t the DIALOGUES to a certain Gerard at
Dantzig, who at that time was French Consul there, and who is at present
a Clerk in your Foreign Office under M. de Vergennes. This Gerard, who
does not want for wit, but who does me the honor to hate me cordially,
retouched these DIALOGUES, and put them into the condition they were
published in. I have laughed a good deal at them: here and there occur
coarse things (GROSSIERETES), and platitudes of the insipid kind:
but there are traits of good pleasantry. I shall not go fencing with
goose-quills against this sycophant. As Mazarin said, 'Let the French
keep singing, provided they let us keep doing.'" [_OEuvres de Frederic,_
xxiii. 319-321: "Potsdam, 2d March, 1775," and "25th March" following.
See PREUSS, iii. 275, iv. 85.]

Chapter V.--A CHAPTER OF MISCELLANIES.

After Neustadt, Kaiser Joseph and the King had no more Interviews.
Kaunitz's procedures in the subsequent Pacification and Partition
business had completely estranged the two Sovereigns: to friendly
visiting, a very different state of mutual feeling had succeeded;
which went on, such "the immeasurable ambition" visible in some of
us, deepening and worsening itself, instead of improving or abating.
Friedrich had Joseph's Portrait hung in conspicuous position in the
rooms where he lived; somebody noticing the fact, Friedrich answered:
"Ah, yes, I am obliged to keep that young Gentleman in my eye." And,
in effect, the rest of Friedrich's Political Activity, from this time
onwards, may be defined as an ever-vigilant defence of himself, and of
the German Reich, against Austrian Encroachment: which, to him, in the
years then running, was the grand impending peril; and which to us in
the new times has become so inexpressibly uninteresting, and will bear
no narrative, Austrian Encroachment did not prove to be the death-peril
that had overhung the world in Friedrich's last years!--

These, accordingly, are years in which the Historical interest goes
on diminishing; and only the Biographical, were anything of Biography
attainable, is left. Friedrich's industrial, economic and other Royal
activities are as beautiful as ever; but cannot to our readers, in our
limits, be described with advantage. Events of world-interest, after the
Partition of Poland, do not fall out, or Friedrich is not concerned in
them. It is a dim element; its significance chiefly German or Prussian,
not European. What of humanly interesting is discoverabl