For some time I had observed that Gretchen span no more, but on the other hand was employed in sewing, and that, too, on very fine work, which surprised me the more, as the days were already shortening, and winter was coming on. I thought no farther about it, only it troubled me that several times I had not found her at home in the morning as formerly, and could not learn, without importunity, whither she had gone. Yet I was destined one day to be surprised in a very odd manner. My sister, who was getting herself ready for a ball, asked me to fetch her some so-called Italian flowers, at a fashionable milliner's. They were made in convents, and were small and pretty; myrtles especially, dwarf-roses, and the like, came out quite beautifully and naturally. I granted her the favour, and went to the shop where I had already often been with her. Hardly had I entered and greeted the proprietress, than I saw sitting in the window a lady, who in a lace cap looked very young and pretty, and in a silk mantilla seemed very well shaped. I could easily recognize that she was an assistant, for she was occupied in fastening a ribbon and feathers upon a hat: The milliner showed me the long box with single flowers of various sorts; I looked them over, and as I made my choice glanced again towards the lady in the window; but how great was my astonishment when I perceived an incredible similarity to Gretchen, nay, was forced to be convinced at last that it was Gretchen herself. No doubt remained, when she winked with her eyes and gave me a sign that I must not betray our acquaintance. I now with my choosing and rejecting drove the milliner into despair more than even a lady could have done. I had, in fact, no choice, for I was excessively confused, and at the same time liked to linger, because it kept me near the girl, whose disguise annoyed me, though in that disguise she appeared to me more enchanting than ever. Finally, the milliner seemed to lose all patience, and with her own hands selected for me a whole bandbox full of flowers, which I was to place before my sister and let her choose for herself. Thus I was, as it were, driven out of the shop, while she sent the box first by one of her girls.
Scarcely had I reached home than my father caused me to be called, and communicated to me that it was now quite certain that the Archduke Joseph would be elected and crowned King of Rome. An event so highly important was not to be expected without preparation, nor allowed to pass with mere gaping and staring. He wished, therefore, he said, to go through with me the election and coronation-diaries of the two last coronations, as well as through the last capitulations of election, in order to remark what new conditions might be added in the present instance. The diaries were opened, and we occupied ourselves with them the whole day till far into the night, while the pretty girl, sometimes in her old house-dress, sometimes in her new costume, ever hovered before me, backwards and forwards among the most august objects of the Holy Roman Empire. This evening it was impossible to see her, and I lay awake through a very restless night. The study of yesterday was the next day zealously resumed, and it was not till towards evening that I found it possible to visit my fair one, whom I met again in her usual house-dress. She smiled when she saw me, but I did not venture to mention anything before the others. When the whole company sat quietly together again, she began and said, "It is unfair that you do not confide to our friend what we have lately resolved upon." She then continued to relate, that after our late conversation, in which the discussion was how any one could get on in the world, something was also said of the way in which a woman could enhance the value of her talent and labour, and advantageously employ her time. The cousins had consequently proposed that she should make an experiment at a milliner's who was just then in want of an assistant. They had, she said, arranged with the woman; she went there so many hours a-day, and was well paid; only when there she was obliged, for propriety's sake, to conform to a certain dress, which, however, she left behind her every time, as it did not at all suit her other modes of life and employment. I was indeed set at rest by this declaration, but it did not quite please me to know that the pretty girl was in a public shop, and at a place where the fashionable world found a convenient resort. But I betrayed nothing, and strove to work off my jealous care in silence. For this the younger cousin did not allow me a long time, as he once more came forward with a proposal for an occasional poem, told me all the personalities, and at once desired me to prepare myself for the invention and disposition of the work. He had already spoken with me several times concerning the proper treatment of such a theme, and as I was voluble in these cases, he readily asked me to explain to him circumstantially what is rhetorical in these things, to give him a notion of the matter, and to make use of my own and others' labours in this kind for examples. The young man had some brains, though he was without a trace of a poetical vein, and now he went so much into particulars, and wished to have such an account of everything, that I gave utterance to the remark: "It seems as if you wanted to encroach upon my trade and steal away my customers!" "I will not deny it," said he, smiling, "as I shall do you no harm by it. This will only continue to the time when you go to the university, and till then you must allow me still to profit something by your society." "Most cordially," I replied, and I encouraged him to draw out a plan, to choose a metre according to the character of his subject, and to do whatever else might seem necessary. He went to work in earnest, but did not succeed. I was in the end compelled to re-write so much of it, that I could more easily and better have written it all from the beginning myself. Yet this teaching and learning, this mutual labour, afforded us good entertainment: Gretchen took part in it and had many a pretty notion, so that we were all pleased, we may indeed say, happy. During the day she worked at the milliner's: in the evenings we generally met together, and our contentment was not even disturbed when at last the commissions for occasional poems began to leave off. Still we felt hurt once, when one of them came back under protest, because it did not suit the party who ordered it. We consoled ourselves, however, as we considered it our very best work, and could therefore declare the other a bad judge. The cousin, who was determined to learn something at any rate, resorted to the expedient of inventing problems, in the solution of which we always found amusement enough, but as they brought in nothing, our little banquets had to be much more frugally managed.
Preparations for the Election.
That great political object, the election and coronation of a King of Rome, was pursued with more and more earnestness. The assembling of the electoral college, originally appointed to take place at Augsburg in the October of 1763, was now transferred to Frankfort, and both at the end of this year and in the beginning of the next, preparations went forward, which should usher in this important business. The beginning was made by a parade never yet seen by us. One of our chancery officials on horseback, escorted by four trumpeters likewise mounted, and surrounded by a guard of infantry, read in a loud clear voice at all the corners of the city, a prolix edict, which announced the forthcoming proceedings, and exhorted the citizens to a becoming deportment suitable to the circumstances. The council was occupied with weighty considerations, and it was not long before the Imperial Quarter-Master, despatched by the Hereditary Grand Marshal, made his appearance, in order to arrange and designate the residences of the ambassadors and their suites, according to the old custom. Our house lay in the Palatine district, and we had to provide for a new but agreeable billetting. The middle story, which Count Thorane had formerly occupied, was given up to a cavalier of the Palatinate, and as Baron von Königsthal, the Nuremberg chargé d'affaires, occupied the upper floor, we were still more crowded than in the time of the French. This served me as a new excuse to be out of doors, and to pass the greater part of the day in the streets, that I might see all that was open to public view.
After the preliminary alteration and arrangement of the rooms in the town-house had seemed to us worth seeing, after the arrival of the ambassadors one after another, and their first solemn ascent in a body, on the 6th of February, had taken place, we admired the coming in of the imperial commissioners, and their ascent also to the Römer, which was made with great pomp. The dignified person of the Prince of Lichtenstein made a good impression; yet connoisseurs maintained that the showy liveries had already been used on another occasion, and that this election and coronation would hardly equal in brilliancy that of Charles the Seventh. We younger folks were content with what was before our eyes; all seemed to us very fine, and much of it perfectly astonishing.
The electoral congress was fixed at last for the 3rd of March. New formalities again set the city in motion, and the alternate visits of ceremony on the part of the ambassadors kept us always on our legs. We were compelled, too, to watch closely, as we were not only to gape about, but to note everything well, in order to give a proper report at home, and even to make out many little memoirs, on which my father and Herr von Königsthal had deliberated, partly for our exercise and partly for their own information. And certainly this was of peculiar advantage to me, as I was enabled very tolerably to keep a living election and coronation-diary, as far as regarded externals.
Baron Von Plotho.
The person who first of all made a durable impression upon me was the chief ambassador from the electorate of Mentz, Baron von Erthal, afterwards Elector. Without having anything striking in his figure, he was always highly pleasing to me in his black gown trimmed with lace. The second ambassador, Baron von Groschlag, was a well-formed man of the world, easy in his exterior, but conducting himself with great decorum. He everywhere produced a very agreeable impression. Prince Esterhazy, the Bohemian envoy, was not tall, though well-formed, lively, and at the same time eminently decorous, without pride or coldness. I had a special liking for him, because he reminded me of Marshal de Broglio. Yet the form and dignity of these excellent persons vanished, in a certain degree, before the prejudice that was entertained in favour of Baron von Plotho, the Brandenburg ambassador. This man, who was distinguished by a certain parsimony, both in his own clothes and in his liveries and equipages, had been greatly renowned from the time of the seven years' war, as a diplomatic hero. At Ratisbon, when the Notary April thought, in the presence of witnesses, to serve him with the declaration of outlawry which had been issued against his king, he had, with the laconic exclamation: "What! you serve:" thrown him, or caused him to be thrown, down stairs. We believed the first, because it pleased us best, and we could readily believe it of the little compact man, with his black, fiery eyes glancing here and there. All eyes were directed towards him, particularly when he alighted. There arose every time a sort of joyous whispering, and but little was wanting to a regular explosion, or a shout of Vivat! Bravo! So high did the king, and all who were devoted to him, body and soul, stand in favour with the crowd, among whom, besides the Frankforters, were Germans from all parts.
On the one hand these things gave me much pleasure; as all that took place, no matter of what nature it might be, concealed a certain meaning, indicated some internal relation, and such symbolic ceremonies again, for a moment, represented as living the old Empire of Germany, almost choked to death by so many parchments, papers, and books. But, on the other hand, I could not suppress a secret displeasure, when I was forced, at home, on my father's account, to transcribe the internal transactions, and at the same time to remark that here several powers, which balanced each other, stood in opposition, and only so far agreed, as they designed to limit the new ruler even more than the old one; that every one valued his influence only so far as he hoped to retain or enlarge his privileges, and better to secure his independence. Nay, on this occasion they were more attentive than usual, because they began to fear Joseph the Second, his vehemence and probable plans.
With my grandfather and other members of the council, whose families I used to visit, this was no pleasant time, they had so much to do with meeting distinguished guests, complimenting, and the delivery of presents. No less had the magistrate, both in general and in particular, to defend himself, to resist, and to protest, as every one on such occasions desires to extort something from him, or burden him with something, und few of those to whom he appeals support him, or lend him their aid. In short, all that I had read in Lersner's Chronicle of similar incidents on similar occasions, with admiration of the patience and perseverance of those good old councilmen, came once more vividly before my eyes.