the highest bidder, makes France, in our day,
Austria's slave!" We omit Kolin Battle, too, spoken of with a proud
modesty (Prag is not spoken of at all); and how the neighboring ravenous
Powers, on-lookers hitherto, have opened their throats with one accord
to swallow Prussia, thinking its downfall certain: "Poor mercenary
Sweden, once so famous under its soldier Kings, now debased by a venal
Senate;"--Sweden, "what say I? my own kindred [foolish Anspach and
others], driven by perverse motives, join in the plot of horrors, and
become satellites of the prospering Triumvirs.

"And thou, loved People [my own Prussians], whose happiness is my charge
[notable how often he repeats this] it is thy lamentable destiny, it is
the danger which hangs over thee, that pierces my soul. The pomps of my
rank I could resign without regret. But to rescue thee, in this black
crisis, I will spend my heart's blood. Whose IS that blood but thine?
With joy will I rally my warriors to avenge thy affront; defy death at
the foot of the ramparts [of Daun and his Eckartsberg, ahead yonder],
and either conquer, or be buried under thy ruins." Very well; but ah,--

"Preparing with such purpose, ye Heavens, what mournful cries are those
that reach us: 'Death haa laid low thy Mother!'--Hah, that was the last
stroke, then, which angry Fate had reserved for me.--O Mother, Death
flies my misfortunes, and spreads his livid horrors over thee! [Very
tender, very sad, what he says of his Mother; but must be omitted and
imagined. General finale is:]

"Thus Destiny with a deluge of torments fills the poisoned remnant of my
days. The present is hideous to me, the future unknown: what, you say I
am the creature of a BENEficent Being?--

Quoi serais-fe forme par un Dieu bienfaisati?
Ah! s'il etait si bon, tendre pour son ouvrage"--
--Husht, my little Titan!

"And now, ye promoters of sacred lies, go on leading cowards by the
nose, in the dark windings of your labyrinth:--to me the enchantment
is ended, the charm disappears. I see that all men are but the sport of
Destiny. And that, if there do exist some Gloomy and Inexorable Being,
who allows a despised herd of creatures to go on multiplying here, he
values them as nothing; looks down on a Phalaris crowned, on a Socrates
in chains; on our virtues, our misdeeds, on the horrors of war, and all
the cruel plagues which ravage Earth, as a thing indifferent to him.
Wherefore, my sole refu