d a screen. "What is that?" he cried, and
stepping across the room pulled the gown out. Beside himself with rage
he crammed it into the fireplace, and threw after it many of the
ornaments the boy had used to decorate his room. Then he walked to the
bookshelves and swept all the volumes to the floor, saying that he would
have a bookseller buy the library next day, because his son was to be a
soldier and not a scholar. For an hour he stayed there, pacing up and
down the room, lecturing Fritz until the boy was almost sick with shame.
Finally he left, and the two in the wood-closet were able to come out,
both of them almost as badly frightened as the Prince himself.

But if the King treated his son so badly, he treated his daughter
Wilhelmina none the less so. He could hardly stand the sight of her at
times, and her mother had to arrange a series of screens in her room so
that when Frederick William came to see her the daughter could escape
behind them. After such scenes Fritz and Wilhelmina would try to comfort
each other, but the boy was gradually growing more sullen and
rebellious.

Again and again the boy thought of escape; he would have been only too
glad to give up his position as Prince in exchange for the chance to
live simply in some foreign land, free to follow his own tastes as other
boys did theirs. He would have made the attempt, but he knew only too
well that should he escape his father's hand would fall in terrible
wrath on his dear sister Wilhelmina. He decided to stay and bear the
burdens of this life the King had planned for him rather than desert his
mother and sister. He was not a coward even if he was not made of iron.

At last the boy felt that he must act in self-defense. His father,
suffering from the gout, took to flogging Fritz in the very presence of
the lords and ladies of the court. The boy had pride, though his father
had done his best to kill it. Once, after striking blows at Fritz's head
before the assembled court, the King cried, "Had I been so treated by my
father, I would have blown my brains out. But this fellow has no honor.
He takes all that comes."

Fritz could stand such treatment no longer. Praying that Wilhelmina
might not suffer he planned an escape with a friend.

His father was taking him on a journey to the Rhine in the company of a
small guard of soldiers who were told to treat the boy like a prisoner.
Three officers were ordered to ride in the same carriage with Fritz, and