"The soldiery became more and more disorderly, and I had to admonish them to be on their good behaviour before the peasants, who were looking at and listening to us from their windows, and making their jests upon us.
"At last, thank God, the rain ceased; a dragoon had led us to a meadow which lay hard by the road, along which I stationed the right wing, and taking command, told the force off into divisions and half-divisions. Whilst I was doing this I heard some horses in the distance coming at a great pace, so I thought, here comes the enemy; I forthwith called out to the right wing to send out some men and challenge the new-comers; at the same time I ran up to one of the grenadiers, and taking his musket from his hand, as during the process of dividing the men I had given up mine, I placed myself with some grenadiers in the middle of the road, and called out, 'Who goes there?' I was answered by a well-known voice, which I immediately recognized as that of Major von Benkendorf, as he did mine likewise. When I challenged him, he called to me, 'Do you not know me?' 'Yes, thank God!' I knew him by his voice, but could not do so before he spoke, on account of the darkness. Thus did God send to the children of Israel in the wilderness; here was the word fulfilled: God forsakes none who trust in him always.
"The first words of the major were: 'Children, what are you doing here?' I answered, Herr Major, God only knows, not I; we have been brought away in such a fashion, that we hardly know how we have come here.' He asked further: 'Did you all march?' 'Yes, there is no longer any one there except the sick, and those they have taken prisoners.' 'Oh, mon Dieu!' exclaimed he, 'we must return thither, even were we to sit down before the gates; where are your majors?' 'At the Schwallungen inn.' Then he called out, 'Allons, children! march away;' and galloped in all haste to the inn, where he may have found them at a good bottle of wine, but what kind of greeting he gave them, or compliments, I have not heard."
Thus far we have the valiant Rauch. In the farther part of his diary he relates how the Gotha troops regained courage, returned to Wasungen and there drove out the Meiningens, who were equally eager to run away, as they had done, and again established themselves there.
Immediately after the first capture of Wasungen, the government at Meiningen, in great consternation, had sent Frau von Gleichen with her husband there in a carriage, attended by Gotha troops. But it was no great pleasure to them to see that the cause of the quarrel was done away with; so the poor court dignitaries met with a cold reception; the health of both was broken by sorrow, vexation, and long imprisonment. In 1748, Herr von Gleichen died, and his wife soon after. Meanwhile, flying-sheets and memorials, mandates of the Imperial chamber, and ministerial missives concerning this affair, flew all over Germany; the Gotha troops kept possession of Wasungen. Anthony Ulrich obstinately refused to acknowledge the claims of Gotha to indemnification, and the voices of numerous princes were loud in condemning the sentence of the Imperial chamber, and the execution of it by Gotha, as a violation of the sovereign rights of a German ruler. Frederick the Great did so likewise.
Just then, when the Duke of Saxe-Gotha was in a desperate position, a new prospect and a new subject of quarrel presented themselves to him. The Duke of Weimar had died, and had settled that his cousin of Gotha was to be guardian to his only son during his minority. The Duke of Gotha speedily entered upon the guardianship, and caused homage to be sworn to him: upon this, a violent altercation again sprang up between him, and the Duke of Coburg and Anthony Ulrich, who both contested the right of the Gotha prince to the guardianship. Then Frederick II. of Prussia offered his services to the Duke of Gotha, who was reduced to great extremities, on condition that he should obligingly offer him the small gift of two hundred picked men from the guards of Weimar. This was done; thus the Duke of Gotha purchased the administration of this country, and the settlement of the Wasunger strife, with two hundred men of the Weimar guards. Two hundred children of the soil of Weimar, to whom the quarrel mattered not in the least, were arbitrarily given away like a herd of sheep. Contrary to all justice, they were chaffered away by a foreign prince.
The two hundred followed King Frederick in the seven Years' war.
CONCLUSION.
This work ends with the name of the great king. The social condition of the country in his time, although very different from the present, is well known to us; and even minute particulars, have become, through its history and literature, the common property of the people. Frederick became the hero of the nation. The Germans have exalted him even more than Gustavus Adolphus. He ruled the minds of men far beyond the boundaries of his limited dominions. In the distant Alpine valleys, among men speaking another tongue, and holding another faith, he was reverenced as a saint both in pictures and writings. He was a powerful ruler, a genial commander, and what was more valued by the Germans, a great man in the highest of earthly positions. It was his personal appearance and manners which made foreigners and even enemies admire him. He inspired the people again with enthusiasm for German greatness, zeal for the highest earthly interests, and sympathy in a German state. In the course of three centuries, he was the third man round whom the national love and veneration had entwined itself; the second to whom it was granted to elevate and improve the character of the nation. For the Germans became better, richer, and happier, when they were carried beyond the narrow interests of their private life, and beyond their petty literary quarrels, by the appearance of a great character daringly aspiring to the highest objects, struggling, suffering, persevering, and firm. He was of their own blood, and in spite of his passion for what was French, he was a thorough child of Germany, reared in a hard time, and belonging to them. Under him, the grandsons of those citizens who had passed through the great war, began for the first time after a century to feel their own powers. We delight to see, how the poor poet sings the praises of him, who would so little appreciate the odes of the German Sappho, or the outpouring of elevated poetry; still more do we rejoice in seeing the whole people, even in Austria, contending on his behalf, his image penetrating into every family, and his name exciting everywhere party spirit, new interests, and political passions. This has been the greatest blessing of his whole life. He forced the private individual to take part in political life; he created a state for the German, which whether loved or hated, must become a continual object of care and watchfulness.
But though enthusiasm for a hero perhaps gives a capacity for the development of powers, it does not give stability. The Germans had yet to go through severe trials after the death of the great king. He had bequeathed to them the first beginning of a German State, but the ruins of the Empire of the middle ages lay defenceless against the western enemy. The curse which since the time of Charles V. had rested on the German Empire had not yet changed into a blessing. Once more was Germany overrun by a great army, once more did a league of German princes unite with a foreign conqueror, even the state of the great Frederick was shattered, the last hope seemed to have vanished, the German people were crushed.