iedrich Wilhelm had returned, that Queen Sophie had that fit of real
sickness we spoke of. Scarcely was his Majesty got home, when the Queen,
rather ambiguous in her sicknesses of late, fell really and dangerously
ill: so that Friedrich Wilhelm, at last recognizing it for real, came
hurrying in from Potsdam; wept loud and abundantly, poor man; declared
in private, "He would not survive his Feekin;" and for her sake
solemnly pardoned Wilhelmina, and even Fritz,--till the symptoms mended.
[Wilhelmina, i. 306.]

HOW VILLA WAS RECEIVED IN ENGLAND.

Meanwhile Dr. Villa, in England, has sped not ill. Villa's eloquence of
truth; the Grumkow-Reichenbach Correspondence in St. Mary Axe: these
two things produce their effect. These on the one hand; and then on the
other, certain questionable aspects of Fleury, after that fine Soissons
Catastrophe to the Kaiser; and certain interior quarrels in the English
Ministry, partly grounded thereon:--"On the whole, why should not we
detach Friedrioh Wilhelm from the Kaiser, if we could, and comply with a
Royal Sister?" think they at St. James's.

Political men take some interest in the question; "Why neglect your
Prince of Wales?" grumbles the Public: "It is a solid Protestant match,
eligible for Prince Fred and us!"--"Why bother with the Kaiser and his
German puddles?" asks Walpole: "Once detach Prussia from him, the
Kaiser will perhaps sit still, and leave the world and us free of
his Pragmatics and his Sanctions and Apanages."--"Quit of him? German
puddles?" answers Townshend dubitatively,--who has gained favor at
headquarters by going deeply into said puddles; and is not so ardent for
the Prussian Match; and indeed is gradually getting into quarrel with
Walpole and Queen Caroline. [Coxe, i. 332-339.] These things are all
favorable to Dr. Villa.

In fact, there is one of those political tempests (dreadful to the
teapot, were it not experienced in them) going on in England, at this
time,--what we call a Change of Ministry;--daily crisis laboring towards
fulfilment, or brewing itself ripe. Townshend and Walpole have had (how
many weeks ago Coxe does not tell us) that meeting in Colonel Selwyn's,
which ended in their clutching at swords, nay almost at coat-collars:
[Ib. p. 335.] honorable Brothers-in-law: but the good Sister, who used
to reconcile them, is now dead. Their quarrels, growing for some years
past, are coming to a head. "When the firm used to be Townshend and
Walpole,