LORD DOVER'S LIFE OF FREDERIC THE GREAT.

IT would be difficult to select a subject more favourable for the display of the talents of an accomplished writer.than a Life of FRE- DERIC of Prussia. It presents the materials of the pleasantest book in the world : the only embarrassment a writer is likely to feel is the difficulty of choice. In the brief space of two volumes, how is he to embrace even a sketch of the history of so many extra- ordinary campaigns? what detail can he enter into of FREDERIC 's remarkable system of domestic government, and the numerous re- forms and improvements by which he raised a paltry state to a level with the first powers of Europe? The mere development of the elm meter of the Monarch, as a man, in all his relations of life—as an author, whether historian or poet—as a philosopher, whether on Paler or in the field—has filled many volumes. Of no historical personage are there more anecdotes related; he has been the sub- ject of nearly as nmuy memoirs as NAPOLEON; with no one do we seem to be more intimately acquainted—his name is as familiar even to our schoolboys as a hero of either Greek or Roman celebrity. Lord DOVER is therefore fortunate in his subject ; the more espe- cially as we believe his statement to be true, that our literature does not contain any compendium of ihis Monarch's memoirs, wit hii a moderate and convenient compass, which is at the same time compiled from all the materials at present accessible. Another motive to the composition of a work of this kind, is the fact, tha t the world has been very generally impressed with the idea that VourAinE chose to spread of FREDERIC 'S character and conduct. It was beyond the power of even a genius like VOLTA IRE to mislead posterity as to his military talents, which were exhibited on the wide theatre of Europe, and at the expense of whole nations who are not likely speedily to forget the proofs of it but as regards the reputation of the individual of private life, the philosopher, poet, and companion, VOLTAIRE'S authority has had a malignant influ- ence. The Prussian Monarch undoubtedly quarrelled with VOL- TAIRE even violently, and this great writer may have been treated at length with harshness and insult; but there is good reason for believing that his conduct was irritating and provoking to a degree which perhaps so ingenious a man alone could have reached : and in short, whether VOLTAIRE, in his own person, had received in- justice or not, that fact does not affect the Kings conduct in any other relation. But VOLTAIRE was a man who never neglected to revenge any aiftent offered to the supremacy of literary genius, set up in his own person. All he has said of FREDERIC, however art- fully couched—and assuredly no man could disguise a motive better —is tinged with the bitterness and malice of offended vanity, and yet the inimitable point and vivacity of his style appears to have dazzled the eyes of the world: VOLTAIRE'S character, anecdotes, and satirical descriptions, are the sole materials of the popular notion of FREDERIC. Lord DOVER has the merit of receiving and examin- ing all the information derived from this source, with caution, and of not accepting evidence so tainted without corroboration. The new materials of this biography are not copious ; such as they are, they are interesting. They are derived from the letters of Lords KEITH and MARISCHAL, two Jacobite Scotchmen, brave soldiers and able generals, in his service, and one of them par ex- cellence" the King's friend" to his last moment; and further, from the MITCHELL papers in the British Museum, which serve to throw light on disputed points of negotiation and diplomacy,-,—that " abynie de nuturaise fel," as it was justly termed by FREDERIC, who nevertheless dipped as deep into it as anybody.

New matter, however, was neither to be expected nor was it -wanted ; a fresh mind was the desideratum. In Lord DOVER we detect neither any remarkable depth of thought, nor yet that com- mand of style to which any ,writer of leisure and education above mediocrity may attain. But, as an historian or biographer, he is free from the vice of tediousness; he does not lose himself in laby- rinthic details; he is not confused from the innumerable branchi- ness of his ideas ; he aims at no fidse brilliancy ; and as he rarely ventures upon a novelty either of expression orconception, we meet with little to offend, or, on the other hand, to excite admiration. Lord DOVER'S literary stock in trade consists of some industry and a good taste,—or it may be, the good sense which collision with the world and society rarely fails to give to a person who is not very much above or very much under par. His Life of FREDERIC is the result of the exertion of both these qualifications : his love of his- torical literature has led him through all the sources of informa- tion; his cultivated taste has enabled him to select the most curi- ous facts, and his good sense has told him where to stop. The re- sult is, an agreeable and respectable compilation ; the defect of which is, chiefly, a too servile adherence to his originals. He seems

to have too often copied out his mere translations from foreign • writers : there are, besides, other signs of a want of a due literary digestion. Such as it is, however, it will afford us an opportunity of putting together various anecdotes of the great subject of these volumes, which cannot fail to be agreeable to our readers, both in themselves, and because they relate to one of the most extraordinary men that ever lived, and who, among the poor race of hereditary kings, stands out a kind of historical prodigy. FREDERIC'S father, FREDERIC WILLIAM, was in his private ca- pacity quite as remarkable a person as his son ; but it was in an entirely different fashion. This was the man who was celebrated all over Europe for his love of drill : GEORGE the First of England

used to call him the Corporal of Potsdam. His passion for tall men was so celebrated, and their treatment in his regiments so rigorous, that no man in Europe above six feet considered himself standing. quite safe in his shoes,—for his system of impressment extended far beyond the limits of his own kingdom, or even Germany. In his mind, the height of human bliss was manceuvering a tall regiment: it was an exercise he took the first thing every morning. It would. have been well if his love of discipline had ended here ; but the cane was as much employed in as out of doors. He caned and kicked all his family, from the Queen to the footmen.; and in all the transactions of his private life he seems to have been utterly destitute of feeling or any other amiable quality. Absolutism was his passion, and he brought it to pass by means of cruelty and tyranny in all its forms. He beat and bruised, starved, imprisoned, insulted, and even withheld from religious consolation his very daughters. One of his notes respecting WILHELMINA runs thus- " My scoundrel daughter may now receive the sacrament." This was after having kicked her fairly out of a high window, whence she must have fallen, had not her mother, the Queen, caught her by her clothes. His son and successor he took an unaccountable dislike to : he treated him with such severity, that the youth attempted to escape from his dominions ; and when apprehended, was tried for his life, and would have undoubtedly been beheaded, had it not been for the interference of the Emperor and other Sovereigns. As it was, he was imprisoned for a considerable time, nearly starved to death, and made to be present at the execution of a faithful and beloved friend who was assisting him in his projects. It is difficult to say whether numerous other instances of this King's domestic tyranny, of a less fatal kind, are more amusing or revolting: they have the advantage of being recorded by his daugh- ter, the Margravine of BAREITH, the beloved sister of FREDERIC, who has not spared her father. A more absurd system of tyranny than at that time existed in the court and family of FREDERIC WI L Li am, has never been seen. For anecdotes of it, we may refer to the Life of Lord DOVER, or better still, to the Memoirs of the Margravine herself. Take one trait only, as an instance which occurs to us as a specimen. In a marriage procession (of the Mar- gravine herself), eighty-five open carriages of the nobility, pre • ceded by the bride and bridegroom; repaired to a country palace at a foot's pace; the old King took- the lead in his berline, and quickly fell asleep; a storm of thunder and excessive rain came on, but nobody dared to awake the King, or deviate from his orders ; so that all the ladies of the court sat in their open carriages and in their full wedding-dresses, receiving the deluge of rain; and as the King did not awake till they reached their destination, they arrived in a state only to have been equalled by tumbling into a river. Yet they were obliged to remain all the evening, to dance or get through the night as well as they could : old FREDERIC WILLIAM allowed nothing for weather. It was nothing to him that his court was composed of mermaids. Shortly before his death, he was taken sharply to task for all his violence and oppression, by his confessor, who felt he had for once got the old tyrant in his power: the King allowed all he said, and confessed his cruelty and un- just severity ; but at the end of every admission, declared he had no doubt that God would forgive him, "for he had never in the course of his life been unfaithful to his wife."

It is pleasant to turn from the character of the father to that of the son,—from ignorance, bigotry, and violence, to calm and phi- losophical pursuits, imperturbable temper, love of justice, and an enlarged mind.

FREDERIC in his youth was expected to distinguish his future reign by his love of pleasure and his taste for magnificence : his father said he would undo all he had done; by which he meant, disband the army and inlist small men : so much for prophecies. FREDERIC proved contemptuous of pleasure—pleased with plain- ness only, was pretty nearly as fond of drilling as his father, and equally fond of tall men, though he preferred breeding to crimping. He had no sooner assumed his father's throne, than lie forsook a life of contemplative ease, instantly adopted habits of business, and for nearly half a century vigorously retained the regulations he- had laid down for his own government and that of the country on the first day of his reign.

It will be impossible for us to trace him through the. different stages of his career; but we can make a selection of such anec- dotes of his temper, conduct, and disposition, as will undoubtedly send the reader who is not familiar with them to their source.

If any man was ever cool under danger, it was FREDERIC; and yet he ran away from his first field. In an inferior man, his escape from his victory, as it turned out to be, at Mollvvitz, would have been fatal. He took refuge in a mill ; and his success was said to have covered him with meal and military glory. This is the man who afterwards stood over a bursting shell, eyeing it with his glass all the time, asking questions of his aide-de-camp with imper- turbable coolness, and on hundreds of other occasions showed a disregard of peril which few men could equal. We have heard little of thehumanity and of the kindheartedness of the King, and yet these are fruitful subjects in the present work. Of his wit, the instances have been numerous, but they are assuredly not tiresome. Of his respect for his own laws, and the curious manner in which he swore by the laws, and yet interfered with the judges, some traits are known ; but those we . shall produce can lose nothing by the repetition. We shall devote the remainder of our space to anecdotes illustrative of this great man's personal character. When reforms are wanted, it were almost to be wished that an absolute monarch should arise, who might be constituted a dictator, to see not that the republic takes no harm, but that it receive all possible good in the shortest possible time. FREDERIC played the .part of a Reform Dictator in Prussia ; and with the aid of the en- lightened COCCEIUS, blew up all the chicanery of a vicious system of law, in less time than he gained a victory : and such was the con- tdence which his regulations, and perhaps too his own character, -created, that the following anecdote may not be doubted. In fact, it is on the authority of an eye-witness.

When the King of Prussia had determined to build what is called the new palace of Sans Souci, part of his plan was to connect the new building with the old Sans Souci, by a pleasure-ground, which, in fact, exists. A mill occu- pied part of the ground, which he wished to include in his new garden. He offered to buy it, and to pay for it considerably more than the value. The miller refused to part with it ; and declared, that he would never leave the mill, which had descended to him from his forefathers. The King himself, in one of his walks, conversed with the miller upon the subject: Becoming at length irritated at the man's obstinacy, he said to Min, " You seem not to be aware that I am the master ; and that I can take by force what you refuse to uiye up to me." " Oh," replied the miller, " you cannot frighten inc in this way : we have Judges at Berlin !" Frederic was so pleased with the answer, that he immediately abandoned his plan, and formed his gardens so as not to interfere with the patrimony of the miller.

It was in favour of the miller that he was of the labouring class ; for this was the Order which FREDERIC valued, because he knew its utility. He knew its importance in composing the strength and wealth of a ' state. The passages which follow will show how he regarded their complaints, and lent a willing ear to their demands.

In one of,the journeys which Frederic made every year, for the purpose of reviewing his troops a miller of the name of Arnold, living near a village in Pomerania, presented him a petition, in which he said, "Sire, I pay your Ma- iesty three hundred rix-dollars of rent for the water-mill, which belongs to you, an the village I inhabit; but the Count N— diverts the course of the water, which is necessary to work the mill ; and I have, in consequence, neither the means a paying your rent nor of existing myself." Frederic sent the petition to the then Chancellor, M. de Furst, with this marginal note to it : "Let justice be done to this miller." The cause was in consequence trivd, and the miller lost it. The following year the miller presented another petitiou, statinmb to the King, that he had lost his cause, but that, nevertheless, the facts which he had before stated to his Majesty were correct. Again Frederic sent the petition to the Chancellor, with the following note : "Let this cause be brought before the second tribunal ; and let great care be taken that justice is done to this man." The miller again had judgment given against him ; and again petitioned the King, but more in the language of despair than of complaint. This last petition Frederic kept, with the view of endeavouring to verify the facts contained in it. For this purpose he sent to the place, under other pre- texts, an old military officer, a man of probity ; and ordered him to visit the spot, and to make an exact report, to himself alone, of every thing relating to the mill, and of the purposes to which the Count N— applied the water. The officer, whose own estate was situated in the neighbourhood, fulfilled his commission without exciting any suspicions and declared to the King, at his return, that after having thoroughly examined the state of things on the spot, he was convinced that the mill could not work for want of water; which want of water was occasioned by the diversion of the stream caused by the Count, and which was, therefore, the cause of the miller's ruin. But Frederic was not content with a single testimony upon the subject. After the departure of the officer, he had given the saint commission, and in the same secret manner, to two other trustworthy persons, who also made him a similar report. Frederic now became extremely indignant with his judges. He sent for the Chancellor Furst, and the three judges who sat in the Court of Appeal. He received them with the greatest severity ; hardly permitting them to utter a word in their own defence, while lie abused them, without measure, for their in- justice and villany. He then took a pen, and wrote with his left hand, being at the moment suffering under -a fit of gout in his ,right, a sentence which con- demned the Count to restore to the use of the miller all the water which the stream contained ; to pay the costs of the suit, and a sum, by way of reparation, to the miller. As soon as he had done this, he recommenced his invectives against the judges ; told Furst he no longer needed his services ; ordered them all to be confined in the fortress of Spandau; and concluded the audience by literally kicking them out of the room.

it is obvious that the conduct of the King of Prussia, upon this occasion, was neither decorous nor judicious, as practised towards the chief magistrates of his tribunals, even supposing they had committed the injustice of which they were accused. But this was not the case. It afterwards appeared that the lands of the Count were situated lower down the stream than the mill ; and that, consequently, he did not receive the water till after the miller had first made use of it. It is true, the Count, for the purpose of irrigating his meadows, had made new channels for the stream, and thus, by increasing the rapidity of its descent, had left the original bed lower than was convenient for the purposes of the miller ; so that those persons who made their report to Frederic, were cor- rect in stating that it was the Count's proceedings which had injured the miller. At the same time, the judges were entirely justified in the decision they had come to; it being a principle of jurisprudence, that a man has a right to do what he pleases with a stream which passes through his lands, provided he does not take it away from proprietors living below him. Of course it was, at the same time, perfectly in the power of the miller to have remedied the inconvenience he com- plained of, by damming up the water to the height that was sufficient for his own purposes.

These violent proceedings of Frederic made a great sensation, not only in his own dominions, but throughout Europe. The lawyers of Berlin, and the Ministers of Frederic, all took the part of the disgraced magistrates; but the Kg refused to listen to them. At length, more than six months after the affair 'ihad happened, Frederic read an account of the transaction in the Annales Politiques of Linguet, in which the whole matter was so ably and clearly dis- cussed, that he-at sauce saw the error he had committed. In consequence, he forthwith released the judges from Spandau, and restored them to their seats on the bench ; all except the Chancellor, with whom he had other causes for being dissatisfied, and who remained in disgrace. But it was not possible for the King, however much he might wish it, to repair the evil he had done. It was long before the tribunals of Brandenburgh recovered any thing like feelings of inde- pendence. Judges who knew- themselves liable to be personally insulted by an

i absolute monarch for the decisions, were not likely to think so much of the justice of the cases that came before them, as of deciding them in the way which might be the least likely to bring upon them similar indignities ; and suitors could not be expected to look either with respect or confidence towards magistrates who had been or might be so treated by their sovereign.

Thiebault mentions, as a remarkable instance of the power of Frederic over himself, with regard to outward appearances, that he himself passed the very evening, on which the scene with • the judges had• taken place, with the King. As they went out at one door, Thiebault entered at another ' • and found the King tranquilly seated in his arm-chair, who discussed with him various sub- jects of literature and philosophy, without appearing more agitated or excited than usual.

In one point of view, and one alone, the anecdote of the miller, from its being so extensively known, had a beneficial effect. It greatly increased the popularity of Frederic among the lower orders of his subjects, by proving to them how much their representations and complaints to him were attended to. It also had, of course, the effect of making those complaints much more nume- rous. One of them became the occasion of showing both the King and one of his judges in a very advantageous point of view. A peasant presented to the King a petition against a decision of the tribunal of justice. The man, it would appear, had no reason on his side, but Frederic thought otherwise, and therefore sent an order to the tribunal to revise their sentence. The cause was heard a second time, and the decision was the same as at first. Again the King sent it back to the tribunal, who confirmed their former judgments. Upon this Frederic became angry, and returned the sentence to Munchausen, the presi- dent of the tribunal, with these words written beneath it, " Ill-examined into ; ill-considered ; ill-decided." Munchausen replied with all the forms of respect, but with these remarkable words—" My head is at your disposal, but not my

conscience ; which obliges me to declare, that the judgment ought to continue as it has been given." Frederic at first was angry at the President's boldness ; but finding, upon farther inquiry, he was in the right, he wrote him a letter applauding his firmness, and gave him an increase of salary.

Noble and hereditary rank he disregarded. He found that merit was a far more useful qualification than birth ; and as he had assumed all the responsibility of his kingdom, he took care not to be encumbered with useless claims. In his reign efficiency was the only possible ground of employment. His ideas on this point may be gathered from the following extract—

A Hanoverian Count wrote to the King of Prussia, requesting him to receive his son into his army, and to make him at once an officer, in favour of his high birth. Frederic thought this a very ridiculous pretension, and dictated, in consequence, the following answer-

" Your letter of the 22d of May has informed me of the request you make to me, on the subject of your son : but I am obliged to tell you, that I have long forbid any Counts being received as such into my army ; for when they have served one or two years, they retire, and merely make their short military ca- reer a subject of vain boasting. ,If your son wishes to serve, the title of Count can be of no use to him; but he will be promoted if he learns his profession well."

Postscript, in the King's own hand—

Young Counts, who have learned nothing, are the most ignorant people in all countries. In England, the King's son begins by being a sailor on board a ship, in order to learn the manoeuvres belonging to that service. If it should miraculously happen that a Count could be good for any thing, it must be by banishing all thoughts about his titles and his birth, for these are only follies.

Every thing depends upon personal merit. " FREDERIC."

His kindness to the peasantry presents us with some remarkably pleasing instances of royal amiability.

During one of Frederic'sjourneys through Silesia, the wife of a peasant, near Breslau, had presented to him a basket of fruit; and had been so touched by the kindness with which he received it, that she determined to send him an- other the next year to Potsdam. She accompanied the offering with the fol- lowing letter- " Most dear and most clement, our Lord the King,

"As our fruit has not succeeded better this year than the last, you must con- descend to receive it, such as it is. I and my husband have picked out the best we could fled; and we have packed it up as well as we were able, with straw and hay. We hope you will eat it in good health. May God give you a long life, in order that you may be able to come and see us for many years to conic. I will always keep the best I have for you. I and my husband entreat you, therefore, to regard us with favour; especially, because our little bit of land produces less than it did, and that we have a debt upon it of one hundred and twenty crowns, ten groschen, and six fenins. Moreover, we commend you to the protection of Almighty God ; and we shall be, till death, and for ever, of

your Majesty, the faithful and devoted subjects, "1 and my Husband." To this communication Frederic replied thus-

" Good Mother,—I am much obliged to you for your fine fruit. If God grants health and life to 111e_, I will return and see you a year hence. Keep something for me, in order that I may find it when I come to you. With re- gard to what you tell me of your little bit of land being chargea with a debt of one hundred and twenty crowns, ten groschen, and six fenins, that is really a had business. You should be very economical, otherwise your affairs will b0-o back, instead of advancing. I send you herewith two hundred crowns, which I have also packed up as well as I was able. Pay your debts with them, and free your bit of land. Take care to economize as much as you are able: this is a counsel which I give you seriously, as your-attached King.

"FREDERIC.

Of the miscellaneous anecdotes, more especially relative to his treatment of the common soldier, we shall club together the fol- lowing characteristic little stories. The account given by Trenck, in his Memoirs, of the discipline and the toils endured by the body-guards of Frederic to whom he belonged, and who were i considered, n many respects the most distinguished troops in the service, may give us some idea of the sufkairigs of the Prussian military. He describes this regiment as the best school for cavalry in the world : it was composed entirely of chosen men ; and the uniform i was the richest possible. He adds that, even in time of peace, he had hardly an hour in a day to himself. At four o'clock in the morning the exercise commenced ; and trial was made of all the new manceuvres which the- • King intended to introduce into the tactics of the cavalry. These unhappy, body-guards were obliged to leap over trenches, which were perpetually enlarged, till some of them fell in, and broke their legs or arms. They were also obliged, in Charging, to leap over hedges, and so to continue their charge, at full gallop; for miles together ; the consequence was, that they frequently brought home some of their number either killed or wounded. At mid-day they mounted fresh horses, and recommenced their la- bours. It was also a very COM 111011 thing to call them from their beds' and make them mount on horseback twice in one night. This was done to keep them on the alert ; and any guardsman, who did not present himself on horse- back and fully equipped in the space of eight minutes, was put under arrest for a fortnight. He adds, that he himself lost three horses in the space of one year; and that in the same space of time, during peace, the body-guards lost more men and horses than they had done in two battles during the war.

It is a more pleasing task than dwelling upon this picture of harsh military servitude, to turn to the kindness, the attention, the familiarity of FREDERIC towards his soldiers, while enduring the fatigues of war.

This was invariable ; and endeared him so much to them, that, at his bidding, they were ready to affront all difficulties and dangers, and even the certainty of

death itself. " Palm," and " Ourgood old Fritz," were the names of endearment by which they distinguished him. His manner of encouraging his soldiers to new exertions, when they were fatigued or out of humour, was by a judicious familiarity. Thus, in the second war of Silesia, when, on a certain occasion, the army had marched all night, and that it was necessary for them to set forward again in the morning in the midst of a snow-storm, Frederic perceived that they were out of humour, and disposed to complain. He therefore descended from his horse, and began marching in the snow at their head ; then, after a few moments of silence, he turned round to them and said, " Come, my friends, let us march. If we were a parcel of cowards, we should be now in our bed-gowns in a warm room : but we are soldiers ; so come on." Upon hearing this appeal the soldiers proceeded cheerfully. It was, indeed, his constant habit, whenever the march was a difficult one, to place himself at the head of the infantry, and to march on foot, in order to encourage them. During one of his campaigns, the bread supplied to the army was exceedingly bad; and the soldiers complained loudly of it. Frederic took an opportunity, when the soldiers were round him, of asking his neighbour for a piece of the bread. He ate it before them with apparent appetite, and then said, aloud, 4' In truth, this bread is not very good : however, one can eat it when one is hungry. I will take care, as soon as it is possible, that we have better: until then, let us make a virtue of necessity." One morning, after a night march, the army halted : the King got off his horse close to a group of his guards, and said aloud, as he was getting off, "It would be agreeable if we had something good to drink here." At these words, several soldiers of the guards, who had - a piece of bread and a small quantity of brandy, pressed forward, and offered their little provision to their sovereign. Frederic was much touched at this conduct, and said to them, "My children, if I could drink brandy, I would accept, with much pleasure, that which you offer me. I thank you for this mark of your attachment, which I will not for- get." He then turned to his attendants, and added, " There is not a happier king than me on the face of the earth." He ordered the names of the soldiers to be taken down, and distributed a Frederic d'or apiece to them. Upon the occasion of a long and fatiguing march, Frederic observed an old non-commissioned officer, belonging to the regiment of the Prince of Brunswick,

who seemed to have great diffi i culty n keeping up with the regiment. " What is the matter with you ?" said the King. " I ant old and feeble," answered the Sergeant, "and I find I can hardly manage to march with the rest." " How long have you served ?"—" Forty-five years; I served under the late King your father, and I have followed your Majesty in the wars of Silesia." " Well, when we are in winter-quarters, you shall be invalided, and I will give you besides a good place."—" No, Sire, I thank you; but that I should consider a disgrace : 1 wish to live and die a soldier." " You are wrong, for in that case you might live quietly, and take care of yourself in your old age."—" Alt, Sire, I am not used to that ; and then how could I fulfil the duties of any place, having never learned to write?" Here the conversation concluded; and the veteran imagined the King would think no more of him. But that very evening Frederic sent him one of his horses to ride during the march; and the next winter he ap- pointed him first lieutenant in a garrison regiment.

Sometimes he mingled with Ins familiarity to his soldiers, a degree of good- humoured pleasantry which was peculiarly attaching. During the seven years' war, immediately previous to the battle of-Lissa, a grenadier, a Frenchman, was brought before him, who had been taken in the act of deserting. " Grenadier," said the King to him, " why did you wish to quit us?"—" Because, Sire, our affairs go on so ill." "Well," replied Frederic, " I allow they do not go on very well ; but, my friend, just let us fight one more battle; and if, after that, our affairs do not go on better, why, we will desert together."—" Agreed, Sire; I consent to that," replied the soldier ; who retired without any more thoughts or desire of quitting the Prussian service.

On the evening of the day of the successful combat at Burkersdorf, during the seven years' war, Frederic was riding, accompanied by the Russian general Czerniidief, when they met a wounded. soldier. " What is the matter ? ' said the King. " Nothing," replied the soldier ; "for the enemies fly, and we are conquerors." But the King, then perceiving he was wounded, gave him his handkerchief, saying at the same time, " You are wounded, my friend ; take this handkerchief, and bind up your wound with it." Upon this Czernichef remarked, "Sire, it is not wonderful that your soldiers should serve you with such devotion, since you treat them with so much kindness."

Anecdotes upon this subject might be multiplied so as to be tedious ; but there is one which ought not to be omitted, on account of its affording a very striking example of the familiarity which existed between FREDERIC and his soldiers, as well as of the dangers to which that Sovereign exposed his person.

One evening, after a great battle, Frederic approached a fire, which had been lighted by some of the grenadiers of his own regiment. The soldiers began to ask him where he had been during the battle: Generally," said they, "you lead us yourself where the fire is hottest; but this time nobody saw you, and it is not right to abandon us so." The King, in a good-humoured manner, ex- plained to them in what part of the field he had been and his reasons for being there, which had prevented him from being at the head of his own regiment. As he began to grow warm, he unbuttoned-his great-coat, and a ball dropped out, which he had received in his clothes. The hole the ball had made in the great- coat and coat was also perceptible. Upon this, the enthusiasm of the soldiers knew no bounds. They cried out, with all the tenderness of expression belong- ing in the German tongue to the singular pronoun, You are our own good old Fritz; you share in all our dangers with us: we will all die for you!" And the conversation concluded with their cheers, and their entreaties to the King to take more care of his own safety. Thiebault relates, that he had seen at Berlin the suit of clothes worn by Fre- deric towards the end of the seven years' war; and that the coat and the hat were pierced with balls in several places. Le Catt, the secretary of Frederic during the latter years of his life, had also in his possession a little gold box which had been flattened by a ball, when in the King's bceeches pocket at the battle of Zorndorf, and had thus saved him from a"diingerous wound in the thigh.

The LE CArr here mentioned was the King's reader. He was selected in a way which .characterizes all FREDERIC'S actions,

but which is utterly dissimilar from the conventional mode in

which crowned heads choose their favourites. FREDERIC was travelling in strict incognito on a canal in Holland, with only one friend. .A passenger in the same barge was invited to share their breakfast, for his conversation had emus& the King. As soon as they had sat down, the King began to converse, and forgot his meal. At length, the stranger, who was LE CAI% alluded to the object of their meeting : tired of all he had been required to tell of his birth, parentage, and education, he said, "Sir, I beg leave to observe, that in return for one cut of pie, you have asked a great many questions." 'Whether pleased with the young man's frank- ness, or for other qualities, he some time after, much to the surprise of LE CATT (who was unconscious of the rank of his fellow-tra- veller), offered him the place of his reader. LE Carr thencefor- ward became attached to the King, and never left him.

There would be no end to the characteristic anecdotes of this hero of the last century : luckily our readers may find the best part of them in Lord DOVER'S very accessible work : to which, in a future Number, if our attention is not withdrawn from it by the pressing claims of subsequent publications, we shall have great pleasure in returning.