“You dare to say that Prussia’s honor has been attacked, and to doubt that the king will hold the offender responsible for such an outrage?” exclaimed the queen, with flashing eyes. “The king, who is the incarnation of honor, will not permit even the shadow of a stain to fall on Prussia’s honor; in generous anger he will hurl back the insolent hand that will dare to shake the palladium of our honor.”
“Oh, if you think and speak thus,” said the prince, enthusiastically, “I have no longer any fears, but consider Prussia as saved already from the dangers now menacing her. As I see your majesty now, in your wondrous beauty, with those eyes reflecting your inward heaven, with this face so radiant with enthusiasm, you seem to be the genius whom Providence has sent to Prussia to guard and protect her, and to guide her on the right path and to the right goal. O, queen! fulfil the mission which Providence has intrusted to you; follow your noble and sacred vocation; be the genius of Prussia; and impart to the vacillating and timid, firm, manly courage and energetic resolution! Queen, I implore you, on my knees, have pity on Prussia, have pity on your children: be the genius of Prussia!”
And quite beside himself, his eyes filled with tears, his lips quivering with emotion, the prince knelt down before the queen and raised his folded hands imploringly to her.
“Your majesty, permit me also to bend my knees before you,” said Minister von Hardenberg, solemnly, “to adore and worship you as the genius of Prussia, from whom we expect our salvation, our peace, and our honor! Oh, queen, you alone have the power to touch the heart of the king and to remove the doubts of his noble and honorable mind; you alone will be able to accomplish what neither our arguments nor our supplications could bring about; you alone will be able to elevate the vacillation of your husband to the strength of high-spirited and courageous resolution!”
“No, not a word against the king!” exclaimed the queen, almost sternly. “Let no one dare to assert that the king lacks manly determination and vigorous courage. If he is hesitating when you would wish to act, it is because he looks into the future more prudently and sagaciously than you, while you only think of the present time; it is because he weighs and calculates the consequences, while you only care for the action of the moment. But arise, gentlemen: let us not perform a sentimental scene at a time when it is of the highest importance to be prudent and to reflect. Let us converse, therefore, gravely and soberly; explain to me what has happened, and what danger is menacing Prussia and my children. I comply now with your wish; let us hold a political conference. Let us sit down, then, and commence.”
She took a seat on the sofa, and invited the gentlemen to sit down on the two chairs opposite her.
“Now tell me what has occurred, and what has changed the political situation. Minister von Hardenberg, pray give me a full and plain account of the state of our political affairs, for I have already told you that I never meddle with politics, and do not know much about them; indeed I have been too happy, and my life too much absorbed by my happiness, to have made it necessary for me to think of politics. But I see very well that the time of quiet happiness is over now! Let us, then, speak of politics. You said, a few minutes ago, Prussia had been insulted by France?”
“Yes, your majesty, Prussia has been insulted. Her most sacred right, her neutrality, has been violated,” replied Hardenberg. “The king, in his generous endeavor to preserve the blessings of peace to his people, intended to maintain a strict neutrality amid all these wars and storms agitating the world, and the friend and ally of no party and no power, to rely exclusively on his own strength. He wanted to wait, to mediate, and conciliate, but not to attack, act, and decide. There may be times when such a role is a weighty and dignified one—may secure the peace of the world; but it always depends on those between whom one wishes to act as a neutral mediator. One may remain neutral between men of honor, between princes, to whom their word is sacred, and who do not dare to violate treaties, but not between those to whom their word is sacred only so long as their own advantage requires it, and who do not violate treaties only so long as they do not interfere with their selfish plans. It is a principle of neutrality not to open one’s territory to either of the contending powers, and this principle has always been strictly observed. When Russia, now that she is going to send her troops for the second time to Germany for the purpose of assisting the Austrians, informed the king that she would march these troops through Southern Prussia and Silesia, the king deemed this information equivalent to a declaration of war, and his majesty immediately ordered the whole army to be placed on the war footing. We should now be at war with Russia, if the Emperor Alexander had not sent on the day after the first dispatch had arrived here, another dispatch to the king, in which he apologized, and declared that he had been too rash in making the above-named demand. [Footnote: Vide Hausser’s “History of Germany,” vol. 11., p. 635. “Memoires d’un Homme d’Etat,” vol. viii., p. 474.] But this step of Russia, this mere threat of violation of our neutrality, had sufficed to induce Prussia to place her army on the war footing, and to do so AGAINST the coalition of Austria, Russia, and England. A cry of horror resounded throughout Germany when the people heard of this first step by which Prussia seemed to declare publicly FOR France and AGAINST the coalition, and this cry was reechoed abroad, of which the conduct of the King of Sweden gave us a striking proof. Your majesty is aware that this king, through his ambassador, M. de Bernstorf, returned to his majesty the King of Prussia the order of the Black Eagle which he had received from the late lamented king, accompanying it by an insulting letter in which he stated, that ‘he could not wear an order which the king had recently also sent to Monsieur Bonaparte.’”
“And on the same day that this offensive return of the highest Prussian order took place,” exclaimed Prince Louis Ferdinand, with a harsh, angry laugh, “on the same day the King of Prussia received from the Emperor of France the grand cordon and seven other grand crosses of the Legion of Honor to be distributed among the princes and ministers. And not only did we receive these seven orders, but in return for them we sent seven orders of the Black Eagle to Paris.” [Footnote: Hausser’s “History of Germany,” vol. ii., p. 76.]
“But you forget to add that the king returned on the same day the Scraphine order to the King of Sweden, and recalled his ambassador, so that we are now in a state of war with Sweden,” said the queen, eagerly.