is his Niece, Princess Charlotte,
Sister to the now reigning Duke.

This Letter, in the translated form, and the glorious results it had
for some of us, are familiar to all English readers for the last hundred
years. Of Friedrich's Answer to it, if he sent one, we have no trace
whatever. Which is a pity, more or less;--though, in truth, the Answer
could only have been some polite formality; the Letter itself being
a mere breath of sentimental wind, absolutely without significance to
Friedrich or anybody else,--except always to the Young Lady herself, to
whom it brought a Royal Husband and Queenship of England, within a year.
Signature, presumably, this Letter once had; date of place, of day,
year, or even century (except by implication), there never was any: but
judicious persons, scanning on the spot, have found that the "Victory"
spoken of can only have meant Torgau; and that the aspiring Young Lady,
hitherto a School Girl, not so much as "confirmed" till a month or two
ago, age seventeen in May last, can only have I written it, at Mirow,
in the Winter subsequent. [Ludwig Giesebrecht,--DER FURSTENHOF IN MIROW
WUHREND DER JAHRE 1708-1761, in _Programm des vereinigten Koniglichen
und Stadt-Gymnasiums_ for 1863 (Stettin, 1863), pp. 26-29,--enters into
a minute criticism.] Certain it is, in September NEXT, September, 1761,
directly after George III.'s Wedding, there appeared in the English
Newspapers, what doubtless had been much handed about in society before,
the following "TRANSLATION OF A LETTER, SAID TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN BY
PRINCESS CHARLOTTE OF MECKLENBERG TO THE KING OF PRUSSIA, ON ONE OF HIS
VICTORIES,"--without farther commentary or remark of any kind; everybody
then understanding, as everybody still. So notable a Document ought to
be given in the Original as well (or in what passes for such), and with
some approach to the necessary preliminaries of time and place: [From
_Gentleman's Magazine_ (for October, 1761, xxxi. 447) we take, verbatim,
the TRANSLATION; from PREUSS (ii. 186) the "ORIGINAL," who does not say
where he got it,--whether from an old German Newspaper or not.]--

[TO HIS MAJESTY THE KING OF PRUSSIA (in Leipzig, or Somewhere. or
Somewhere).

MIROW IN MECHLENBURG-STRELITZ, Winter of 1760-1761.]

"Sire!--Ich weiss nicht, ob ich uber Ewr. Majestat letzteren Sieg
frohlich odor traurig sein soll, weil eben der gluckliche Sieg, der neue
Lorbeern um Dero Scheitel geflochten hat, uber mein Vaterland J