"Have had to suffer, says your highness?" cried Burgsdorf impatiently; "they still suffer continuously, and their suffering will be without cessation or end if your highness does not take pity upon the poor people, upon us all."
"I?" asked Frederick William, astonished. "What then can I do?"
"You can do everything, my Prince, everything, and in the name of your future country, in the name of your subjects, I beseech you to do so. The Mark Brandenburg stands upon the brink of a precipice. Save it, Electoral Prince. The religion, policy, and independence of Brandenburg are in danger; take your sword in hand and save her. Speak three words, three little insignificant words, and all the noblemen in the Mark will rally exultingly about you, and the people will flock to you in crowds, and make you so mighty and so strong that you need only to will and your will shall be executed."
"What three words are those, Sir Colonel von Burgsdorf?"
"Those three words, your highness, which the people shouted up at the palace window yesterday, when you got home. The three words, 'Down with him!'"
"Down with him," repeated the Electoral Prince. "And who is this him?"
"It is Count Schwarzenberg, your highness—it is the minister who rules here in the Mark as if it were his own property, and as if he were not your father's Stadtholder, but the reigning Prince, who had obtained the Mark as a fief from the Emperor of Germany, to whom alone he were responsible. Look about you, Frederick William, look at these poor, wretched apartments, in which you live—look at the decay of the princely house, the embarrassments with which your father has to contend, and the privations which your mother and sisters have to undergo. And then, Prince, then look across at Broad Street, at Count Schwarzenberg's palace. There all is glory and splendor, there are to be seen lackeys in golden liveries, costly equipages, handsomely furnished halls. They practice wanton luxury, they live amid pomp and pleasure, arrange magnificent hunts and splendid entertainments, while the people cry out for hunger. They make merry in Count Schwarzenberg's palace, and while the burgher, whose last cent he has seized for the payment of taxes and imposts, creeps about in rags, he struts by in velvet clothes, decked out with gold and precious stones, and laughingly boasts that half the Mark of Brandenburg might be bought at the price of one of his court suits. Most gracious Prince, yesterday the steward of your father, with the Electoral consent, brought out the velvet caps which had been kept in the Electoral wardrobe, took off the genuine silver lace with which they were trimmed, and sold it to the Jews, in order to pay the servants their month's wages,[24] and the count's servants yesterday received new liveries, so thickly set with gold lace that the scarlet cloth was hardly distinguishable underneath. The Stadtholder in the Mark revels in superfluity, while the Elector in the Mark almost suffers want, and esteems himself happy if he can give one piece of land after another to his minister as security for the payment of debt. Oh, it is enough to drive one to despair, and make him tear his hair for rage and grief, when he sees the state of things here, and must perceive that the Elector is nothing and the Stadtholder everything. To his adherents he gives offices and dignities, and those whom he knows to be attached to the interests of the Electoral family he removes from court, and replaces by his favorites and servants. Upon the Colonels von Kracht and von Rochow he has bestowed good positions, making them commandants of Berlin and Spandow, with double salaries, but me, whom he knows to be the faithful servant of the Electoral family, he has banished from court and sent to Küstrin with only half as high a salary as the other two have. From the Electoral privy council he has also removed all those gentlemen who were bold enough to lift up their voices against him, and has introduced such men as say yes to everything that he desires and asks. No longer does an honest, upright word reach the Electoral ear, and while the whole people lament and cry out against Schwarzenberg, fearing him as they do the devil himself, our Elector fancies that his Stadtholder is as much beloved by the people of the Mark Brandenburg as by the Emperor at Vienna. But it is just so; Catholics and Imperialists will Schwarzenberg make us; ever he presses us further and further from our comrades in the faith, the Swedes and Dutch; ever he draws us closer to the Catholics; and if he could succeed in making the Elector Catholic, removing all Evangelists and Reformers from court, and putting Catholics in their places, then he would rejoice and obtain a high reward from the Emperor and Pope."
"And you believe, Burgsdorf, that he will do such a thing, and esteem such a thing possible?" asked the Electoral Prince, with a sly smile.
"I believe that he will, and we all believe so. And with the Stadtholder to will is to do, for he carries through all that he undertakes. But we will not suffer it, Prince, we will not be turned into Imperialists and Catholics. We will hold to our Elector and our religion; we will not suffer and submit to our Elector's being any longer in dependence upon Emperor and empire, and nothing at all but a powerless tool in Schwarzenberg's hands. We want a free Elector, who has courage and power to defy the Emperor himself, and league himself with the Swedes against him. For the Swedes are our rightful allies, not merely because the mother of the little Queen Christina is sister to our Elector, but also because we are neighbors, and of one religion and one faith. Oh, my gracious young sir, do not allow Schwarzenberg to make us Catholics and Imperialists! Free your country, your subjects, and yourself from this man, who weighs upon us like a scourge from God!"
"But, Burgsdorf, just consider what you say there. I, who have but just returned from a three years' absence, I, who am almost a stranger to these combinations and circumstances, I am to free you from this most mighty and influential man, the Stadtholder in the Mark! I should like to know how to go about it."