Count von Rantzau more particularly displayed a sustained hardness and fearful blackness of soul. He, doubtless, believed that by closing all access to clemency, by forcing to the scaffold two intimate friends, one of whom had been his benefactor, he should purge himself of the suspicion of complicity, and that by sheer hypocrisy he should cause his connection with the condemned men to be forgotten. At any other time, instead of sitting in the council and determining the fate of the culprits, he would have himself been the object of a severe sentence; instead of being spared for having betrayed the favourites, there would have been an additional charge against him, that of anticipating the royal commands to arrest them; hence, being well aware that, in spite of his dignities, he was marked, both as a restless and unbelieving man, he was more assiduous than any one in his attendance at the court chapel, and joined in singing hymns, which must have possessed all the charm of novelty for him.[17]
How little feeling that most miserable of monarchs, Christian, really had in the whole matter, is seen by a perusal of the Danish journals at the time. The amusements of the court offer a most revolting exhibition of apathy and want of sympathy.
On April 23, there was a masked ball, en domino, at which the king, the queen dowager, and their suite were present; on the 24th, instead of the play, a concert at the Danish theatre, where the royal family were present; on the 25th, the sentence on Counts Struensee and Brandt was pronounced in open court; in the evening, the opera of Adrien en Syrie was performed. The small-pox continuing its ravages, on the 26th, Sunday, profane amusements were interdicted by the new government. On the 27th, the king dined with his court at Charlottenlund, and returned to town at 7 P.M.; he signed the sentences, and proceeded to the Italian Opera. On the 28th, the day of the execution, there was a grand concert at court. Well may a writer in the Annales Belgiques for May, 1772, remark:—
"If the king has unfortunately reached such a stage of unfeelingness, what praise does not Caroline Matilda deserve for having succeeded in captivating him so greatly that up to the present it was not even suspected that he possessed such a disposition?"
In the meanwhile, Dr. Münter had informed Struensee, on April 26th, of the promulgation of the sentences, and that they would be carried into effect two days after. Struensee listened to him patiently, and then remarked, as to the circumstances which were to throw infamy upon his death—
"I am far above all this, and I hope my friend Brandt may be the same. Here in this world—since I am on the point of leaving it—neither honour nor infamy can affect me any more. It is equally the same to me after death, whether my body putrifies under ground or in the open air; whether it serves to feed the worms or the birds. God will know very well how to preserve those particles of my body which, on the day of resurrection, are to constitute my future glorified body. It is not my all which is to be laid on the wheel. Thank God! I know now very well that this dust is not my whole being."
After this they conversed quietly about various matters concerning Struensee's administration. The decision whether his government had been politically bad he left to posterity, and many times repeated his assurance that he was not conscious of any wrong intentions. When Dr. Münter left him, Struensee handed him the following letter for Frau von Berkentin at Pinneberg. This was the patroness who, as chief gouvernante to the prince royal, had recommended Struensee as physician in ordinary for the king's foreign tour:—
I make use of the first moments which permit me to write to you. Business, duties, and my late connexions have perhaps lessened in me the remembrance of my former friends, but they have been not able to obliterate their memory entirely. My present leisure has revived it. If my silence has aroused suspicion as to my former sentiments, I beg pardon of all those who are entitled to my gratitude, and of you, gracious lady, in particular. This however, is not the only advantage which the change of my fate has produced. I owe my knowledge of truth to it; it has procured me a happiness of which I had no further expectation, as I had already lost sight of it. I entreat you to consider my misfortunes in no other light but that of religion. I gain more by them than I can ever lose; and I feel and assure you of this with conviction, ease, and joy of heart. I beg you to repeat what I now write in the house of Count Ahlefeldt and at Rantzau. I am under great obligations to these two families, and it has grieved me far more to have drawn with me into misfortune persons who are related to them.
On the following day, April 27, Struensee also referred to his administration, and assured Münter again, most sacredly, that he had not falsified the accounts about the presents made by the king to him and Brandt. Münter's remarks on this subject are worthy quotation:—