not what. [Pollnitz,
ii. 272-274.] The particles of fact in the affair are likewise two:
First, that Queen Sophie, and from her the Courtier Public generally,
expected the Hanover Royal Highness, who probably had real thoughts
of seeing Berlin and his Intended, on this occasion; Dubourgay reports
daily rumors of the Royal Highness being actually "seen" there in an
evanescent manner; and Wilhelmina says, her Mother was so certain of
him, "she took every ass or mule for the Royal Highness,"--heartily
indifferent to Wilhelmina. This is the first particle of fact. The
Second is, that a subaltern Official about the Royal Highness, one
Lamothe of Hanover, who had appeared in Berlin about that time, was
thrown into prison not long after, for what misbehavior none knew,--for
encouraging dissolute Royal Highness in wild schemes, it was guessed.
And so the Myth grew, and was found ready for Pollnitz and his
followers. Royal Highness did come over to England; not then as the
Myth bears, but nine months afterwards in December next; and found
other means of irritating his imperative, flighty, irascible and rather
foolish little Father, in an ever-increasing degree. "Very coldly
received at Court," it is said: ill seen by Walpole and the Powers;
being too likely to become a focus of Opposition there.

The Visit, meanwhile, though there came no Duke of Edinburgh to see it,
was sublime in the extreme; Polish Majesty being magnificence itself;
and the frugal Friedrich Wilhelm lighting up his dim Court into
insurpassable brilliancy, regardless of expense; so that even the
Smoking Parliament (where August attended now and then) became luminous.
The Crown-Prince, who in late months had languished in a state of
miserable health, in a manner ominous to his physicians, confined mostly
to his room or his bed, was now happily on foot again;--and Wilhelmina
notes one circumstance which much contributed to his recovery: That the
fair Orzelska had attended her natural (or unnatural) Parent, on this
occasion; and seemed to be, as Wilhelmina thinks, uncommonly kind to
the Crown-Prince. The Heir-Apparent of Saxony, a taciturn, inoffensive,
rather opaque-looking gentleman, now turned of thirty, and gone over to
Papistry long since, with views to be King of Poland by and by, which
proved effectual as we shall find, was also here: Count Bruhl,
too, still in a very subaltern capacity, and others whom we and th