ot much
know. They are not inconceivable, if we read his situation well; but
in the way of speech, there is, as usual, next to nothing. Here are two
stray utterances, worth gathering from a man so uncommunicative in that
form.

FRIEDRICH A MONTH BEFORE PRAG (From Lockwitz, 25th March, to Princess
Amelia, at Berlin).--"My dearest Sister, I give you a thousand thanks
for the hints you have got me from Dr. Eller on the illness of our dear
Mother. Thrice-welcome this; and reassures me [alas, not on good basis!]
against a misfortune which I should have considered very great for me.

"As to us and our posture of affairs, political and military,--place
yourself, I conjure you, above every event. Think of our Country and
remember that one's first duty is to defend it. If you learn that a
misfortune happens to one of us, ask, 'Did he die fighting?' and if Yes,
give thanks to God. Victory or else death, there is nothing else for
us; one or the other we must have. All the world here is of that temper.
What! you would everybody sacrifice his life for the State, and you
would not have your Brothers give the example? Ah, my dear Sister, at
this crisis, there is no room for bargaining. Either at the summit of
glorious success, or else abolished altogether. This Campaign now
coming is like that of Pharsalia for Rome, or that of Leuctra for the
Greeks,"--a Campaign we verily shall have to win, or go to wreck upon!
[_OEuvres de Frederic,_ xxvii. i. 391.]

FRIEDERICH SHORTLY AFTER PRAG (To his Mother, Letter still extant in
Autograph, without date).--"My Brothers and I are still well. The whole
Campaign runs risk of being lost to the Austrians; and I find myself
free, with 150,000 men. Add to this, that we are masters of a Kingdom
[Bohemia here], which is obliged to furnish us with troops and money.
The Austrians are dispersed like straw before the wind. I will send a
part of my troops to compliment Messieurs the French; and am going [if I
once had Prag!] to pursue the Austrians with the rest of my Army." [Ib.
xxvi. 75.]

Friedrich, who keeps his emotions generally to himself, does not, as
will be seen, remain quite silent to us throughout this great Year;
but, by accident, has left us some rather impressive gleanings in that
kind;--and certainly in no year could such accident have been luckier to
us; this of 1757 being, in several respects, the greatest of his Life.
From nearly the topmost heights down to the lowest deeps, his fortun