he German Reich. His young Brother, Maximilian, he
contrives, Czarina helping, to get elected Co-adjutor of Koln; Successor
of our Lanky Friend there, to be Kur-Koln in due season, and make the
Electorate of Koln a bit of Austria henceforth. [Lengthy and minute
account of that Transaction, in all the steps of it, in DOHM, i.
295-39.] Then there came "PANIS-BRIEFE," [PANIS (Bread) BRIEF is a
Letter with which, in ancient centuries, the Kaiser used to furnish an
old worn-out Servant, addressed to some Monastery, some Abbot or Prior
in easy circumstances: "Be so good as provide this old Gentleman with
Panis (Bread, or Board and Lodging) while he lives." Very pretty in
Barbarossa's time;--but now--!]--who knows what?--usurpations, graspings
and pretensions without end:--finally, an open pretension to incorporate
Bavaria, after all. Bavaria, not in part now, but in whole: "You, Karl
Theodor, injured man, cannot we give you Territory in the Netherlands;
a King there you shall be, and have your vote as Kur-Pfalz still; only
think! In return for which, Bavaria ours in fee-simple, and so finish
that?" Karl Theodor is perfectly willing,--only perhaps some others are
not. Then and there, these threatening complexities, now gone like a
dream of the night, were really life-perils for the Kingdom of Prussia;
never to be lost sight of by a veteran Shepherd of the People. They
kept a vigilant King Friedrich continually on the stretch, and were
a standing life-problem to him in those final Years. Problem nearly
insoluble to human contrivance; the Russian card having palpably
gone into the other hand. Problem solved, nevertheless; it is still
remembered how.

On the development of that pretty Bavarian Project, the thing became
pressing; and it is well known by what a stroke of genius Friedrich
checkmated it; and produced instead a "FURSTENBUND," or general
"Confederation of German Princes," Prussia atop, to forbid peremptorily
that the Laws of the Reich be infringed. FURSTENBUND: this is the
victorious summit of Friedrich's Public History, towards which all his
efforts tended, during these five years: Friedrich's last feat in the
world. Feat, how obsolete now,--fallen silent everywhere, except in
German Parish-History, and to the students of Friedrich's character in
old age! Had no result whatever in European History; so unexpected was
the turn things took. A FURSTENBUND which was swallowed bodily within
few years, in that World-Explosio