FOOTNOTES:
[57] The new Speaker soon came over too, and went to Newmarket: George Selwyn seeing him very busy at the hazard-table, said, “With what expedition the Speaker passes the Money-bills!”
[58] A bon mot, much repeated at this time, was not more favourable to the King, who, making the nation pay him for this defence of himself, Doddington said, “His Majesty would not for the world lend himself a farthing.”
[59] Vide the [Debates on the Sheriffs-depute.]
[60] The threatened invasion had been a blind to disguise the design on Minorca.
[CHAPTER VII.]
French Invasion of Minorca—Character of the Duc de Richelieu, and Blakeney—Incapacity of the Duke of Newcastle—French Reports from Minorca—Public Indignation against Admiral Byng—His Despatch—Remarks on the Character of Government—The Empress-Queen joins with France—Law-suit respecting the public right of way through Richmond New Park—The Prince of Wales—The Princess Dowager and Lord Bute—Death of Chief Justice Rider—Loss of Minorca—Byng arrested—Political Squibs—Popular Movements on the loss of Minorca—Revolution in Sweden—Causes of the War in Germany—German Ministers—The Courts of Dresden and Vienna—Character of the Czarina—League of Russia, Austria, and Saxony against the King of Prussia—He is apprized of it—Endeavours to secure Peace—He invades Saxony, and captures Dresden.
During these agitations of the Court, which were little known, and less talked of, the attention of the public was directed to Minorca. Sixteen thousand French had landed there without opposition: no part of the island, indeed, was capable of defence, but Fort St. Philip. The inhabitants received the invaders even with alacrity, though their privileges had been preserved under the English Government, and though they enjoyed all the folly of their religion without the tyranny of it. The Jews and Greeks established there behaved with more gratitude: of the natives, sixteen only adhered to the English. The magistrates hurried to take new oaths, and to welcome the singular personage sent to be a conqueror. This was the Duc de Richelieu; a man, who had early surprised the fashionable world by his adventures, had imposed on it by his affectations, had dictated to it by his wit and insolent agreeableness, had often tried to govern it by his intrigues, and who would be the hero of the age, if histories were novels, or women wrote history. His first campaign was hiding himself at fourteen under the Duchess of Burgundy’s bed, from whence he was led to the Bastille, and whither he had returned four several times. A genius so enterprising could not fail to captivate the ladies: the Duchess of Modena, the Regent’s daughter, would fain have preferred him to the triste glory of reigning over an acre of territory with a dismal Italian husband. Richelieu was soon after sent to, and as soon recalled from, Vienna, for carrying a black lamb in his state-coach at midnight to sacrifice to the moon, in order to obtain a recruit of vigour. The very exploit gained him as many hearts as if the boon had been granted. Yet with an advantageous person and adventurous disposition, he was supposed to want the two heroic attributes that generally compose a woman’s Alexander. So much was his courage questioned, that he was driven to fight and kill the Prince of Lixin in the trenches at Philipsburg.
Ruling the female world, and growing exhausted with the fatigues of his government, he at last thought of reposing himself on the lesser care of the French Monarchy: and making himself necessary to the pleasures of the mistresses, the Duchesse de Chateauroux and Madame Pompadour, he attained considerable weight in a Government where trifling qualities are no disrecommendation. Embarking with all the luxurious pomp of an Asiatic grandee, this genteel but wrinkled Adonis sailed to besiege a rock, and to attack a rough veteran, who was supposed to think that he had little business left but to do his duty and die. His name was Blakeney: he had passed through all the steps of his profession, and had only attained the sweets of it by living to be past the enjoyment of them. He was remarkably generous and disinterested, and of great bravery, which had been but little remarked. Having the government of the Castle of Stirling in the last Rebellion, he was summoned to give it up as soon as the King’s troops were defeated at Falkirk: but he replied, the loss of that battle made no alteration in his orders—yet he had then provision but for three weeks. This gallantry, which had been overlooked for his sake, was now recollected and extolled for our own: the most sanguine hopes were conceived—Minorca was regarded as the nation’s possession, Scotland as the King’s: if the former was lost, it passed to an enemy—Stirling would only have gone to another friend. As every day brought out the weakness of the garrison of Mahon, all hope was contracted to the person of Blakeney: yet in no neglect were the Ministry more culpable, for he proved to be superannuated.
The French covered the siege with a fleet of twelve men-of-war. Accounts were impatiently expected here of the arrival of Admiral Byng in those seas with his squadron, and with succours which he was ordered to take in at Gibraltar, and which it was hoped he would be able to fling into St. Philip’s. If he could effect that service, and disperse or demolish the French fleet, there was no doubt but the troops on the island must remain prisoners of war, or be the victims of their attempt; for as yet they had made little progress. Having landed on the opposite side of the island, they found the roads almost impracticably rocky; and if cut off from supplies from the continent, they must have perished by hunger, Minorca by no means supplying the natives with superabundance. The heats, too, were now coming on, which would be insupportable to new constitutions, to the natural impatience of the French, and still more to an effeminate General. Hitherto their transports had passed and repassed in full security. The Mediterranean, where we so long had reigned, seemed abandoned by the English.
The truth was, the clamours of the merchants, sometimes reasonable, always self-interested, terrified the Duke of Newcastle; and while, to prevent their outcries in the City of London, he minced the Navy of England into cruizers and convoys, every other service was neglected. I say it with truth (I say it with concern, considering who was his associate), this was the year of the worst Administration that I have seen in England; for now Newcastle’s incapacity was left to its full play. While conjoined with Sir Robert Walpole, the attention of the latter to the security of the House of Brunswick, and to the preservation of public tranquillity, prevented the mischiefs that the Duke’s insufficience might have occasioned. If Lord Granville, his next coadjutor, was rash and dangerous, yet he ventured with spirit, and had great ideas and purposes in view. He provided not the means of execution, but an heroic plan was not wanting; and if he improperly provoked some allies, he stuck at nothing to engross the whole co-operation of others. Mr. Pelham was too timorous not to provide against complaint: his life was employed in gathering up the slips of his brother. But now Fox was called in to support a Government, from a share in which it was determined he should be excluded, and every part of which, where he had influence, it was a measure with Newcastle to weaken, the consequences could not but be fatal—and fatal they were! Indeed, Fox himself was not totally excusable. He came in, despairing of the prosperity of his country; and neither conversant in, nor attentive to the province allotted to him; he thought too much of wresting the remains of power from his competitors. He had neither the patriotism which forms a virtuous character, nor the love of fame which composes a shining one, and often supplies the place of the other. His natural bent was the love of power, with a soul generous and profuse; but growing a fond father, he became a provident father—and from a provident father to a rapacious man, the transition was but too easy!
In the midst of the anxious suspense I have mentioned, on June 3rd, came news that Admiral Byng, after a very tedious passage, arriving at Gibraltar on the 2nd of May, had, according to his orders, demanded of General Fowke, the Governor, a battalion to be transported to Minorca; but that the Governor, instead of obeying these directions, had called a Council of War, where, in pursuance of the opinion of engineers whom they consulted, it was determined to be impracticable to fling succours into St. Philip’s, and that it would be weakening the garrison of Gibraltar to part with so much force, which accordingly was refused.
But the same post brought an account that occasioned still more astonishment and dismay. Mazzoni, the Spanish Minister at Paris, transmitted to D’Abreu, the Spanish Resident in England, the copy of a letter which Monsieur Machault had received from Galissonière, the French Admiral, and which had been assiduously communicated to foreign Ministers, relating “That on May 18th, the French Admiral, as he lay off Mahon, had perceived the English squadron, who had approached nearer on the 19th, but seemed unwilling to engage. That on the 20th, the English had the advantage of the wind, but still seemed unwilling to fight: that the engagement, however, had been entamé, but could not be universal, for the English kept trop serrés: that two or three English ships had sheered off; that night separated the fleets; that he (Galissonière) had lost thirty-eight men, and had nine officers wounded; that he had taken no English ship, but had prevented their flinging succours into Mahon. That he had expected to be attacked again the next day, but, to his great surprise, found the English had disappeared.”
It is necessary to be well acquainted with the disposition of a free, proud, fickle, and violent people, before one can conceive the indignation occasioned by this intelligence. Nothing can paint it so strongly as what was its instant consequences. Sir Edward Hawke and Admiral Saunders were immediately dispatched in the Antelope to supersede Byng and West, to arrest and bring them prisoners to England. This was the first movement; the second should have been to reflect, that there was not the least ground for this information but what was communicated through the channel of Spanish agents (not very friendly to Britain,) from the vapouring letter of the enemy’s own Admiral, interested to heighten or palliate his own conduct:—this should have been the second thought, but it was long ere it was suffered to place itself. In the Antelope, a little cargo of courage, as it was called, were sent at the same time Lord Tyrawley and Lord Panmure, to supersede General Fowke, and take the government of Gibraltar. Is it credible, that Lord Tyrawley, dispatched with such vaunted expedition, was the actual Governor of Minorca, where he ought to have been from the beginning of the war?
The impression against Mr. Byng was no sooner taken, than every art and incident that could inflame it were industriously used and adopted. Though he had demanded the Mediterranean service as his right, and had pressed for it as the scene of his father’s[61] glory, his courage was now called in question, and omens were recollected to have foretold this miscarriage. A letter from him before the engagement had mentioned nothing of Minorca; it only said, that if he found the French too strong, he would retire under the cannon of Gibraltar. The King was now reported to have dashed this letter on the ground in a passion, saying, “This man will not fight!”—his Majesty, it seems, had great skill in the symptoms of cowardice! He was represented, too, as neither eating nor sleeping, and as lamenting himself that this account would be his death. As Minorca was but too likely to follow the fate of Calais, his Ministers prepared to write Mahon on that heart, which had never yet felt for any English possession. The Duke, whose sensibility on this occasion can less be doubted, took care to be quoted too: he said, “We are undone! Sea and land are cowards! I am ashamed of my profession!”
But on the arrival of the Admiral’s own dispatch, an abstract of which was immediately published, the rage of the people rose to the height. The letter spoke the satisfaction of an officer, who thought he had done his duty, and done it well—an air of triumph, that seemed little to become a man who had left the French masters of the sea, and the garrison of St. Philip’s without hope of relief. Their despair on the disappearance of the British fleet must have been extreme, and could not fail to excite the warmest compassion here. The Admiral was burned in effigy in all the great towns; his seat and park in Hertfordshire were assaulted by the mob, and with difficulty saved. The streets and shops swarmed with injurious ballads, libels, and prints, in some of which was mingled a little justice on the Ministers. Charles Townshend undertook a weekly paper, called the Test, of which only one number was published: he had too much mercury and too little ill-nature to continue a periodical war. We shall see in the following winter that some of the persons attacked were rather more settled in their passions, when they revived the title of this paper, and turned it on its patrons.
As I shall soon be obliged to open a blacker scene than what has hitherto employed my pen, I will take leave of the preceding period with these few remarks. Considering how seldom the world is blessed with a government really good, and that the best are generally but negatively good, I am inclined to pronounce the times of which I have been writing, happy. Every art and system that brings advantage to the country was permitted: commerce was in no shape checked: liberty, not being wanton, nay, being complaisant, was not restrained. The Church was moderate, and, when the Ministry required it, yielding. If the Chancellor was ravenous, and arbitrary, and ambitious, he moved too deliberately and too gravely, to bring on any eminent mischief. If the Duke of Newcastle was fond of power, and capricious, and fickle, and false, they were the whims of a child: he circumscribed the exertion of his pomp to laying perhaps the first stone of a building at Cambridge, for a benefaction to which he was forced to borrow a hundred pounds. His jealousy was not of the privileges of Parliament, but lest some second among his favourites should pay more court to his first favourite than to him; and if he shifted his confidence, and raised but to depress, and was communicative but to betray, he moved in a narrow circle, and the only victims of his whims were men who had shifted and betrayed as often, and who deserved no better fortune. If the Duke was haughty and rigorous, he was satisfied with acting within the sphere of the Army, and was content to govern it, not to govern by it. If the King was too partial to Hanover, and was unnecessarily profuse of subsidies to Germany, perhaps it was the only onerous grievance; and the King, who did no more harm, and the Ministers, who by vailing to this passion, purchased the power of doing no more harm, certainly constituted no very bad Government. The occasions of war called forth another complexion—but we must proceed with a little regularity.
The reconciliation of the King and his nephew of Prussia had given great umbrage to the Empress-Queen. England had heaped as great obligations on the House of Austria as can be conferred by one nation on another; great enough almost to touch the obdurate heart of policy, and infuse real amity and gratitude. But the Princess in question had imbibed passions still more human. Offended pride and plundered dignity had left no soft sensation in her heart. She was a woman, a queen, a bigot, an Austrian. A heretic her friend, embracing a heretic her enemy, left no shades in the colour of their heresy. France bid high for her friendship, and purchased it, by bidding up to her revenge. They made a treaty of neutrality, called only defensive during this war; as if Princes could not leap from peace to war but through a necessary medium. This news was received with indignation: England considered this desertion as almost Rebellion in a people whom she had long kept in her pay with regret. Memorable were the wise and moderate words of Lord Granville to Coloredo, the Austrian Minister, who, in a visit, endeavoured to palliate this league. The Earl said, “We understand it as only a treaty of neutrality, and can but be glad of it; the people in general look on it otherwise; and I fear a time will come when it may be right for us, and may be our inclination, to assist your mistress again; but the prepossession against her will be too strong—nobody then will dare to be a Lord Granville.”
The lawsuit with Princess Emily for free passage into Richmond Park, which I have formerly mentioned, continued. By advice of the Attorney-General, she now allowed ladders over the wall, without standing a trial.[62] I will here finish all I have to say on this head. This concession did not satisfy; the people sued for gates for foot passengers, and in the year 1758 obtained them; on which the Princess in a passion entirely abandoned the park. Her mother, Queen Caroline, had formerly wished to shut up St. James’s Park, and asked Sir Robert Walpole what it would cost her to do it. He replied, “Only a crown, madam.”
July 7th.—The attack on Leicester House was renewed. A Cabinet Council was held to consider a message which Newcastle and the Chancellor proposed should be sent in his Majesty’s name to the Prince, to know if he adhered to living with his mother, and to the demand of having Lord Bute for his Groom of the Stole. Mr. Fox asked if the Prince had ever made such a demand? “Oh! yes,” said Newcastle. “By whom?” asked Fox. Newcastle—“Oh! by Munchausen and others.” The fact was, the Prince had most privately, by Munchausen, requested it as a particular favour; and it was extraordinary that Newcastle had not seized with alacrity an opportunity of ingratiating himself with the successor, without the knowledge of his master. The truth was, he was overruled by the Chancellor, who having been slighted and frowned on by the Princess in the winter, was determined to be revenged; and the gentle method he took was to embroil the Royal Family, and blast the reputation of the mother of the Heir-apparent. Accordingly, this second message was sent by Lord Waldegrave.
The Prince answered in writing, “That since the King did him the honour to ask him the question, he did hope to have leave to continue with his mother, as her happiness so much depended on it—for the other point, he had never directly asked it—yet, since encouraged, he would explain himself; and from the long knowledge and good opinion he had of Lord Bute, he did desire to have him about his person.”
As if this letter confirmed, instead of contradicting their assertions, the two Ministers produced it at the same Council. Lord Granville opened the deliberation, and began to favour Lord Bute; but finding how unwelcome such advice was, he turned short and said, it was best to proceed no further; as there must be a quarrel in the Royal family, it was best the King should do nothing. The Duke of Devonshire said, with great decency, he hoped that was not the case; he hoped they were met to prevent such a rupture. “Oh! yes,” replied Lord Granville, “it must happen; the Prince has declared he will use ill all that shall be placed about him; and though young Lords will ambition the situation, they will not endure to be treated like footmen: the King will treat Lord Bute like a footman; and then he will make the Prince use the others in the same manner. This family always has and will quarrel from generation to generation.”
Mr. Fox then observed, that as it would fall to his province in the House of Commons to defend the King’s refusal, if his Royal Highness should petition there for a larger allowance, he must know on what ground to defend it, for the Opposition would produce his Majesty’s former message, as evidence that the King had thought it right the Prince of Wales should have 40,000l. a year. “You must explain,” said the Chancellor, “that in the first message something was meant which was known to both parties”—and then went into a formal pleading against the Prince, at the conclusion of which Newcastle prevailed to have the determination put off for the present; though, on being pressed by Fox, he agreed that it should be considered again. After sacrificing the Princess in this cruel manner, they persuaded the King that Fox was making his court to her.
At this conjuncture, the great office of Chief Justice being vacant by the death of Sir Dudley Rider, Murray demanded it without a competitor, because above competition; and agreeably to his constant asseverations, that he meant to rise by his profession, not by the House of Commons; though the jealousy of his aspiring in the latter had signally contributed to throw Pitt into his then opposition. As Murray was equally the buckler of Newcastle against his ally, Fox, and his antagonist, Pitt, one may conceive how a nature so apt to despond from conscious insufficience was alarmed at this event. No words can paint the distress it occasioned more strongly than what Charles Townshend said to Murray himself on the report of his intended promotion. “I wish you joy,” said he, “or rather myself, for you will ruin the Duke of Newcastle by quitting the House of Commons, and the Chancellor by going into the House of Lords.” The apostrophe was frank, considering Newcastle was his uncle;[63] but tenderness for his family seldom checked the burst of Townshend’s vivacity. It was at the same period he said, when the struggle about Lord Bute was depending, “Silly fellow for silly fellow; I think it is as well to be governed by my uncle with a blue riband, as by my cousin[64] with a green one.”
What contributed to make the want of Murray more embarrassing was the confusion that followed the loss of Minorca, of which the account came on July 14th. The French, who had kept us alarmed with the fears of an invasion, while they made immense preparations at Toulon, had sailed on the 7th of April, and landed with 16,000 men at Ciudadella on the 18th. Byng had sailed but on the same day. The garrison of Mahon, which had retired into St. Philip’s, consisted of 2800 men. Galissonière had blocked up the port from whence Captain Edgecombe, with his little squadron of three men of war and five frigates, had escaped, and were gone to meet Mr. Byng. As the roads had been broken up, and the works of the assailants were to be practised on firm rock, the trenches were not opened till the 8th of May; and from that time to the 20th they had made no impression. The engagement in sight of the fort, and the disappearance and despair of all succour which followed, had as little effect on the resolution of the garrison. They continued to fire obstinately on the besiegers till June 6th; and Marshal Richelieu gained so little immediate advantage from the retreat of the English squadron, that he was obliged to demand additional force from France. Having received it, on the 6th he opened a grand scene of batteries, which by the 14th had effectuated several breaches. Yet those brave men still held out, and in proportion as no account came of their surrender, the fame of Blakeney rose.
At last, it was determined in the French Council of War to storm the place on the 27th at night, which was performed accordingly, and three forts were taken. At the Queen’s Fort (the last of the three), the fate of Minorca, and the truth of its defence were decided. Lieutenant-Colonel Jefferies, the soul of the garrison, unwilling to trust so important a commission to another, too rashly flew with one hundred men to defend the last redoubt—he found it taken—attempted to retire, and was made prisoner. This happened about midnight: by five next morning a suspension of arms was agreed on to bury the dead, and at two in the afternoon the garrison capitulated. They obtained honourable conditions. If it is asked what part the hero Blakeney took in the event, it must be answered, that, during the whole siege, he had been in bed with the gout, and executed all his glory by deputy. But not only a Commander was wanting: when the general assault was made, many of the British soldiers had done unremitted duty for three days; and they had so few officers, that scarce a mine was fired, and some were attempted so late, that the French carried off the matches before they could take effect.[65]
If the clamours of the people rose on the confirmation of this misfortune, so did the terrors of the Administration. The very first effects of their fear showed that, if they had neglected Minorca, they were at least prepared to transfer the guilt to others. They descended even to advertise in the Gazette, that orders were sent to every port to arrest Admiral Byng, in case he should not have been met by Sir Edward Hawke. All the little attorneys on the Circuit contributed to blow up the flame against the Admiral, at the same time directing its light from the original criminals. New offers were made to Murray, if he would decline for eight months the post of Chief Justice and the Peerage that was to accompany it.[66] The very distress that made Newcastle catch so eagerly at his assistance, was sufficient warning to make him refuse. He knew it was safer to expound laws than to be exposed to them: and he said peremptorily at last, that if he was not to be Chief Justice, neither would he any longer be Attorney-General.
July 26th.—The prisoners arrived at Portsmouth; Mr. Byng was immediately committed to close confinement. His younger brother who went to meet him, was so struck with the abuse he found wherever he passed, that he fell ill on the first sight of the Admiral, and died next day in convulsions. Byng himself expressed no emotions but of surprise at the rigour of his treatment, persisting in declarations of having beaten the French. West, whose behaviour had been most gallant, was soon distinguished from his chief, and was carried to Court by Lord Anson. The King said to West, “I am glad to hear you have done your duty so well; I wish every body else had!” Anson himself did not escape so honourably: his incapacity grew the general topic of ridicule; and he was joined in all the satiric prints with his father-in-law, Newcastle, and Fox. A new species of this manufacture now first appeared, invented by George Townshend: they were caricatures on cards. The original one, which had amazing vent, was of Newcastle and Fox, looking at each other, and crying, with Peachum, in the Beggar’s Opera, “Brother, brother, we are both in the wrong.” On the Royal Exchange a paper was affixed, advertising, “Three kingdoms to be let; inquire of Andrew Stone, broker, in Lincoln’s-Inn-fields.”
From Portsmouth, Byng, strictly guarded, at once to secure him from the mob and inflame their resentment, was transferred to Greenwich. His behaviour continued so cheerfully firm and unconcerned, that those who thought most moderately of his conduct, thought full as moderately of his understanding. Yet, if he could be allowed a judge, Lord Anson had, in the year 1755, given the strongest testimonial in Byng’s favour, recommending him particularly for an essential service, as one whose head and heart would always answer. As a forerunner to the doom of the Admiral, so much demanded from, and so much intended by the Ministry, General Fowke was brought to his trial for disobedience of orders in refusing the regiment for Minorca. He pleaded the latitude and discretion allowed to him by his orders, and the imminent danger of his important government. Though the danger of that was increased by the probability that France would either offer Minorca to purchase the alliance of Spain, or assistance to recover Gibraltar, yet Fowke found neither efficient to save him; no, nor the diversity of opinions in his Judges; yet it was plain from their sentence, that they by no means thought he came under the rigour of the law, condemning him only to be suspended for a year, for having mistaken his orders. When a man is tried for an absolute breach of orders, and appears only to have mistaken them, in equity one should think that punishment ought to fall on those who gave the orders. However, as the mob was to be satiated with victims, that the real guilty might escape, Fowke was broken by the King, and his regiment given to Jefferies.
The next symptom of discontent was an address to the King from Dorsetshire, demanding an inquiry into the loss of Minorca, and justice on the culpable. This flame spread: the counties of Huntingdon, Buckingham, Bedford, Suffolk, Shropshire, Surrey, Somerset, and Lancashire, with the great towns, as Bristol, Chester, Leominster, and others, followed the example, and directed their members to promote the inquiry. But the strongest and most dictatorial was that presented from the city of London; to which the trembling Ministers persuaded the King to pledge his royal word that he would save no delinquent from justice. A promise that, being dictated by men secure of the Parliament, plainly indicated on what class of criminals punishment was not designed to be inflicted. The Duke of Newcastle, indeed, could with more propriety than the rest engage the King in a promise, seemingly indefinite, he, who with a volubility of timorous folly, when a deputation of the city had made representations to him against the Admiral, blurted out, “Oh! indeed he shall be tried immediately—he shall be hanged directly.”
While England was thus taken up with the contemplation of her own losses and misconduct, a vaster war, more ample revolutions, and a novel hero, were on the point of occupying the theatre of Europe: before I lay open this scene, a word must be said on the situation of Sweden. France had long dictated in that indigent senate. That influence, however, was too precarious and liable to too many changes, to satisfy the view of commanding a steady ally. Though senators are far from being incorruptible, the liberty of their country and its glory, will often operate, and make them feel the weight of the richest chains. A Court, at once arbitrary and necessitous, France thought could never be tempted to slip out of their hands. Accordingly, they laid a plan for making the King absolute; and the conjuncture seemed well chosen. He was much devoted to his Queen, sister of Prussia, a woman artful and ambitious—yet the King had too much gratitude and virtue to yield to the temptation—he neither desired to be arbitrary nor French.—It remained for the members of a free senate to act the ignominious part, which had been more excusable, as more natural in a King. France then threw all her weight into the faction opposite to the Court. A conspiracy was pretended to be discovered, of a design in the King to make himself arbitrary. Every affront that he would have deserved, had the aspersion been true, was offered to him and the Queen: their power was annihilated; their friends proscribed. The King added to the merit of refusing despotism the virtue of not endeavouring to recover his legal authority; nor let the weakness of his means be urged: no King is so important as not to be able to sacrifice some of his subjects to the most chimeric pretensions.
The greater scene we must trace farther back. The King of Prussia was the point of hatred in which the passions of several Courts met. The Empress-queen could never digest the loss of Silesia; the Czarina had long suspected him of tampering to set the young Czar, John, on the throne, the nephew of the Queen of Prussia. The Court of Saxony dreaded so powerful a neighbour; and, while it trembled for its manufacture of porcelain, could scarce forgive the contempt with which the King of Prussia had left it untouched, when he formerly made himself master of Dresden. Yet perhaps the two latter Princes, the one in the arms of her grenadiers, the other in his china palace, or among his bears, had suffered their apprehensions and indignation to cool, if their Ministers had had as little activity. For the Empress-queen, her Ministers might serve her passions, they could not outrun them. The war that approached must be traced to its source, ere we can fix on the original aggressor. The House of Austria had long meditated the recovery of that predominant power, which so many circumstances and intrigues had concurred to unite in the person of Charles the Fifth. Ferdinand the Second had acted with most open violence; but almost all the race had usurped whenever they saw a proper moment. Silesia had been wrested from the House of Brandenburg. At the very period that the Empire vanished from the House of Austria, the Crown of Prussia fell on the head of a man, who thought much of aggrandizing himself, more of distinguishing himself, not at all of the justice or injustice of the means of attaining either. On the contrary, he seemed to admire the subtlety of policy as much for its beauty as for its use. He at once imposed on the Queen of Hungary and invaded her. The provocation was vehement; the usurpations and arts of her House were taken from her, and turned against her; and, after a bloody war, she had no resource but in swearing to new treaties, with intention of violating them on the first opportunity:—that opportunity was so eagerly sought, that she could not wait till it arrived; and many busy emissaries conspired to hasten the crisis.
Of these, the chief was Count Bruhl, the favourite of the King of Poland. This man, whom no merit, or no merit that is known, had recommended to Augustus the Third, governed absolutely, I may say, reigned in Saxony, for the Prince, who hated pomp, and divided his time between his priests and his forests, chose that Bruhl should be his proxy to display that grandeur, which Germans take for empire—and he could not have made a properer choice. As Elector, Bruhl[67] was magnificent, expensive, tawdry, vain;—as Minister, weak and false. He had two or three suits of clothes for every day in the year:—strangers were even carried to see his magazine of shoes! This man, who had mortgaged the revenues of Saxony to support his profusion, and who had prepared nothing but baubles against a Prince that lived in a camp, with the frugality of a common soldier,—this daring trifler aspired to form a league with two mighty Empires, to overturn the throne of Prussia, and pretended to a share in the spoils.
At the same time the Councils of Vienna were directed by Count Kaunitz, a man lately returned from an Embassy to Paris, where he had pushed all the luxurious effeminacy of dress and affectation to an excess common to imitators, and of all imitators most common to Germans. I will mention but one instance: it was fashionable to wear little powder: every morning when he dressed, he had the whole air of a room put in agitation with powder, and when announced to be properly impregnated, he just presented himself in it, and received the atoms in equal dispersion over his hair. These were the politicians that took upon them to annihilate the House of Brandenburg at the very period that it was headed by Frederic the Third. I mention them only to show what pismires roused that lion. Yet Kaunitz had parts—Bruhl had no more than just served to govern his master’s none. The tools associated to their plot were such as recommended themselves by activity, cunning, or inveteracy: yet one they had, sensible enough to negotiate a conspiracy, and cool enough to conduct it: his name Count Fleming, a haughty and sullen Saxon, who had been employed in England, and was now at Vienna.
In the year 1745, Bruhl had made a partition-treaty with the Empress-queen, by which part of the King of Prussia’s dominions were to be allotted to Saxony. That treaty had produced nothing but the seizure of Dresden by Frederic. He palliated the violent possession he had taken of Silesia, to which he thought he had a right, by the moderation with which he restored Saxony, to which he had no title but provocation. Yet Augustus had scarce sworn to the articles of a peace by which he recovered his dominions, before he was tempted to a violation of them by the Court of Vienna. As eager as Bruhl was to close with perfidy, yet he could not forget the invasion of Dresden: he suggested that a previous treaty between the Courts of Vienna and Petersburg would expedite and secure their common wishes. To facilitate this union, the Saxon Ministers in every Northern Court received secret instructions to spread suggestions and alarms of great machinations at Berlin against the Czarina. As Bruhl was not penurious of lies, he took the pains to dictate these slanders himself in the blackest terms. In his intercepted despatches one sees how successfully he administered his calumnies, till the Czarina believed herself aimed at even by assassination—and this project of terrifying her into an attack upon the King of Prussia, Bruhl had the modesty to call a somewhat artful, though good intention.
The Czarina was an amiable woman, of no great capacity. She had been deprived of a throne to which she had pretensions, and had passed her youth in the terror which must accompany such a claim in a despotic empire, where, if civilized manners were stealing in, humanity to a competitor was one of the last arts of which they were likely to find or adopt a pattern. Yet she had been treated with great lenity, and, which perhaps was still more extraordinary, as the addition of gratitude, another virtue, made the imitation still more difficult, returned it. Her first transport on her rapid elevation was devout mercy; she made a vow never to put any person to death, and adhered to it; Siberia and the prisons, during her reign, were crowded with criminals, tortured, but never executed. She not only spared the little dethroned Czar, John, and had him educated with great care, but was as indulgent as she could be with safety to her rival the Princess Anne, his mother. With so much tenderness of heart, it was not wonderful that her heart was entirely tender—and how slight was that unbounded abuse of power, which only tended to gratify an unbounded inclination! Let us compare the daughters of two ferocious men, and see which was sovereign of a civilized nation, which of a barbarous one. Both were Elizabeths. The daughter of Peter was absolute, yet spared a competitor and a rival; and thought the person of an Empress had sufficient allurements for as many of her subjects as she chose to honour with the communication. Elizabeth, of England, could neither forgive the claim of Mary Stuart nor her charms, but ungenerously imprisoned her when imploring protection, and without the sanction of either despotism or law, sacrificed Mary to her great and little jealousy. Yet this Elizabeth piqued herself on chastity; and while she practised every ridiculous art of coquetry to be admired at an unseemly age, kept off lovers whom she encouraged, and neither gratified her own desires nor their ambition:—who can help preferring the honest, open-hearted, barbarian Empress?
Besides an attempt on her person, the Czarina was made to believe that Frederic had designs on Courland, on Polish Prussia, and Dantzick; and that France, Prussia, and Sweden had fixed a successor if a vacancy should happen in Poland. She signed the league with the Empress-queen, and resolved to attack the King of Prussia. Saxony was summoned to accede, on its own terms of having two Duchies and three Circles dismembered, on the conquest of Prussia. Bruhl engaged his master to sign, but obtained so much favour as to have the secret articles concealed: and having obtained that indulgence, spared no falsehoods to deny the existence of any secret articles at all: then endeavoured to draw the King of England to accede to the same secret articles; and persisted all the time in the strongest professions of friendship to the King of Prussia. But Bruhl, as the King of Prussia said, had more art in forming plots than in concealing them; and having to do with a vigilant Prince, whose own practice had taught him not to trust to professions, every lie that was despatched from the Secretary’s office at Dresden was accompanied with a duplicate to Berlin. Bruhl, so indefatigable and so cautious, little thought that Frederic knew all his secrets before they reached the places of their destination.
Had the King of Prussia wanted intelligence, the preparations of his great enemies, and the folly of his little ones, would have alarmed him. The troops of the two Empresses were in motion, yet neither so much as professed an intention of succouring the King of England their ally. The Empress-queen excused herself in form, when her assistance, so dearly purchased, was demanded. The Muscovite Empress was raising forces against the new ally of Britain with the very money she had received to hold her troops in readiness for England: and the Court of Saxony, to facilitate their junction with the Austrian forces cut a new road to Bohemia, which Bruhl had the ostentatious imprudence to christen in an inscription, the military road. The King of Prussia was the only object against whom all these armaments could be levelled; and they were intended to crush him as early as the year 1755: yet the contracting powers had acted with so little providence, that not one of them had magazines, arms, provisions, or money sufficient to set their great machine in motion. The Czarina, though mistress of such a continent, had neither sailors, nor soldiers, nor treasure; and having begun to march her troops, was reduced to recall them, and to accept a million of florins from Vienna. The Empress-queen had affected great economy and regulation of her finances; but the sums that were squeezed from the subject, as a foundation of frugality, were wasted on buildings, and ceremonies, and pageants. The Emperor indeed was rich, and banker to his wife: she indulged him in this only pleasure: surrounded by the frightfullest Maids of Honour that she could select, she permitted him to hoard what she never let him have temptation or opportunity to squander.
However, towards the middle of the summer of 1756, the bomb was ready to burst; and Frederic (as he wrote to his uncle of England,) saw it was more prudent “prævenire quam præveniri.” Yet, by no means ambitious of a defensive war, and fully apprised that the first stroke he should strike would set his Crown, his reputation, his life at stake, he attempted to avert the storm; at least, resolved to convince Europe that he was not the aggressor. He asked of the Empress-queen the meaning of those mighty armaments. She gave him an evasive answer. He demanded a categoric one; concluding his letter with these words,—“Point de reponse en style d’oracle.” Yet the Pythian, though she grew more haughty, was not less enigmatic. He had told her that he would take an ambiguous answer as a hostile declaration: accordingly, towards the end of August, at a great supper, the King of Prussia whispered Mitchell, the British resident, to come to him at three in the morning, when he carried him to his camp, and told him, there were a hundred thousand men setting out that instant, they knew not whither; and bade him write to his master, that he was going to defend his Majesty’s dominions and his own. He ordered two Armies into Upper and Lower Silesia, assembled another body at Glatz, and left another in Prussia to oppose the Russians. Yet, though Frederic knew that his most numerous and most determined enemies were in Bohemia, he would not venture to leave Saxony behind him. He marched with another Army to Leipsic, and dispatched a sixth to Dresden—yet again endeavoured peace. A third time he sent to the Empress-Queen, that if she would give a positive assurance of not attacking him that year or the next, he would directly withdraw his troops: she refused that satisfaction—and Saxony fell an instantaneous sacrifice. The King of Poland, however, was so far prepared as to have encamped his little Army in the only strong situation he had; to which, on the approach of the Prussian army, he withdrew. Frederic, with insulting politeness, sent word to Augustus, that he had ordered relays of post-horses to be prepared for him, if he chose, as it was the season of holding the Diet, to go to Poland. He promised his protection to the Royal Family and Civil Officers, “Jusqu’à votre ministre,” said he, “qui est trop au dessous de moi pour le nommer.” He lamented Augustus being in the hands of a man, whom he offered to prove guilty of the grossest conspiracies.
Dresden was not an easier conquest than a contented one. They were rigid Protestants, offended by a bigoted Catholic Court, and ruined by an oppressive Court. They were charmed to see a King at Church, and with pleasure remembered Frederic at their devotions when he conquered them before. Augustus, and Bruhl, and 12,000 men were in the strong camp at Pirna; the Queen and Saxon Royal Family remained at Dresden. Keith was ordered to search the archives there for the original pieces, of which Frederic had the copies in his hands. The Queen made all the resistance in her power, and told the Marshal that, as his master had promised to use no violence, all Europe would exclaim against this outrage—“And then,” said she, with spirit, “you will be the victim. Depend upon it, your King is a man to sacrifice you to his own honour.” Keith was startled, and sent for further orders; and on receiving reiteration of them, possessed himself of the papers, though the Queen herself sat on the most material trunk, and would not rise, till he convinced her that he could not avoid proceeding to force.
Frederic, in the meantime, was employed in straitening the camp at Pirna, and unavoidably wasted the season for pushing into Bohemia before the Austrians were well prepared to receive him. General Brown advanced to disengage the Saxons, and Keith, who was ready to check his progress, wrote to the King that he was on the point of giving battle. Frederic, leaving Augustus blocked up, posted away to his little Army, and arrived just in time to command the charge. The battle was fought at Lowoschutz on September 29th. The Prussians were not above 25,000 men; Brown had double their number; yet Frederic thought himself, or endeavoured to be thought, victorious. The inveteracy between the contending nations was remarkable, but the bravery of the Prussians most signalized, eight squadrons sustaining the efforts of thirty-two of Austrians. Brown retired a little; but with so much order, and he and Piccolomini remained so firmly entrenched, that the King would not venture to renew the attack. With the same vivacity of expedition with which he had left it, he returned to his Army besieging that of Augustus. October 11th, Brown, with 15,000 select men, made forced marches to arrive on the back of the camp of Pirna. This was in private concert with the Saxons, who, flinging a bridge over the Elbe at Konigstein, passed the river on the 12th under favour of a foggy night. Darkness and the mist dispersing ere they had made four leagues, to their amazement they found the King of Prussia between them and the Austrians, and master of all the defiles. He advised them to return to their camp. They prepared to follow an advice which it was to no purpose to reject, but, to the increase of their astonishment, found that this universal man had battered down their bridge. They laid down their arms. Augustus shut himself up in the castle of Konigstein, where Frederic sent word to the Queen that she would be indulged in visiting him; and that care was taken to furnish her Lord with provisions and diversions.
I have abridged this narrative as much as possible. From this time, the King of Prussia was too much connected with our affairs to be passed over in silence; but his actions have been too singular and too splendid to want illustration from a private annalist. Europe was the tablet on which he has written his own memoirs with his sword, as he will probably with his pen. Besides, I live too near the times, and too far from the scene of action, to be able to penetrate into the exact detail of his campaigns and measures, and to winnow the truth from such a variety of interested, exaggerated, contested relations, as are at once produced by eminent glory, and strive to obscure it. I shall observe the same circumspection whenever I have further occasion to mention this extraordinary man.