mity, ability or heroism, but unconsciously exhibiting
a good deal; which by degrees gained universal recognition. He did
not shine much as Reichs-Generalissimo, under Kaiser Sigismund, in his
expeditions against Zisca; on the contrary, he presided over huge defeat
and rout, once and again, in that capacity; and indeed had represented
in vain that, with such a species of militia, victory was impossible. He
represented and again represented, to no purpose; whereupon he
declined the office farther; in which others fared no better. [Hormayr,
_OEsterreichischer Plutarch_ vii. 109-158, ? Zisca.]

The offer to be Kaiser was made him in his old days; but he wisely
declined that too. It was in Brandenburg, by what he silently founded
there, that he did his chief benefit to Germany and mankind. He
understood the noble art of governing men; had in him the justice,
clearness, valor and patience needed for that. A man of sterling
probity, for one thing. Which indeed is the first requisite in said
art:--if you will have your laws obeyed without mutiny, see well that
they be pieces of God Almighty's Law: otherwise all the artillery in the
world will not keep down mutiny.

Friedrich "travelled much over Brandenburg;" looking into everything
with his own eyes;--making, I can well fancy, innumerable crooked
things straight. Reducing more and more that famishing dog-kennel of
a Brandenburg into a fruitful arable field. His portraits represent a
square headed, mild-looking solid gentleman, with a certain twinkle
of mirth in the serious eyes of him. Except in those Hussite wars for
Kaiser Sigismund and the Reich, in which no man could prosper, he may be
defined as constantly prosperous. To Brandenburg he was, very literally,
the blessing of blessings; redemption out of death into life. In
the ruins of that old Friesack Castle, battered down by Heavy Peg,
Antiquarian Science (if it had any eyes) might look for the tap-root of
the Prussian Nation, and the beginning of all that Brandenburg has since
grown to under the sun.

Friedrich, in one capacity or another, presided over Brandenburg near
thirty years. He came thither first of all in 1412; was not completely
Kurfurst in his own right till 1415; nor publicly installed, "with
100,000 looking on from the roofs and windows," in Constance yonder,
till 1417,--age then some forty-five. His Brandenburg residence, when
he happened to have time for residing or sitting still, was Tangermunde,
the