specimen, capable of
tocadille
or backgammon, capable
of rough slashes of sarcasm when he opens his old
beard for speech): these, and the like of these, intimate
confidants of the King, men who could speak a little,
or who could be socially silent otherwise, -- seem to
have been the staple of the Institution.
of rough slashes of sarcasm when he opens his old
beard for speech): these, and the like of these, intimate
confidants of the King, men who could speak a little,
or who could be socially silent otherwise, -- seem to
have been the staple of the Institution.
Thomas Carlyle
] ENTER ORDNANCE-MASTER SECKENDORF.
37
1726.
Wilhelmina's Book rather aggravating than assuaging
that feeling, on the part of intelligent readers. A Book
written long afterwards, from her recollections, from her
own oblique point of view; in a beautifully shrill
humour; running, not unnaturally, into confused exag-
gerations and distortions of all kinds. Not menda-
ciously written anywhere, yet erroneously everywhere.
Wilhelmina had no knowledge of the magical machinery
that was at work: she vaguely suspects Grumkow and
Seckendorf; but does not guess, in the mad explosions
of Papa, that two devils have got into Papa, and are
doing the mischief. Trusting to memory alone, she
misdates, mistakes, misplaces; jumbles all things topsy-
turvy; -- giving, on the whole, an image of affairs
which is altogether oblique, dislocated, exaggerative;
and which, in fine, proves unintelligible, if you try to
construe it into a fact, or thing done. Yet her Human
Narrative, in that wide waste of merely Pedant
Maunderings, is of great worth to us. A green tree, a
leafy grove, better or worse, in the wilderness of dead
bones and sand, -- how welcome! Many other Books
have been written on the matter; but these, to my ex-
perience, only darken it more and more. Pull Wil-
helmina straight, the best you can; deduct a twenty-
five or sometimes even a seventy-five per-cent, from the
exaggerative portions of her statement; you will find
her always true, lucid, charmingly human; and by far
the best authority on this part of her Brother's History.
State-Papers to some extent have also been printed on
the matter; and of written State-Papers, here in Eng-
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? 38 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED, [book V.
1726.
land and elsewhere, this Editor has had several hun-
dredweights distilled for him: but except as lights
hung-out over Wilhelmina, nothing yet known, of
published or manuscript, can be regarded as good for
much.
O Heavens, had one but seven-league boots, to get
across that inane country, -- a bottomless whirlpool of
dust and cobwebs in many places; -- where, at any
rate, we had so little to do! Elucidating, rectifying,
painfully contrasting, comparing, let us try to work-out
some conceivable picture of this strange Imperial
Much ado about Nothing; and get our unfortunate
Crown-Prince, and our unfortunate selves, alive
through it.
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? CHAP. vII. ] TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT, 39
CHAPTER Vn.
TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT.
In these distressing junctures, it may cheer the
reader's spirits, and will tend to explain for him what
is coming, if we glance a little into the Friedrich-Wil-
helm Tabagie (Tabaks-Collegium or Smoking College),
more worthy to be called Tobacco-Parliament, of which
there have already been incidental notices. Far too
remarkable an Institution of the country to be over-
looked by us here.
Friedrich Wilhelm, though an absolute Monarch,
does not dream of governing without Law, still less
without Justice, which he knows well to be the one
basis for him and for all Kings and men. His life-
effort, prosecuted in a grand, unconscious, unvarying
and instinctive way, may be defined rather as the effort
to find-out everywhere in his affairs what was justice;
to make regulations, laws in conformity with that, and
to guide himself and his Prussia rigorously by these.
Truly he is not of constitutional turn; cares little about
the wigs and formalities of justice, pressing-on so
fiercely towards the essence and fact of it; he has been
known to tear asunder the wigs and formalities, in a
notably impatient manner, when they stood between
him and the fact. But Prussia has its Laws withal,
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? 40 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED. [bOOK V.
1726.
tolerably abundant, tolerably fixed and supreme: and
the meanest Prussian man that could find-out a definite
Law, coming athwart Friedrich Wilhelm's wrath, would
check Friedrich Wilhelm in mid-volley, -- or hope
with good ground to do it. Hope, we say; for the
King is in his own and his people's eyes, to some in-
definite extent, always himself the supreme ultimate
Interpreter, and grand living codex, of the Laws, --
always to some indefinite extent; -- and there remains
for a subject man nothing but the appeal to Philip
sober, in some rash cases! On the whole, however,
Friedrich Wilhelm is by no means a lawless Monarch;
nor are his Prussians slaves by any means: they are
patient, stout-hearted, subject men, with a very con-
siderable quantity of radical fire, very well covered-in;
prevented from idle explosions, bound to a respectful
demeanour, and especially to hold their tongues as
much as possible.
Friedrich Wilhelm has not the least shadow of a
Constitutional Parliament, nor even a Privy-Council, as
we understand it; his Ministers being in general mere
Clerks to register and execute what he had otherwise
resolved upon: but he had his Tabaks-Collegium, To-
bacco-College, Smoking Congress, Tabagie, which has
made so much noise in the world, and which, in a
rough natural way, affords him the uses of a Parlia-
ment, on most cheap terms, and without the formidable
inconveniences attached to that kind of Institution.
A Parliament reduced to its simplest expression, and,
instead of Parliamentary eloquence, provided with
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? CHAP. TO. ] TOBACCO-PAKLIAMENT. , 41
1726. 1
Dutch claypipes and tobacco, so we may define this
celebrated Tabagie of Friedrich Wilhelm's.
Tabagies were not uncommon among German Sove-
reigns of that epoch: George I. at Hanover had his
Smoking-room, and select smoking Party on an even-
ing; and even at London, as we noticed, smoking
nightly, wetting his royal throat with thin beer, in
presence of his fat and of his lean Mistress, if there
were no other company. Tobacco, -- introduced by
the Swedish soldiers in the Thirty-Years War, say
some; or even by the English soldiers in the Bohemian
or Palatinate beginnings of said War, say others; --
tobacco, once shown them, was enthusiastically adopted
by the German populations, long in want of such an
article; and has done important multifarious functions
in that Country ever since. For truly, in Politics, Mo-
rality and all departments of their Practical and Spe-
culative affairs, we may trace its influences, good and
bad, to this day.
Influences generally bad; pacificatory but bad, en-
gaging you in idle cloudy dreams; -- still worse, pro-
moting composure among the palpably chaotic and dis-
composed; soothing all things into lazy peace; that all
things may be left to themselves very much, and to
the laws of gravity and decomposition. Whereby Ger-
man affairs are come to be greatly overgrown with
funguses in our Time; and give symptoms of dry and
of wet rot, wherever handled.
George I. , we say, had his Tabagie; and other
German Sovereigns had: but none of them turned it to
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? 42
DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED, [book V.
172(5.
a Political Institution, as Friedrich Wilhelm did. The
thrifty man; finding it would serve in that capacity
withal. He had taken it up as a commonplace solace
and amusement: it is a reward for doing strenuously
the day's heavy labours, to wind them up in this man-
ner, in quiet society of friendly human faces, into a
contemplative smoke-canopy, slowly spreading into the
realm of sleep and its dreams. Friedrich Wilhelm was
a man of habitudes; his evening Tabagie became a law
of Nature to him, constant as the setting of the sun.
Favourable circumstances, quietly noticed and laid hold
of by the thrifty man, developed this simple evening
arrangement of his into a sort of Smoking Parliament,
small but powerful, where State-consultations, in a fitful
informal way, took place; and the weightiest affairs
might, by dextrous management, cunning insinuation
and manoeuvring from those that understood the art and
the place, be bent this way or that, and ripened to-
wards such issue as was desirable.
To ascertain what the true course in regard to this
or the other high matter will be; what the public will
think of it; and, in short, what and how the Executive-
Royal shall do therein: this, the essential function of a
Parliament and Privy-Council, was here, by artless
cheap methods, under the bidding of mere Nature,
multifariously done; mere taciturnity and sedative smoke
making the most of what natural intellect there might
be. The substitution of Tobacco-smoke for Parliamen-
tary eloquence is, by some, held to be a great im-
provement . Here is Smelfungus's opinion, quaintly ex-
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? chAp, vn. ]
43
TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT.
1726.
pressed, with a smile in it, which perhaps is not all
of joy:
"Tobacco-smoke is the one element in which, by our
"European manners, men can sit silent together without
"embarrassment, and where no man is bound to speak one
"word more than he has actually and veritably got to say.
"Nay, rather every man is admonished and enjoined by the
"laws of honour, and even of personal ease, to stop short of
"that point; at all events, to hold his peace and take to his
"pipe again, the instant he has spoken his meaning, if he
"chance to have any. The results of which salutary practice,
"if introduced into Constitutional Parliaments, might evi-
"dently be incalculable. The essence of what little intellect
"and insight there is in that room: we shall or can get nothing
"more out of any Parliament; and sedative, gently-soothing,
"gently-clarifying tobacco-smoke (if the room were well
"ventilated, open atop, and the air kept good), with the
"obligation to a minimum of speech, surely gives human in-
"tellect and insight the best chance they can have. Best
"chance, instead of the worst chance as at present: ah me, ah
"me, who will reduce fools to silence again in any measure?
"Who will deliver men from this hideous nightmare of Stump-
"Oratory, under which the grandest Nations are choking to a
"nameless death, bleeding (too truly) from mouth and nose
"and ears, in our sad days? "
This Tobacco-College is the Grumkow-and-Secken-
dorf chief field of action. These two gentlemen under-
stand thoroughly the nature of the Prussian Tobacco-
Parliament; have studied the conditions of it to the
most intricate cranny: no English Whipper-in or elo-
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? 44
DOUBLE-MARRIAGE TROJECT STARTED, [book V.
1726.
quent Premier knows his St. Stephen's better, or how
to hatch a measure in that dim hot element. By hint,
by innuendo; by contemplative smoke, speech and
forbearance to speak; often looking one way and rowing
another, -- they can touch the secret springs, and
guide in a surprising manner the big dangerous Fire-
ship (for such every State-Parliament is) towards the
haven they intend for it . Most dextrous Parliament-
men (Smoke-Parliament); no Walpole, no Dundas, or
immortal Pitt, First or Second, is cleverer in Parlia-
mentary practice. For their Fireship, though smaller
than the British, is very dangerous withal. Look at
this, for instance: Seckendorf, one evening, far con-
trary to his wont, which was prostrate respect in easy
forms, and always judicious submission of one's own
weaker judgment, towards his Majesty, -- has got
into some difficult defence of the Kaiser; defence very
difficult, or in reality impossible. The cautious man
is flustered by the intricacies of his position, by his
Majesty's indignant counter-volleys, and the perilous
necessity there is to do the impossible on the spur of
the instant: -- gets into emphasis, answers his Ma-
jesty's volcanic fire by incipient heat of his own; and,
in short, seems in danger of forgetting himself, and
kindling the Tobacco-Parliament into a mere confla-
gration. That will be an issue for us! And yet who
dare interfere? Friedrich Wilhelm's words, in high
clangorous metallic plangency, and the pathos of a
lion raised by anger into song, fall hotter and hotter;
Seckendorfs puckered brow is growing of slate colour;
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? CHAP. vII. ] TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT, 45
1726.
his shelf-lip, shuttling violently, lisps and snuffles mere
unconciliatory matter: -- What on earth will become
of us? -- "Hoom! Boom! " dextrous Grumkow has
drawn a Humming-top from his pocket, and suddenly
sent it spinning. There it hums and caracoles, through
the bottles and glasses; reckless what dangerous break-
age and spilth it may occasion. Friedrich Wilhelm
looked aside to it indignantly. "What is that? " in-
quired he, in metallic tone still high. "Pooh, a toy I
bought for the little Prince August, your Majesty: am
only trying it! " His Majesty understood the hint,
Seckendorf still better; and a jolly touch of laughter,
on both sides, brought the matter back into the safe
tobacco-clouds again. *
This Smoking Parliament or Tabaks-Collegium of
his Prussian Majesty was a thing much talked-of in the
world; but till Seckendorf and Grumkow started their
grand operations there, its proceedings are not on re-
cord; nor indeed till then had its political or parlia-
mentary function become so decidedly evident. It was
originally a simple Smoking-Club; got together on hest
of Nature, without ulterior intentions: -- thus English
Parliamenta themselves are understood to have been,
in the old Norman time, mere royal Christmas-Festi-
vities, with natural colloquy or parleying between King
and Nobles ensuing thereupon, and what wisest consul-
tation concerning the arduous things of the realm the
circumstances gave rise to. Such parleyings or con-
* FBrjter, II. 110.
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? 46 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED, [bookv.
1726.
saltations, -- always two in number in regard to every
matter, it would seem, or even three; one sober, one
drunk, and one just after being drunk, -- proving of
extreme service in practice, grew to be Parliament, with
its three readings, and what not.
A Smoking-room, -- with wooden furniture, we
can suppose, -- in each of his Majesty's royal Palaces,
was set apart for this evening service, and became the
Tabagie of his Majesty. A Tabagie-room in the Ber-
lin Schloss, another in the Potsdam, if the cicerone
had any knowledge, could still be pointed-out: -- but
the Tobacco-pipes that are shown as Friedrich Wil-
helm's, in the Kunstkammer or Museum of Berlin, pipes
which no rational smoker, not compelled to it, would
have used, awaken just doubt as to the cicerones; and
you leave the Locality of the Tabagie a thing con-
jectural. In summer season, at Potsdam and in coun-
try situations, Tabagie could be held under a tent: we
expressly know, his Majesty held Tabagie at Wuster-
hausen nightly on the Steps of the big Fountain, in
the Outer Court there. Issuing from Wusterhausen
Schloss, and its little clipped lindens, by the western
side; passing the sentries, bridge and black ditch, with
live Prussian eagles, vicious black bears, you come
upon the royal Tabagie of Wusterhausen; covered by
an awning, I should think; sending forth its bits of
smoke-clouds, and its hum of human talk, into the
wide free Desert round. Any room that was large
enough, and had height of ceiling, and air-circulation
and no cloth-furniture, would do: and in each Palace
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? CHAP, vn. l
47
TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT.
1726. .
is one, or more than one, that has been fixed-upon and
fitted-out for that object
.
A high large Room, as the Engravings (mostly-
worthless) give it us: contented saturnine human figures,
a dozen or so of them, sitting round a large long
Table, furnished for the occasion; long Dutch pipe in
the mouth of each man; supplies of knaster easily
accessible; small pan of burning peat, in the Dutch
fashion (sandy native charcoal, which burns slowly
without smoke), is at your left hand; at your right a
jug, which I find to consist of excellent thin bitter
beer. Other costlier materials for drinking, if you
want such, are not beyond reach. On side-tables stand
wholesome cold-meats, royal rounds of beef not want-
ing, with bread thinly sliced and buttered: in a rustic
but neat and abundant way, such innocent accommoda-
tions, narcotic or nutritious, gaseous, fluid and solid,
as human nature, bent on contemplation and an even-
ing lounge, can require. Perfect equality is to be the
rule; no rising, or notice taken, when anybody enters
or leaves. Let the entering man take his place and
pipe, without obligatory remarks: if he cannot smoke,
which is Seckendorfs case for instance, let him at least
affect to do so, and not ruffle the established stream of
things. And so, Puff, slowly Pff! -- and any com-
fortable speech that is in you; or none, if you authen-
tically have not any.
Old official gentlemen, military for most part;
Grumkow, Derschau, Old-Dessauer (when at hand),
Seckendorf, old General Flans (rugged Platt-Deutsch
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DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED, [book V.
1726.
specimen, capable of tocadille or backgammon, capable
of rough slashes of sarcasm when he opens his old
beard for speech): these, and the like of these, intimate
confidants of the King, men who could speak a little,
or who could be socially silent otherwise, -- seem to
have been the staple of the Institution. Strangers
of mark, who happened to be passing, were occasional
guests; Ginckel the Dutch Ambassador, though foreign
like Seckendorf, was well-seen there; garrulous Pollnitz,
who has wandered-over all the world, had a standing
invitation. Kings, high Princes on visit, were sure to
have the honour. The Crown-Prince, now and after-
wards, was often present; oftener than he liked, -- in
such an atmosphere, in such an element. "The little
"Princes were all wont to come in," doffing their bits
of triangular hats, "and bid Papa goodnight. One of
"the old Generals would sometimes put them through
"their exercise; and the little creatures were unwilling
"to go away to bed. "
In such Assemblage, when business of importance,
foreign or domestic, was not occupying the royal
thoughts, -- the Talk, we can believe, was rambling
and multifarious: the day's hunting, if at Wusterhausen;
the day's news, if at Berlin or Potsdam; old re-
miniscences, too, I can fancy, turning-up, and talk,
even in Seckendorf's own time, about siege of Menin
(where your Majesty first did me the honour of some
notice), Siege of Stralsund, and -- duly on September
11th at least -- Malplaquet, with Marlborough and
Eugene: what Marlborough said, looked: and especially
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? chAp, vrr. 1
49
TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT,
1726.
Lottum, late Feldmarschall Lottum;* and how the
Prussian Infantry held firm, like a wall of rocks, when
the horse were swept away, -- rocks highly volcanic,
and capable of rolling forward too; -- and "how a
certain Adjutant" (Derschau smokes harder, and blushes
brown) "snatched poor Tettau on his back, bleeding to
death, amid the iron whirlwinds, and brought him out
of shot-range. "** -- "Hm, na, such a Day, that, Herr
Feldzeugmeister, as we shall not see again till the Last
of the Days! "
Failing talk, there were Newspapers in abundance;
scraggy Dutch Courants, Journals of the Rhine, Famas,
Frankfurt Zeitungs; with which his Majesty exuberantly
supplied himself; -- being willing to know what was
passing in the high places of the world, or even what
in the dark snuffy Editor's thoughts was passing. This kind of matter, as some picture of the actual hour, his
Majesty liked to have read to him, even during meal-
time. Some subordinate character, with clear windpipe,
-- all the better too, if he be a book-man, cognisant
of History, Geography, and can explain everything, --
usually reads the Newspaper from some high seat be-
hind backs, while his Majesty and Household dine.
The same subordinate personage may be worth his
place in the Tabagie, should his function happen to
prove necessary there. Even book-men, though generally
* Died 1719.
** MUitair-Lexikon, It. 78, ? Major-General von Tettau, and i. 348,
? Derschau. This was the beginning of Derschau's favour with Friedrich
Wilhelm, who had witnessed this piece of faithful work.
Carlyte, Frederic the Great. 111. 4
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? 50 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED. [BOOK v.
1726.
pedants and mere bags of wind and folly, are good for
something, more especially if rich mines of quizzability
turn-out to be workable in them.
Of Gundling, and the Literary Men in Tobacco-
Parliament.
Friedrich Wilhelm had, in succession or sometimes
simultaneously, a number of such Nondescripts, to read
his Newspapers and season his Tabagie; -- last evanes-
cent phasis of the old Court-Fool species; -- who form
a noticeable feature of his environment. One very fa-
mous literary gentleman of this description, who dis-
tanced every competitor, in the Tabagie and elsewhere,
for serving his Majesty's occasions, was Jakob Paul
Gundling; a name still laughingly remembered among
the Prussian people. Gundling was a Country Clergy-
man's son, of the Numberg quarter; had studied, carry-
ing-off the honours in various Universities; had read, or
turned-over, whole cartloads of wise and foolish Books
(gravitating, I fear, towards the latter kind); had gone
the Grand Tour as travelling tutor, "as companion to
an English gentleman. " He had seen courts, perhaps
camps, at lowest cities and inns; knew in a manner,
practically and theoretically, all things, and had pub-
lished multifarious Books of his own. * The sublime
long-eared erudition of the man was not to be contested;
manifest to everybody; thrice and four times manifest
to himself, in the first place.
* List of them, Twenty-one in number, mostly on learned Antiquarian
subjects, -- in Forster, ii. 255, 256.
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? cnAP. vII. ] TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT, 51
1726.
In the course of his roamings, and grand and little
tours, he had come to Berlin in old King Friedrich's
time; had thrown powder in the eyes of men there,
and been appointed to Professorships in the Bitter-Aca-
demy, to Chief-Heraldships, -- "Historiographer Royal," and perhaps other honours and emoluments. The whole
of which were cut-down by the ruthless scythe of
Friedrich Wilhelm, ruthlessly mowing his field clear,
in the manner we saw at his Accession. Whereby
learned grandiloquent Gundling, much addicted to li-
quor by this time, and turning the corner of forty, saw
himself cast-forth into the general wilderness; that is to
say, walking the streets of Berlin, with no resources
but what lay within himself and his own hungry skin.
Much given to liquor too. How he lived, for a year
or two after this, -- erudite pen and braggart tongue
his only resources, -- were tragical to say. At length
a famous Tavernkeeper, the "Leipziger Polter-Hans
(Leipzig Kill-Cow, or Boisterous-Jack)," as they call
him, finding what a dungeon of erudite talk this
Gundling was, and how gentlemen got entertained by
him, gave Gundling the run of his Tavern (or, I fear,
only a seat in the drinking-room); and it was here that
General Grumkow found him, talking big, and disserting
de omni scibili, to the ancient Berlin gentlemen over
their cups.
A very Dictionary of a man; who knows, in a
manner, all things; and is by no means ignorant that
he knows them: Would not this man suit his Majesty?
thought Grumkow; and brought him to Majesty, to
4*
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? 52 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED. [bOOKv.
1726.
read the Newspapers and explain everything. Date is
not given, or hinted at; but incidentally we find Gund-
ling in full blast "in the year 1718;"* and conclude
his instalment was a year or two before. Gundling
came to his Majesty from the Taproom of Boisterous-
Jack; read the Newspapers, and explained everything:
such a Dictionary-in-breeches (much given to liquor) as
his Majesty had got, was never seen before. Working
into the man, his Majesty, who had a great taste for
such things, discovered in him such mines of college-
learning, court-learning, without end; self-conceit, and
depth of appetite, not less considerable: in fine, such
Chaotic Blockheadism with the consciousness of being
Wisdom, as was wondrous to behold, -- as filled his Majesty, especially, with laughter and joyful amaze-
ment . Here are mines of native Darkness and Human
Stupidity, capable of being made to phosphoresce and
effervesce, -- are there not, your Majesty? Omniscient
Gundling was a prime resource in the Tabagie, for
many years to come. Man with sublimer stores of
long-eared Learning and Omniscience; man more desti-
tute of Mother-wit, was no-where to be met with. A
man, bankrupt of Mother-wit; -- who has squandered
any poor Mother-wit he had in the process of acquiring
his sublime Long-eared Omniscience; and has retained
only depth of appetite, -- appetite for liquor among
other things, as the consummation and bottomless cess-
pool of appetites: -- is not this a discovery we have
made, in Boisterous-Jack's, your Majesty!
* Von Loen: Kleine Schriflen, i. 201 (cited in Fb'rstcr, i. 260).
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? CHAP. vH. ] TOBACCO-PAKLIAMENT. 53
1726.
The man was an Eldorado for the peculiar quizzing
humour of his Majesty; who took immense delight in
working him, when occasion served. In the first years,
he had to attend his Majesty on all occasions of amuse-
ment; if you invite his Majesty to dinner, Gundling too
must be of the party. Daily, otherwise, Gundling was
at the Tabagie; getting drunk, if nothing better. Vein
after vein, rich in broad fun (very broad and Brobdig-
nagian, such as suits there), is discovered in him: with-
out wit himself, but much the cause of wit. None
oftener shook the Tabagie with inextinguishable Hahas:
daily, by stirring into him, you could wrinkle the Ta-
bagie into grim radiance of banter and silent grins.
He wore sublime clothes: Friedrich Wilhelm, whom
we saw dress-up his regimental Scavenger-Executioners
in French costume, for Count Rothenbui-g's behoof,
made haste to load Gundling with Rathships, Kammer-
herrships, Titles such as fools covet; -- gave him
tolerable pensions too, poor devil, and even functions,
if they were of the imaginary or big-insignificant sort.
Above all things, his Majesty dressed him, as the pink
of fortunate ambitious courtiers. Superfine scarlet coat,
gold buttonholes, black-velvet facings and embroideries
without end: "straw-coloured breeches; red silk stock-
ings," with probably blue clocks to them, "and shoes
with red heels:" on his learned head sat an immense
cloud-periwig of white goats-hair (the man now growing
towards fifty); in the hat a red feather:-- in this guise
he walked the streets, the gold Key of Kammerherr
(Chamberlain) conspicuously hanging at his coat-breast j
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? 54 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED, [book V.
1726.
and looked proudly down upon the world, when sober.
Alas, he was often not sober; and fiends in human
shape were ready enough to take advantage of his un-
guarded situation. No man suffered ruder tarring-and-
feathering;-- and his only comfort was his bane withal,
that he had, under such conditions, the use of the
royal cellars, and could always command good liquor
there.
His illustrious scarlet coat, by tumblings in the
ditch, soon got dirty to a degree; and exposed him to
the biting censures of his Majesty, anxious for the re-
spectability of his Hofraths. One day, two wicked
Captains, finding him prostrate in some lone place, cut-
off his Kammerherr Key; and privately gave it to his
Majesty. Majesty, in Tabagie, notices Gundling's
coat-breast: "Where is your Key, then, Herr Kammer-
herr? " "Hm, hah -- unfortunately lost it, Ihro Ma-
jestat! " -- "Lost it, say you? " and his Majesty looks
dreadfully grave. -- "Key lost? " thinks Tabagie, grave
Seckendorf included: "Jarni-bleu, that is something
serious! " "As if a Soldier were to drink his musket! "
thinks his Majesty: "And what are the laws, if an
ignorant fellow is shot, and a learned wise one escapes? "
Here is matter for a deliberative Tabagie; and to poor
Gundling a bad outlook, fatal or short of fatal. He
had better not even drink much; but dispense with
consolation, and keep his wits about him, till this
squall pass. After much deliberating, it is found that
the royal clemency can be extended; and an outlet de-
vised, under conditions. Next Tabagie, a servant
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? CHAP. TO. ] TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT, 55
1726.
enters with one of the biggest trays in the world, and
upon it a "Wooden Key gilt, about an ell long;"
this gigantic implement is solemnly hung round
the repentant Kammerherr; this he shall wear pub-
licly as penance, and be upon his behaviour, till
the royal mind can relent. Figure the poor block-
head till that happen! "On recovering his metal
key, he goes to a smith, and has it fixed on with
wire. "
What Gundling thought to himself, amid these
pranks and hoaxings, we do not know. The poor soul
was not born a fool; though he had become one, by
college-learning, vanity, strong-drink, and the world's
perversity and his own. Under good guidance, espe-
cially if bred to strict silence, he might have been in
some measure a luminous object, -- not as now a
phosphorescent one, shining by its mere rottenness! A
sad "Calamity of Authors" indeed, when it overtakes
a man! -- Poor Gundling probably had lucid intervals
now and then; tragic fits of discernment, in the inner-
man of him. He had a Brother, also a learned man,
who retained his senses; and was even a rather famed
Professor at Halle; whose Portrait, looking very aca-
demic, solemn and well-to-do, turns-up in old print-
shops; whose Books, concerning "Henry the Fowler
(De Henrico Aucupe)" "Kaiser Conrad I. ," and other
dim Historical objects, are still consultable, -- though
with little profit, to my experience. The name of this
one was Nicolaus Hieronymus; ours is Jakob Paul, the
senior brother, --- once the hope of the house, it is
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? 56 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED. [BOOK v.
1726.
likely, and a fond Father's pride, in that poor old
Niirnberg Parsonage long ago!
Jakob Paul likewise continued to write Books, on
Brandenburg Heraldries, Topography, Genealogies:
even a "Life" or two of some old Brandenburg Elec-
tors are still extant from his hand; but not looked-at
now by any mortal. He had been, perhaps was again,
Historiographer Royal; and felt bound to write such
Books: several of them he printed; and we hear of
others still manuscript, "in five folio volumes written
fair. " He held innumerable half-mock Titles and Offices;
among others, was actual President of the Berlin Royal
Society, or Academie des Sciences, Leibnitz's pet daughter,
-- there Gundling actually sat in office; and drew the
salary, for one certainty. "As good he as another,"
thought Friedrich Wilhelm: "What is the use of these
solemn fellows, in their big perukes, with their crabbed
x + y's, and scientific Pedlar's-French; doing nothing
that I can see, except annually the Berlin Almanac,
which they live upon? Let them live upon it, and be
thankful; with Gundling for their head man. "
Academy of Sciences makes its Almanac, and some
peculium of profit by it; lectures perhaps a little "on
Anatomy" (good for something, that, in his Majesty's
mind); but languishes without encouragement during
the present reign. Has his Majesty no prize-questions
to propose, then? None, or worse. He once officially
put these learned Associates upon ascertaining for him
"Why Champagne foamed? " They, with a hidden
vein of pleasantry, required "material to experiment
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? chAp. vn. ]
57
TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT.
1726.
upon. " Friedrich Wilhelm sent them a dozen, or cer-
tain dozens; and the matter proved insoluble to this
day. No King, scarcely any man, had less of reve-
rence for the Sciences so-called; for Academic culture,
and the art of the Talking-Schoolmaster in general! A
King obtuse to the fine Arts, especially to the vocal
Arts, in a high degree. Literary fame itself he regards
as mountebank fame; the art of writing big admirable
folios is little better to him than that of vomiting long
coils of wonderful ribbon, for the idlers of the market-
place; and he bear-baits his Gundling, in this manner,
as phosphorescent blockhead of the first magnitude,
worthy of nothing better.
Nay it is but lately (1723 the exact year), that he
did his ever-memorable feat in regard to Wolf and his
Philosophy, at Halle. Illustrious Wolf was recognised,
at that time, as the second greater Leibnitz, and Head-
Philosopher of Nature, who "by mathematical method"'
had as it were taken Nature in the fact, and illuminated
everything, so that whosoever ran might read, -- which
all manner of people then tried to do, but have now
quite ceased trying "by the Wolf-method:" -- Immortal
Wolf, somewhat of a stiff, reserved humour, inwardly
a little proud, and not wanting in private contempt of
the contemptible, had been accused of heterodoxy by
the Halle Theologians. Immortal Wolf, croakily sati-
rical withal, had of course defended himself; and of
course got into a shoreless sea of controversy with the
Halle Theologians; pestering his Majesty with mere
wars, and rumours of war, for a length of time, from
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1726.
Wilhelmina's Book rather aggravating than assuaging
that feeling, on the part of intelligent readers. A Book
written long afterwards, from her recollections, from her
own oblique point of view; in a beautifully shrill
humour; running, not unnaturally, into confused exag-
gerations and distortions of all kinds. Not menda-
ciously written anywhere, yet erroneously everywhere.
Wilhelmina had no knowledge of the magical machinery
that was at work: she vaguely suspects Grumkow and
Seckendorf; but does not guess, in the mad explosions
of Papa, that two devils have got into Papa, and are
doing the mischief. Trusting to memory alone, she
misdates, mistakes, misplaces; jumbles all things topsy-
turvy; -- giving, on the whole, an image of affairs
which is altogether oblique, dislocated, exaggerative;
and which, in fine, proves unintelligible, if you try to
construe it into a fact, or thing done. Yet her Human
Narrative, in that wide waste of merely Pedant
Maunderings, is of great worth to us. A green tree, a
leafy grove, better or worse, in the wilderness of dead
bones and sand, -- how welcome! Many other Books
have been written on the matter; but these, to my ex-
perience, only darken it more and more. Pull Wil-
helmina straight, the best you can; deduct a twenty-
five or sometimes even a seventy-five per-cent, from the
exaggerative portions of her statement; you will find
her always true, lucid, charmingly human; and by far
the best authority on this part of her Brother's History.
State-Papers to some extent have also been printed on
the matter; and of written State-Papers, here in Eng-
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? 38 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED, [book V.
1726.
land and elsewhere, this Editor has had several hun-
dredweights distilled for him: but except as lights
hung-out over Wilhelmina, nothing yet known, of
published or manuscript, can be regarded as good for
much.
O Heavens, had one but seven-league boots, to get
across that inane country, -- a bottomless whirlpool of
dust and cobwebs in many places; -- where, at any
rate, we had so little to do! Elucidating, rectifying,
painfully contrasting, comparing, let us try to work-out
some conceivable picture of this strange Imperial
Much ado about Nothing; and get our unfortunate
Crown-Prince, and our unfortunate selves, alive
through it.
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? CHAP. vII. ] TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT, 39
CHAPTER Vn.
TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT.
In these distressing junctures, it may cheer the
reader's spirits, and will tend to explain for him what
is coming, if we glance a little into the Friedrich-Wil-
helm Tabagie (Tabaks-Collegium or Smoking College),
more worthy to be called Tobacco-Parliament, of which
there have already been incidental notices. Far too
remarkable an Institution of the country to be over-
looked by us here.
Friedrich Wilhelm, though an absolute Monarch,
does not dream of governing without Law, still less
without Justice, which he knows well to be the one
basis for him and for all Kings and men. His life-
effort, prosecuted in a grand, unconscious, unvarying
and instinctive way, may be defined rather as the effort
to find-out everywhere in his affairs what was justice;
to make regulations, laws in conformity with that, and
to guide himself and his Prussia rigorously by these.
Truly he is not of constitutional turn; cares little about
the wigs and formalities of justice, pressing-on so
fiercely towards the essence and fact of it; he has been
known to tear asunder the wigs and formalities, in a
notably impatient manner, when they stood between
him and the fact. But Prussia has its Laws withal,
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? 40 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED. [bOOK V.
1726.
tolerably abundant, tolerably fixed and supreme: and
the meanest Prussian man that could find-out a definite
Law, coming athwart Friedrich Wilhelm's wrath, would
check Friedrich Wilhelm in mid-volley, -- or hope
with good ground to do it. Hope, we say; for the
King is in his own and his people's eyes, to some in-
definite extent, always himself the supreme ultimate
Interpreter, and grand living codex, of the Laws, --
always to some indefinite extent; -- and there remains
for a subject man nothing but the appeal to Philip
sober, in some rash cases! On the whole, however,
Friedrich Wilhelm is by no means a lawless Monarch;
nor are his Prussians slaves by any means: they are
patient, stout-hearted, subject men, with a very con-
siderable quantity of radical fire, very well covered-in;
prevented from idle explosions, bound to a respectful
demeanour, and especially to hold their tongues as
much as possible.
Friedrich Wilhelm has not the least shadow of a
Constitutional Parliament, nor even a Privy-Council, as
we understand it; his Ministers being in general mere
Clerks to register and execute what he had otherwise
resolved upon: but he had his Tabaks-Collegium, To-
bacco-College, Smoking Congress, Tabagie, which has
made so much noise in the world, and which, in a
rough natural way, affords him the uses of a Parlia-
ment, on most cheap terms, and without the formidable
inconveniences attached to that kind of Institution.
A Parliament reduced to its simplest expression, and,
instead of Parliamentary eloquence, provided with
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? CHAP. TO. ] TOBACCO-PAKLIAMENT. , 41
1726. 1
Dutch claypipes and tobacco, so we may define this
celebrated Tabagie of Friedrich Wilhelm's.
Tabagies were not uncommon among German Sove-
reigns of that epoch: George I. at Hanover had his
Smoking-room, and select smoking Party on an even-
ing; and even at London, as we noticed, smoking
nightly, wetting his royal throat with thin beer, in
presence of his fat and of his lean Mistress, if there
were no other company. Tobacco, -- introduced by
the Swedish soldiers in the Thirty-Years War, say
some; or even by the English soldiers in the Bohemian
or Palatinate beginnings of said War, say others; --
tobacco, once shown them, was enthusiastically adopted
by the German populations, long in want of such an
article; and has done important multifarious functions
in that Country ever since. For truly, in Politics, Mo-
rality and all departments of their Practical and Spe-
culative affairs, we may trace its influences, good and
bad, to this day.
Influences generally bad; pacificatory but bad, en-
gaging you in idle cloudy dreams; -- still worse, pro-
moting composure among the palpably chaotic and dis-
composed; soothing all things into lazy peace; that all
things may be left to themselves very much, and to
the laws of gravity and decomposition. Whereby Ger-
man affairs are come to be greatly overgrown with
funguses in our Time; and give symptoms of dry and
of wet rot, wherever handled.
George I. , we say, had his Tabagie; and other
German Sovereigns had: but none of them turned it to
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? 42
DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED, [book V.
172(5.
a Political Institution, as Friedrich Wilhelm did. The
thrifty man; finding it would serve in that capacity
withal. He had taken it up as a commonplace solace
and amusement: it is a reward for doing strenuously
the day's heavy labours, to wind them up in this man-
ner, in quiet society of friendly human faces, into a
contemplative smoke-canopy, slowly spreading into the
realm of sleep and its dreams. Friedrich Wilhelm was
a man of habitudes; his evening Tabagie became a law
of Nature to him, constant as the setting of the sun.
Favourable circumstances, quietly noticed and laid hold
of by the thrifty man, developed this simple evening
arrangement of his into a sort of Smoking Parliament,
small but powerful, where State-consultations, in a fitful
informal way, took place; and the weightiest affairs
might, by dextrous management, cunning insinuation
and manoeuvring from those that understood the art and
the place, be bent this way or that, and ripened to-
wards such issue as was desirable.
To ascertain what the true course in regard to this
or the other high matter will be; what the public will
think of it; and, in short, what and how the Executive-
Royal shall do therein: this, the essential function of a
Parliament and Privy-Council, was here, by artless
cheap methods, under the bidding of mere Nature,
multifariously done; mere taciturnity and sedative smoke
making the most of what natural intellect there might
be. The substitution of Tobacco-smoke for Parliamen-
tary eloquence is, by some, held to be a great im-
provement . Here is Smelfungus's opinion, quaintly ex-
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? chAp, vn. ]
43
TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT.
1726.
pressed, with a smile in it, which perhaps is not all
of joy:
"Tobacco-smoke is the one element in which, by our
"European manners, men can sit silent together without
"embarrassment, and where no man is bound to speak one
"word more than he has actually and veritably got to say.
"Nay, rather every man is admonished and enjoined by the
"laws of honour, and even of personal ease, to stop short of
"that point; at all events, to hold his peace and take to his
"pipe again, the instant he has spoken his meaning, if he
"chance to have any. The results of which salutary practice,
"if introduced into Constitutional Parliaments, might evi-
"dently be incalculable. The essence of what little intellect
"and insight there is in that room: we shall or can get nothing
"more out of any Parliament; and sedative, gently-soothing,
"gently-clarifying tobacco-smoke (if the room were well
"ventilated, open atop, and the air kept good), with the
"obligation to a minimum of speech, surely gives human in-
"tellect and insight the best chance they can have. Best
"chance, instead of the worst chance as at present: ah me, ah
"me, who will reduce fools to silence again in any measure?
"Who will deliver men from this hideous nightmare of Stump-
"Oratory, under which the grandest Nations are choking to a
"nameless death, bleeding (too truly) from mouth and nose
"and ears, in our sad days? "
This Tobacco-College is the Grumkow-and-Secken-
dorf chief field of action. These two gentlemen under-
stand thoroughly the nature of the Prussian Tobacco-
Parliament; have studied the conditions of it to the
most intricate cranny: no English Whipper-in or elo-
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? 44
DOUBLE-MARRIAGE TROJECT STARTED, [book V.
1726.
quent Premier knows his St. Stephen's better, or how
to hatch a measure in that dim hot element. By hint,
by innuendo; by contemplative smoke, speech and
forbearance to speak; often looking one way and rowing
another, -- they can touch the secret springs, and
guide in a surprising manner the big dangerous Fire-
ship (for such every State-Parliament is) towards the
haven they intend for it . Most dextrous Parliament-
men (Smoke-Parliament); no Walpole, no Dundas, or
immortal Pitt, First or Second, is cleverer in Parlia-
mentary practice. For their Fireship, though smaller
than the British, is very dangerous withal. Look at
this, for instance: Seckendorf, one evening, far con-
trary to his wont, which was prostrate respect in easy
forms, and always judicious submission of one's own
weaker judgment, towards his Majesty, -- has got
into some difficult defence of the Kaiser; defence very
difficult, or in reality impossible. The cautious man
is flustered by the intricacies of his position, by his
Majesty's indignant counter-volleys, and the perilous
necessity there is to do the impossible on the spur of
the instant: -- gets into emphasis, answers his Ma-
jesty's volcanic fire by incipient heat of his own; and,
in short, seems in danger of forgetting himself, and
kindling the Tobacco-Parliament into a mere confla-
gration. That will be an issue for us! And yet who
dare interfere? Friedrich Wilhelm's words, in high
clangorous metallic plangency, and the pathos of a
lion raised by anger into song, fall hotter and hotter;
Seckendorfs puckered brow is growing of slate colour;
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? CHAP. vII. ] TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT, 45
1726.
his shelf-lip, shuttling violently, lisps and snuffles mere
unconciliatory matter: -- What on earth will become
of us? -- "Hoom! Boom! " dextrous Grumkow has
drawn a Humming-top from his pocket, and suddenly
sent it spinning. There it hums and caracoles, through
the bottles and glasses; reckless what dangerous break-
age and spilth it may occasion. Friedrich Wilhelm
looked aside to it indignantly. "What is that? " in-
quired he, in metallic tone still high. "Pooh, a toy I
bought for the little Prince August, your Majesty: am
only trying it! " His Majesty understood the hint,
Seckendorf still better; and a jolly touch of laughter,
on both sides, brought the matter back into the safe
tobacco-clouds again. *
This Smoking Parliament or Tabaks-Collegium of
his Prussian Majesty was a thing much talked-of in the
world; but till Seckendorf and Grumkow started their
grand operations there, its proceedings are not on re-
cord; nor indeed till then had its political or parlia-
mentary function become so decidedly evident. It was
originally a simple Smoking-Club; got together on hest
of Nature, without ulterior intentions: -- thus English
Parliamenta themselves are understood to have been,
in the old Norman time, mere royal Christmas-Festi-
vities, with natural colloquy or parleying between King
and Nobles ensuing thereupon, and what wisest consul-
tation concerning the arduous things of the realm the
circumstances gave rise to. Such parleyings or con-
* FBrjter, II. 110.
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? 46 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED, [bookv.
1726.
saltations, -- always two in number in regard to every
matter, it would seem, or even three; one sober, one
drunk, and one just after being drunk, -- proving of
extreme service in practice, grew to be Parliament, with
its three readings, and what not.
A Smoking-room, -- with wooden furniture, we
can suppose, -- in each of his Majesty's royal Palaces,
was set apart for this evening service, and became the
Tabagie of his Majesty. A Tabagie-room in the Ber-
lin Schloss, another in the Potsdam, if the cicerone
had any knowledge, could still be pointed-out: -- but
the Tobacco-pipes that are shown as Friedrich Wil-
helm's, in the Kunstkammer or Museum of Berlin, pipes
which no rational smoker, not compelled to it, would
have used, awaken just doubt as to the cicerones; and
you leave the Locality of the Tabagie a thing con-
jectural. In summer season, at Potsdam and in coun-
try situations, Tabagie could be held under a tent: we
expressly know, his Majesty held Tabagie at Wuster-
hausen nightly on the Steps of the big Fountain, in
the Outer Court there. Issuing from Wusterhausen
Schloss, and its little clipped lindens, by the western
side; passing the sentries, bridge and black ditch, with
live Prussian eagles, vicious black bears, you come
upon the royal Tabagie of Wusterhausen; covered by
an awning, I should think; sending forth its bits of
smoke-clouds, and its hum of human talk, into the
wide free Desert round. Any room that was large
enough, and had height of ceiling, and air-circulation
and no cloth-furniture, would do: and in each Palace
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? CHAP, vn. l
47
TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT.
1726. .
is one, or more than one, that has been fixed-upon and
fitted-out for that object
.
A high large Room, as the Engravings (mostly-
worthless) give it us: contented saturnine human figures,
a dozen or so of them, sitting round a large long
Table, furnished for the occasion; long Dutch pipe in
the mouth of each man; supplies of knaster easily
accessible; small pan of burning peat, in the Dutch
fashion (sandy native charcoal, which burns slowly
without smoke), is at your left hand; at your right a
jug, which I find to consist of excellent thin bitter
beer. Other costlier materials for drinking, if you
want such, are not beyond reach. On side-tables stand
wholesome cold-meats, royal rounds of beef not want-
ing, with bread thinly sliced and buttered: in a rustic
but neat and abundant way, such innocent accommoda-
tions, narcotic or nutritious, gaseous, fluid and solid,
as human nature, bent on contemplation and an even-
ing lounge, can require. Perfect equality is to be the
rule; no rising, or notice taken, when anybody enters
or leaves. Let the entering man take his place and
pipe, without obligatory remarks: if he cannot smoke,
which is Seckendorfs case for instance, let him at least
affect to do so, and not ruffle the established stream of
things. And so, Puff, slowly Pff! -- and any com-
fortable speech that is in you; or none, if you authen-
tically have not any.
Old official gentlemen, military for most part;
Grumkow, Derschau, Old-Dessauer (when at hand),
Seckendorf, old General Flans (rugged Platt-Deutsch
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? 48
DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED, [book V.
1726.
specimen, capable of tocadille or backgammon, capable
of rough slashes of sarcasm when he opens his old
beard for speech): these, and the like of these, intimate
confidants of the King, men who could speak a little,
or who could be socially silent otherwise, -- seem to
have been the staple of the Institution. Strangers
of mark, who happened to be passing, were occasional
guests; Ginckel the Dutch Ambassador, though foreign
like Seckendorf, was well-seen there; garrulous Pollnitz,
who has wandered-over all the world, had a standing
invitation. Kings, high Princes on visit, were sure to
have the honour. The Crown-Prince, now and after-
wards, was often present; oftener than he liked, -- in
such an atmosphere, in such an element. "The little
"Princes were all wont to come in," doffing their bits
of triangular hats, "and bid Papa goodnight. One of
"the old Generals would sometimes put them through
"their exercise; and the little creatures were unwilling
"to go away to bed. "
In such Assemblage, when business of importance,
foreign or domestic, was not occupying the royal
thoughts, -- the Talk, we can believe, was rambling
and multifarious: the day's hunting, if at Wusterhausen;
the day's news, if at Berlin or Potsdam; old re-
miniscences, too, I can fancy, turning-up, and talk,
even in Seckendorf's own time, about siege of Menin
(where your Majesty first did me the honour of some
notice), Siege of Stralsund, and -- duly on September
11th at least -- Malplaquet, with Marlborough and
Eugene: what Marlborough said, looked: and especially
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? chAp, vrr. 1
49
TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT,
1726.
Lottum, late Feldmarschall Lottum;* and how the
Prussian Infantry held firm, like a wall of rocks, when
the horse were swept away, -- rocks highly volcanic,
and capable of rolling forward too; -- and "how a
certain Adjutant" (Derschau smokes harder, and blushes
brown) "snatched poor Tettau on his back, bleeding to
death, amid the iron whirlwinds, and brought him out
of shot-range. "** -- "Hm, na, such a Day, that, Herr
Feldzeugmeister, as we shall not see again till the Last
of the Days! "
Failing talk, there were Newspapers in abundance;
scraggy Dutch Courants, Journals of the Rhine, Famas,
Frankfurt Zeitungs; with which his Majesty exuberantly
supplied himself; -- being willing to know what was
passing in the high places of the world, or even what
in the dark snuffy Editor's thoughts was passing. This kind of matter, as some picture of the actual hour, his
Majesty liked to have read to him, even during meal-
time. Some subordinate character, with clear windpipe,
-- all the better too, if he be a book-man, cognisant
of History, Geography, and can explain everything, --
usually reads the Newspaper from some high seat be-
hind backs, while his Majesty and Household dine.
The same subordinate personage may be worth his
place in the Tabagie, should his function happen to
prove necessary there. Even book-men, though generally
* Died 1719.
** MUitair-Lexikon, It. 78, ? Major-General von Tettau, and i. 348,
? Derschau. This was the beginning of Derschau's favour with Friedrich
Wilhelm, who had witnessed this piece of faithful work.
Carlyte, Frederic the Great. 111. 4
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? 50 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED. [BOOK v.
1726.
pedants and mere bags of wind and folly, are good for
something, more especially if rich mines of quizzability
turn-out to be workable in them.
Of Gundling, and the Literary Men in Tobacco-
Parliament.
Friedrich Wilhelm had, in succession or sometimes
simultaneously, a number of such Nondescripts, to read
his Newspapers and season his Tabagie; -- last evanes-
cent phasis of the old Court-Fool species; -- who form
a noticeable feature of his environment. One very fa-
mous literary gentleman of this description, who dis-
tanced every competitor, in the Tabagie and elsewhere,
for serving his Majesty's occasions, was Jakob Paul
Gundling; a name still laughingly remembered among
the Prussian people. Gundling was a Country Clergy-
man's son, of the Numberg quarter; had studied, carry-
ing-off the honours in various Universities; had read, or
turned-over, whole cartloads of wise and foolish Books
(gravitating, I fear, towards the latter kind); had gone
the Grand Tour as travelling tutor, "as companion to
an English gentleman. " He had seen courts, perhaps
camps, at lowest cities and inns; knew in a manner,
practically and theoretically, all things, and had pub-
lished multifarious Books of his own. * The sublime
long-eared erudition of the man was not to be contested;
manifest to everybody; thrice and four times manifest
to himself, in the first place.
* List of them, Twenty-one in number, mostly on learned Antiquarian
subjects, -- in Forster, ii. 255, 256.
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? cnAP. vII. ] TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT, 51
1726.
In the course of his roamings, and grand and little
tours, he had come to Berlin in old King Friedrich's
time; had thrown powder in the eyes of men there,
and been appointed to Professorships in the Bitter-Aca-
demy, to Chief-Heraldships, -- "Historiographer Royal," and perhaps other honours and emoluments. The whole
of which were cut-down by the ruthless scythe of
Friedrich Wilhelm, ruthlessly mowing his field clear,
in the manner we saw at his Accession. Whereby
learned grandiloquent Gundling, much addicted to li-
quor by this time, and turning the corner of forty, saw
himself cast-forth into the general wilderness; that is to
say, walking the streets of Berlin, with no resources
but what lay within himself and his own hungry skin.
Much given to liquor too. How he lived, for a year
or two after this, -- erudite pen and braggart tongue
his only resources, -- were tragical to say. At length
a famous Tavernkeeper, the "Leipziger Polter-Hans
(Leipzig Kill-Cow, or Boisterous-Jack)," as they call
him, finding what a dungeon of erudite talk this
Gundling was, and how gentlemen got entertained by
him, gave Gundling the run of his Tavern (or, I fear,
only a seat in the drinking-room); and it was here that
General Grumkow found him, talking big, and disserting
de omni scibili, to the ancient Berlin gentlemen over
their cups.
A very Dictionary of a man; who knows, in a
manner, all things; and is by no means ignorant that
he knows them: Would not this man suit his Majesty?
thought Grumkow; and brought him to Majesty, to
4*
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? 52 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED. [bOOKv.
1726.
read the Newspapers and explain everything. Date is
not given, or hinted at; but incidentally we find Gund-
ling in full blast "in the year 1718;"* and conclude
his instalment was a year or two before. Gundling
came to his Majesty from the Taproom of Boisterous-
Jack; read the Newspapers, and explained everything:
such a Dictionary-in-breeches (much given to liquor) as
his Majesty had got, was never seen before. Working
into the man, his Majesty, who had a great taste for
such things, discovered in him such mines of college-
learning, court-learning, without end; self-conceit, and
depth of appetite, not less considerable: in fine, such
Chaotic Blockheadism with the consciousness of being
Wisdom, as was wondrous to behold, -- as filled his Majesty, especially, with laughter and joyful amaze-
ment . Here are mines of native Darkness and Human
Stupidity, capable of being made to phosphoresce and
effervesce, -- are there not, your Majesty? Omniscient
Gundling was a prime resource in the Tabagie, for
many years to come. Man with sublimer stores of
long-eared Learning and Omniscience; man more desti-
tute of Mother-wit, was no-where to be met with. A
man, bankrupt of Mother-wit; -- who has squandered
any poor Mother-wit he had in the process of acquiring
his sublime Long-eared Omniscience; and has retained
only depth of appetite, -- appetite for liquor among
other things, as the consummation and bottomless cess-
pool of appetites: -- is not this a discovery we have
made, in Boisterous-Jack's, your Majesty!
* Von Loen: Kleine Schriflen, i. 201 (cited in Fb'rstcr, i. 260).
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? CHAP. vH. ] TOBACCO-PAKLIAMENT. 53
1726.
The man was an Eldorado for the peculiar quizzing
humour of his Majesty; who took immense delight in
working him, when occasion served. In the first years,
he had to attend his Majesty on all occasions of amuse-
ment; if you invite his Majesty to dinner, Gundling too
must be of the party. Daily, otherwise, Gundling was
at the Tabagie; getting drunk, if nothing better. Vein
after vein, rich in broad fun (very broad and Brobdig-
nagian, such as suits there), is discovered in him: with-
out wit himself, but much the cause of wit. None
oftener shook the Tabagie with inextinguishable Hahas:
daily, by stirring into him, you could wrinkle the Ta-
bagie into grim radiance of banter and silent grins.
He wore sublime clothes: Friedrich Wilhelm, whom
we saw dress-up his regimental Scavenger-Executioners
in French costume, for Count Rothenbui-g's behoof,
made haste to load Gundling with Rathships, Kammer-
herrships, Titles such as fools covet; -- gave him
tolerable pensions too, poor devil, and even functions,
if they were of the imaginary or big-insignificant sort.
Above all things, his Majesty dressed him, as the pink
of fortunate ambitious courtiers. Superfine scarlet coat,
gold buttonholes, black-velvet facings and embroideries
without end: "straw-coloured breeches; red silk stock-
ings," with probably blue clocks to them, "and shoes
with red heels:" on his learned head sat an immense
cloud-periwig of white goats-hair (the man now growing
towards fifty); in the hat a red feather:-- in this guise
he walked the streets, the gold Key of Kammerherr
(Chamberlain) conspicuously hanging at his coat-breast j
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? 54 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED, [book V.
1726.
and looked proudly down upon the world, when sober.
Alas, he was often not sober; and fiends in human
shape were ready enough to take advantage of his un-
guarded situation. No man suffered ruder tarring-and-
feathering;-- and his only comfort was his bane withal,
that he had, under such conditions, the use of the
royal cellars, and could always command good liquor
there.
His illustrious scarlet coat, by tumblings in the
ditch, soon got dirty to a degree; and exposed him to
the biting censures of his Majesty, anxious for the re-
spectability of his Hofraths. One day, two wicked
Captains, finding him prostrate in some lone place, cut-
off his Kammerherr Key; and privately gave it to his
Majesty. Majesty, in Tabagie, notices Gundling's
coat-breast: "Where is your Key, then, Herr Kammer-
herr? " "Hm, hah -- unfortunately lost it, Ihro Ma-
jestat! " -- "Lost it, say you? " and his Majesty looks
dreadfully grave. -- "Key lost? " thinks Tabagie, grave
Seckendorf included: "Jarni-bleu, that is something
serious! " "As if a Soldier were to drink his musket! "
thinks his Majesty: "And what are the laws, if an
ignorant fellow is shot, and a learned wise one escapes? "
Here is matter for a deliberative Tabagie; and to poor
Gundling a bad outlook, fatal or short of fatal. He
had better not even drink much; but dispense with
consolation, and keep his wits about him, till this
squall pass. After much deliberating, it is found that
the royal clemency can be extended; and an outlet de-
vised, under conditions. Next Tabagie, a servant
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? CHAP. TO. ] TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT, 55
1726.
enters with one of the biggest trays in the world, and
upon it a "Wooden Key gilt, about an ell long;"
this gigantic implement is solemnly hung round
the repentant Kammerherr; this he shall wear pub-
licly as penance, and be upon his behaviour, till
the royal mind can relent. Figure the poor block-
head till that happen! "On recovering his metal
key, he goes to a smith, and has it fixed on with
wire. "
What Gundling thought to himself, amid these
pranks and hoaxings, we do not know. The poor soul
was not born a fool; though he had become one, by
college-learning, vanity, strong-drink, and the world's
perversity and his own. Under good guidance, espe-
cially if bred to strict silence, he might have been in
some measure a luminous object, -- not as now a
phosphorescent one, shining by its mere rottenness! A
sad "Calamity of Authors" indeed, when it overtakes
a man! -- Poor Gundling probably had lucid intervals
now and then; tragic fits of discernment, in the inner-
man of him. He had a Brother, also a learned man,
who retained his senses; and was even a rather famed
Professor at Halle; whose Portrait, looking very aca-
demic, solemn and well-to-do, turns-up in old print-
shops; whose Books, concerning "Henry the Fowler
(De Henrico Aucupe)" "Kaiser Conrad I. ," and other
dim Historical objects, are still consultable, -- though
with little profit, to my experience. The name of this
one was Nicolaus Hieronymus; ours is Jakob Paul, the
senior brother, --- once the hope of the house, it is
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? 56 DOUBLE-MARRIAGE PROJECT STARTED. [BOOK v.
1726.
likely, and a fond Father's pride, in that poor old
Niirnberg Parsonage long ago!
Jakob Paul likewise continued to write Books, on
Brandenburg Heraldries, Topography, Genealogies:
even a "Life" or two of some old Brandenburg Elec-
tors are still extant from his hand; but not looked-at
now by any mortal. He had been, perhaps was again,
Historiographer Royal; and felt bound to write such
Books: several of them he printed; and we hear of
others still manuscript, "in five folio volumes written
fair. " He held innumerable half-mock Titles and Offices;
among others, was actual President of the Berlin Royal
Society, or Academie des Sciences, Leibnitz's pet daughter,
-- there Gundling actually sat in office; and drew the
salary, for one certainty. "As good he as another,"
thought Friedrich Wilhelm: "What is the use of these
solemn fellows, in their big perukes, with their crabbed
x + y's, and scientific Pedlar's-French; doing nothing
that I can see, except annually the Berlin Almanac,
which they live upon? Let them live upon it, and be
thankful; with Gundling for their head man. "
Academy of Sciences makes its Almanac, and some
peculium of profit by it; lectures perhaps a little "on
Anatomy" (good for something, that, in his Majesty's
mind); but languishes without encouragement during
the present reign. Has his Majesty no prize-questions
to propose, then? None, or worse. He once officially
put these learned Associates upon ascertaining for him
"Why Champagne foamed? " They, with a hidden
vein of pleasantry, required "material to experiment
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? chAp. vn. ]
57
TOBACCO-PARLIAMENT.
1726.
upon. " Friedrich Wilhelm sent them a dozen, or cer-
tain dozens; and the matter proved insoluble to this
day. No King, scarcely any man, had less of reve-
rence for the Sciences so-called; for Academic culture,
and the art of the Talking-Schoolmaster in general! A
King obtuse to the fine Arts, especially to the vocal
Arts, in a high degree. Literary fame itself he regards
as mountebank fame; the art of writing big admirable
folios is little better to him than that of vomiting long
coils of wonderful ribbon, for the idlers of the market-
place; and he bear-baits his Gundling, in this manner,
as phosphorescent blockhead of the first magnitude,
worthy of nothing better.
Nay it is but lately (1723 the exact year), that he
did his ever-memorable feat in regard to Wolf and his
Philosophy, at Halle. Illustrious Wolf was recognised,
at that time, as the second greater Leibnitz, and Head-
Philosopher of Nature, who "by mathematical method"'
had as it were taken Nature in the fact, and illuminated
everything, so that whosoever ran might read, -- which
all manner of people then tried to do, but have now
quite ceased trying "by the Wolf-method:" -- Immortal
Wolf, somewhat of a stiff, reserved humour, inwardly
a little proud, and not wanting in private contempt of
the contemptible, had been accused of heterodoxy by
the Halle Theologians. Immortal Wolf, croakily sati-
rical withal, had of course defended himself; and of
course got into a shoreless sea of controversy with the
Halle Theologians; pestering his Majesty with mere
wars, and rumours of war, for a length of time, from
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