Berlin, Nov., 1800.
It is always my fate to begin my letters to you and Mrs. Elliot with acknowledgments for past civilities, or, to speak more justly, acts of kindness. The last I received from you has been of infinite use, and promises to contribute very much to the agrément of my visit to Berlin; as nothing could be more flattering than the reception your letter procured me from Lady Carysfort; and the manner in which she lives makes her house a great resource to those who love a little quiet private society. She is always at home, except when upon duty with some of the Princesses; and has desired me to pass every evening with her in which I have not some other engagement. I have passed my time chiefly at her house, since my arrival. She seems to have all that strong desire to please, so necessary in her situation, and great powers of attraction in private society; I have not yet seen her in public.
We have been expecting you these five days. I will still hope you may come; and that, from being in the same house, I may now and then have the chance of a little conversation with you; which I would tell you with truth I know how to appreciate, if I had not read the phrase in nine out of ten of the notes I have received since my arrival here; and if, alas! I had not often used it in a sense very contrary to that in which it is usually understood. I will therefore banish it from my intercourse with those to whom I wish to express my real feelings; and of whom it seems a sort of profanation to express my ideas in the common jargon of worldly intercourse.
Is Buonaparte dead or not? This is the first question asked in every society. If you can answer it, pray do; and give me a new speculation as to the probable consequences of his death. I will pass it off as my own; and from your political stores you will not miss it.
Nov. 18-23.—It is unnecessary to endeavour to discriminate every day in my journal, when all are so much alike in my life. I pass it entirely at Lord Carysfort’s. I have been at a great supper at Count Schulenberg’s, which did not vary the scene, as I sat by Lord Carysfort at supper in a very large company instead of sitting by him at dinner in a very small one. As usual, I saw Beurnonville, who was very attentive. He looks like an immense cart-horse put by mistake in the finest caparisons; for his figure is colossal and ungainly; and his uniform of blue and gold, which appears too large even for his large person, is half covered with the broadest gold lace. His ton is that of a corps-de-garde (he was really a corporal), but when he addresses himself to women, he affects a softness and légèrete, which reminds one exactly of the Ass and the Spaniel, and his compliments are very much in the style of M. Jourdain. It is said, however, he is benevolent and well meaning.
Nov. 28.—I have not, according to Mr. Elliot’s phrase, found a Paradise at Berlin, but it is quite as pleasant as I expected. However, apart from the impression it has made on me, which always depends on trifling circumstances, I conceive it to be less agreeable, less various, less polished, than Vienna. Both are infinitely more inferior to London than I had supposed before I saw them.
Nov. 29.—Dined to-day with Madame Divoff, saw several curious contrasts in the entertainment—a dinner dressed by a French cook, and dirty napkins, &c.—the servants in magnificent liveries of scarlet and gold, with dirty shirts—the mistress of the house in a point-lace cap, and a dirty silk pelisse. For two hours after dinner we sang with Righini, an excellent maître de chapelle, who, to prove he was at his ease, came in his boots, and made love to Madame Divoff. Supped at the Princess Wyzimska’s; sang duets with Righini, and heard him sing charmingly—without a voice, but with a variety, taste, and suitableness to the expression of the air in his manière de broder, which I think unequalled.
Nov. 30.—Supped at Mad. Angeström’s, wife to the Swedish Minister, who is perfectly indifferent as to all the interests of Europe, provided nothing interrupts her reception of the Paris fashions, for which she has an uncommon avidity. ‘N’est ce pas, ma chère, que ceci est charmant; c’est copié fidèlement d’un journal de Paris, et quel journal, délicieux!’ She wears very little covering on her person, and none on her arms of any kind (shifts being long exploded) except sleeves of the finest cambric, unlined, and travaillé au jour, which reach only half way from the shoulder to the elbow. She seems to consider it a duty to shiver in this thin attire, for she said to Lady Carysfort, ‘Ah, Miledi, que vous êtes heureuse, vous portez des poches et des jupes.’ I conversed chiefly with Beurnonville and Pignatelli. Beurnonville says, ‘Mon sécrétaire est pour les affaires, mon aide-de-camp pour les dames, et moi pour la réprésentation.’ The people about him are conscious he is peu de chose, but say, ‘Qu’importe? on est si bon en Prusse, et si bien disposé pour nous.’ A person asked Vaudreuil, aide-de-camp to Beurnonville, if the latter was a ci-devant. ‘Non,’ dit-il, ‘mais il voudroit l’être’—a reply of a good deal of finesse, and plainly proving how unconquerable the respect for rank, and wish among those who have destroyed the substance, to possess the shadow. On my return I found an immense inhabitant of the hair on my tucker. My suspicions turned for a moment on Pignatelli, but on reflection I am sure he belonged to the French mission.
Dec. 2.—Accompanied Mr. Headlam, a sensible, well-bred, respectful young man, and the Miss Browns, to the porcelain manufactory, and observed the whole process which transforms a piece of Silesian stone into a beautiful, brilliant, and valuable vase. The operation is begun by a steam-engine, which acts in various ways till the mass is formed. Then the manipulation begins; round forms are turned as in England; other shapes begun and ended in moulds without any assistance from the wheel. Some are painted before they are varnished, but these only receive a dark blue colour, which is black till it passes through the fire. The finest are varnished first, which increases the difficulty of painting them, as the colours used are metallic, the porcelain but an earth: the intervention of a body which has some analogy with both is therefore necessary; and for chymical reasons, which I do not retain, the painters use colours which do not produce effect immediately, so are forced to an exertion of mind and memory as well as of the hand. This china is cheaper than that of Dresden or Vienna. It is said that Berlin china excels in the colours of the painting, Vienna in the gilding, Dresden in the mass. As to general taste in the forms and painting I place Dresden first, and Berlin last.