and which now came upon me in a far
worse form. When Cleve became French, I took leave of it; I felt in my
heart pleasure in returning under the sceptre of my own King, and under
the rule of home laws; this one anchor to which I had held, was now
torn from me. The power of Prussia was shattered, the whole State, with
the exception of a small portion, was now in the power of a conqueror,
whose ambitious plans displayed themselves more and more. It was only
too certain that we should be trampled upon; but what our fate might
be, over that a dark veil was drawn. The grief which gnawed in our
bosoms and the deep mourning in which we were sunk, were increased by
the annoyance of witnessing the joyful exultation of the people of
Muenster over their liberation from Prussian rule, and the favour with
which they were treated by the conqueror and his satellites. It was
more especially the Muenster nobles who thus distinguished themselves,
and behaved in a most undignified way. I will relate some instances of
it.

"In order in the speediest way to remove the hated Prussian colours,
which were painted on the turnpikes, bridges, and public buildings, and
to replace them by the old Muenster colours, a subscription was raised
to defray the costs, and our colours were erased as soon as possible.
One of the most opulent nobles took pleasure in showing his warm
participation in this undertaking, by giving his signature to a
considerable sum; in order to make known that he could not refrain from
expressing his satisfaction, he added to his subscription, the phrase:
'With pleasure,' that no one might doubt his patriotic feeling.

"The presidents, directors, councillors, assessors and referendaries of
the government, and of the war and royal domain departments, continued
to wear their official uniforms. These reminiscences of Prussian
supremacy were an abomination in the eyes of the nobles. They therefore
endeavoured to work upon General Loison to order the laying aside of
the uniform; but they only half succeeded. The General expressly
permitted the continuance of the uniform, and only ordered that the
Prussian button should be taken away, which we were obliged to change
for a smooth one. Thus the uniform was not laid aside, and the Geheime
Rath von Forkenbeck and I still wore it at the council in the year
1808, when we were called to Duesseldorf.

"This otherwise proud Muenster nobility paid as much court to the French
Generals as to