s the King of Prussia, having
only had a common gout in larger dose than common, was already well
of it again, before the Austrian Army had got to their Rendezvous. The
Kaiser made all these troops return to their old quarters; and the Court
of Vienna had nothing but mockery for its imprudent conduct." [_OEuvres
de Frederic,_ vi. 124.]

The first of these gout-attacks seems to have come in the end of
September, and to have lasted about a month; after which the illness
abated, and everybody thought it was gone. The Kaiser-Joseph evolution
must have been in October, and have got its mockery in the next months.
Friedrich, writing to VOLTAIRE, October 22d, has these words:... "A pair
of charming Letters from Ferney; to which, had they been from the great
Demiurgus himself, I could not have dictated Answer. Gout held me tied
and garroted for four weeks;--gout in both feet and in both hands; and,
such its extreme liberality, in both elbows too: at present the pains
and the fever have abated, and I feel only a very great exhaustion."
[Ib. xxv. 44.] "Four consecutive attacks; hope they are now all over;"
but we read, within the Spring following, that there have been in
all twelve of them; and in May, 1776, the Newspapers count eighteen
quasi-consecutive. So that in reality the King's strength was sadly
reduced; and his health, which did not recover its old average till
about 1780, continued, for several years after this bad fit, to be a
constant theme of curiosity to the Gazetteer species, and a matter of
solicitude to his friends and to his enemies.

Of the Kaiser's immense ambition there can be no question. He is
stretching himself out on every side; "seriously wishing," thinks
Friedrich, "that he could 'revivify the German Reich,'"--new Barbarossa
in improved FIXED form; how noble! Certainly, to King Friedrich's sad
conviction, "the Austrian Court is aiming to swallow all manner of
dominions that may fall within its grasp." Wants Bosnia and Servia in
the East; longs to seize certain Venetian Territories, which would unite
Trieste and the Milanese to the Tyrol. Is throwing out hooks on Modena,
on the Ferrarese, on this and on that. Looking with eager eyes on
Bavaria,--the situation of which is peculiar; the present Kur-Baiern
being elderly, childless; and his Heir the like, who withal is already
Kur-Pfalz, and will unite the Two Electorates under one head; a thing
which Austria regards with marked dislike. [_OEuvres de Frede