ressive of
reticence and reflection, of slow constancy rather than of SPEED in
any kind. One expects, could the picture speak, the querulous sound
of maternal and other solicitude; of a temper tending towards the
obstinate, the quietly unchangeable;--loyal patience not wanting, yet
in still larger measure royal impatience well concealed, and long
and carefully cherished. This is what I read in Sophie Dorothee's
Portraits,--probably remembering what I had otherwise read, and come to
know of her. She too will not a little concern us in the first part
of this History. I find, for one thing, she had given much of her
physiognomy to the Friedrich now born. In his Portraits as Prince-Royal,
he strongly resembles her; it is his mother's face informed with youth
and new fire, and translated into the masculine gender: in his later
Portraits, one less and less recognizes the mother.

Friedrich Wilhelm, now in the sixth year of wedlock, is still very fond
of his Sophie Dorothee,--_ "Fiechen" (Feekin_ diminutive of _ Sophie _),
as he calls her; she also having, and continuing to have, the due wife's
regard for her solid, honest, if somewhat explosive bear. He troubles
her a little now and then, it is said, with whiffs of jealousy; but they
are whiffs only, the product of accidental moodinesses in him, or of
transient aspects, misinterpreted, in the court-life of a young and
pretty woman. As the general rule, he is beautifully good-humored, kind
even, for a bear; and, on the whole, they have begun their partnership
under good omens. And indeed we may say, in spite of sad tempests that
arose, they continued it under such. She brought him gradually no fewer
than fourteen children, of whom ten survived him and came to maturity:
and it is to be admitted their conjugal relation, though a royal, was
always a human one; the main elements of it strictly observed on both
sides; all quarrels in it capable of being healed again, and the feeling
on both sides true, however troublous. A rare fact among royal wedlocks,
and perhaps a unique one in that epoch.

The young couple, as is natural in their present position, have many
eyes upon them, and not quite a paved path in this confused court of
Friedrich I. But they are true to one another; they seem indeed to have
held well aloof from all public business or private cabal; and go along
silently expecting, and perhaps silently resolving this and that in
the future tense; but with moderate immunit