Thomas Carlyle

“ In the driest years we couldn't cart the hay out, but had to put it up in big ricks. Only in winter, when the frost was sharp, could we get it home. But now we have cut away the hillocks; and the trenches that your Majesty got made for us take the water off. And now the Luch is as dry as your Majesty sees, and we can carry out our hay when we please.'
KING. "'That is well. Have your tenants, too, more cattle than formerly?'
ICH. "'Ja!'
KING. "'How many more?'
ICH. "'Many have one cow, many two, according as their means admit.'
KING. "'But how many more have they in all? ”

“ ICH. "'Is fallen into poverty.'
KING. "'By woman husbandry!'
ICH. "'Your Majesty's pardon! She cultivated well, but a heap of mischances brought her down: those may happen to the best husbandman. I myself, two years ago, lost so many cattle by the murrain, and got no remission: since that, I never can get on again either.'
KING. "'My son, to-day I have some disorder in my left ear, and cannot hear rightly on that side of my head' (!) .
ICH. "'It is a pity that Geheimer-Rath Michaelis has got the very same disorder!'—I now retired a little back from the carriage ”

“ ICH. "'Your Majesty, that would never be my notion, nor any reasonable Beamte's.'
KING. "'Tell me, then, where does Stollen lie?'
ICH. "'Stollen your Majesty cannot see just here. Those big hills there on the left are the hills at Stollen; there your Majesty will have a view of all the Colonies.'
KING. "'So? That is well. Then ride you with us thither.'
"Now his Majesty came upon a quantity of peasants who were mowing rye; they had formed themselves into two rows, were wiping their scythes, and so let his Majesty drive through them. ”

“ Oberamtmann Fromme (whom I mark "Ich") LOQUITUR: "Major-General Graf von Gortz," whom Fromme keeps strictly mute all day, is a distinguished man, of many military and other experiences; much about Friedrich in this time and onwards. ”

“ KING. "'You may tell me, I have no view in asking: why did the man take his discharge?'
ICH. "'Your Majesty, I really cannot say.'
"We had now got on to Protzen. I perceived old General van Ziethen standing before the Manor-house in Protzen,"—rugged brave old soul; with his hanging brows, and strange dim-fiery pious old thoughts!—"I rode forward to the carriage and said:—
ICH. "'Your Majesty, the Herr General von Ziethen is [are, SIND] also here.'
KING. "'Where? where? Oh, ride forward, and tell the people to draw up ”

“ Here lies the Kemmensee [Kemmen-lake] : if that were drained out, your Majesty would gain some 1,800 acres [MORGEN, three-fifths English acre] of pasture-land, where colonists could be settled; and then the whole country would have navigation too, which would help the village of Fehrbellin and the town of Ruppin to an uncommon degree.'
KING. "'I suppose so! Be a great help to you, won't it; and many will be ruined by the job, especially the proprietors of the ground NICHT WAHR?' [Ha?] ”

“ Na, have you many cattle here on the Colonies?'
KL. "'1,887 head of cows, your Majesty. There would have been above 3,000, had it not been for the murrain that was here.'
KING. "'Do the people too increase well? ”

“ Whether the draining of the Luch had done him good; Whether the murrain had been there among their cattle?—and recommended rock-salt against the murrain. Suddenly his Majesty stept aside, turned towards me, and called: 'Amtmann! [THEN CLOSE INTO MY EAR] Who is the fat man there with the white coat?'
ICH (ALSO CLOSE INTO HIS MAJESTY'S EAR) . "'Your Majesty, that is the Landrath Quast, of the Ruppin Circle.'
KING. "'Very well.'
"Now his Majesty went back to General von Ziethen and Herr von Kleist, and spoke of different things. Herr von Kleist presented some very fine fruit to his Majesty ”

“ ICH. "'To Berlin.'
KING. "'Why not to Ruppin?'
ICH. "'Most of the Ruppin people keep cows, as many as are needed for their own uses. The soldier eats nothing but old [salt] butter, he cannot buy fresh.'
KING. "'What do you get for your butter in Berlin?'
ICH. "'Four groschen the pound; now the soldier at Ruppin buys his salt butter at two.'
KING. "'But your capons and poults, you could bring these to Ruppin?'
ICH. "'In the regiment there are just four Staff-Officers; they can use but little: the burghers don't live delicately ”

“ He had originally been an Officer of the Artillery; but obtained his discharge in 1769, and got, before long, into this employment. A man of excellent disposition and temper; with a solid and heavy stroke of work in him, whatever he might be set to; and who in this OBERAMTMANNSHIP "became highly esteemed." He died in 1798; and has left sons (now perhaps grandsons or great-grandsons) , who continue estimable in like situations under the Prussian Government.
One of Fromme's useful gifts, the usefulest of all for us at present, was "his wonderful talent of exact memory." ”

“ KING. "'That does look miserable.' Here Mitschepfal's daughter, who has married a baronial Herr von Kriegsheim from Mecklenburg, came forward while the horses were changing. Kriegsheim came on account of her into this country: the King has given them a Colony of 200 MORGEN (acres) . Coming to the carriage, Frau von Kriegsheim handed some fruit to his Majesty. ”

“ But let Fromme begin:— [Anekdoten und Karakterzuge aus dem Leben Friedrich des Zweyten (Berlin, bei Johann Friedrich Unger, 1787) , 8te Sammlung, ss. 15-79.]
"On the 23d of July, 1779, it pleased his Majesty the King to undertake a journey to inspect those" mud "Colonies in the Rhyn-Luch about Neustadt-on-the-Dosse, which his Majesty, at his own cost, had settled; thereby reclaiming a tract of waste moor (EINEN ODEN BRUCH URBAR MACHEN) into arability, where now 308 families have their living. ”

“ From east to west, or from north to south?' ["VAN MORGEN GEGEN ABEND, ODER VAN ABEND GEGEN MORGEN?" so in ORIG. (p. 22) ;—but, surely, except as above, it has no sense? From north to south, there is but one fir-seed sown against the wind; from east to west, there is a whole row.] ”

“ ICH. "'That is not much. Please your Majesty to ask the Herr General von Gortz [who has not spoken a syllable all day] ; he knows this is not reckoned much in Holstein:'— (the General Graf von Gortz I first had the honor to make acquaintance with in Holstein) .
"They now talked, for a while, of the rye, in the carriage together. Presently his Majesty called to me from the carriage, 'Na, stand by the Holstein STAUDEN-rye, then ”