1763-1769. With aston after every new effort, perceived with astonishment that she was further from success than ever. ishment; and gradually with irritation, thickening and mounting towards indignation. There is no reason to believe that the grandiose Woman handled, or designed to handle, a doomed Poland in the merciless feline-diabolic way set forth with wearisome loud reiteration in those distracted Books; playing with the poor Country as cat does with mouse; now lifting her fell paw, letting the poor mouse go loose in floods of celestial joy and hope without limit; and always clutching the hapless creature back into the blackness of death, before eating and ending it. Reason first is, that the Czarina, as we see her elsewhere, never was in the least a Cat or a Devil, but a mere Woman; already virtual proprietress of Poland, and needing little contrivance to keep it virtually hers. Reason second is, that she had not the gift of prophecy, and could not foreknow the Polish events of the next ten years, much less shape them out beforehand, and preside over them, like a Devil or otherwise, in the way supposed. My own private conjecture, I confess, has rather grown to be, on much reading of those Rulhières and distracted Books, that the Czarina,-who was a grandiose creature, with considerable magnanimities, natural and acquired; with many ostentations, some really great qualities and talents; in effect, a kind of She-Louis Quatorze (if the reader will reflect on that Royal Gentleman, and put him into petticoats in Russia, and change his improper females for improper males), that the Czarina, very clearly resolute to keep Poland hers, had determined with herself to do something very handsome in regard to Poland; and to gain glory, both with the enlightened Philosophe classes and with her own proud 1763-1769. heart, by her treatment of that intricate matter. "On the one hand," thinks she, or let us fancy she thinks, "here is Poland; a Country fallen bedrid amid Anarchies, curable or incurable; much tormented with religious intolerance at this time, hateful to the philosophic mind; a hateful fanaticism growing upon it for forty years past" (though it is quite against Polish Law); "and the cries of oppressed Dissidents" (Dissenters, chiefly of the Protestant and of the Greek persuasion) "becoming more and more distressing to hear. And, on the other hand, here is Poniatowski who, who-!"— Readers have not forgotten the handsome, otherwise extremely paltry, young Polack, Stanislaus Poniatowski, whom Excellency Williams took with him 8 or 9 years ago, ostensibly as "Secretary of Legation," unostensibly as something very different? Handsome Stanislaus did duly become Lover of the Grand Duchess; and has duly, in the course of Nature, some time ago (date uncertain to me), become discarded Lover; the question rising, What is to be done with that elegant inane creature, and his vaporous sentimentalisms and sublime sorrows and disappointments? "Let us make him King of Poland!" said the Czarina, who was always much the gentleman with her discarded Lovers (more so, I should say, than Louis Quatorze with his;-and indeed it is computed they cost her, in direct moneys, about twenty millions sterling, being numerous and greedy; but never the least tiff of scolding or ill language):23-"King of Poland, with furnishings, and set him handsomely up in the world! We will close the Dissident Business for him, cure many a curable Anarchy of Poland, to the satisfaction of Voltaire and all leading spirits of mankind. 23 Castéra (Vie de Catharine II) has an elaborate Appendix on this part of his subject. 1763-1769. He shall have outfit of Russian troops, poor creature; and be able to put down Anarchies, and show himself a useful and grateful Viceroy for us there. Outfit of 10,000 troops, a wise Russian Manager: and the Question of the Dissidents to be settled as the first glory of his reign!" Ingenuous readers are invited to try, in their diffuse vague Rulhières, and unintelligible shrieky Polish Histories, whether this notion does not rise on them as a possible human explanation, more credible than the feline-diabolic one, which needs withal such a foreknowledge, unattainable by cat or devil? Poland must not rise to be too strong a Country, and turn its back on Russia. No, truly; nor, except by miraculous suspension of the Laws of Nature, is there danger of that. But neither need Poland lie utterly lame and prostrate, useless to Russia; and be tortured on its sick-bed with Dissident Questions and Anarchies, curable by a strong Sovereign, of whom much is expected by Voltaire and the leading spirits of mankind. What we shall have to say with perfect certainty, and what alone concerns us in our own affair, is, First, that Catharine did proceed by this method, of crowning, fitting out and otherwise setting up Stanislaus; did attempt settlement (and at one time thought she had settled) the Dissident Question and some curable Anarchies, but stirred up such legions of incurable, waxing on her hands, day after day, year after year, as were abundantly provoking and astonishing:-and that within the next eight years she had arrived, with Poland and her cargo of anarchies, at results which struck the whole world dumb. Dumb with astonishment, for some time; and then into tempests of vociferation more or less delirious, which have never yet quite ended, though sinking 7th Sept.-25th Nov. 1764. gradually to lower and lower stages of human vocality. Fact first is abundantly manifest. Nor is fact second any longer doubtful, That King Friedrich, in regard to all this, till a real crisis elsewhere had risen, took little or no visible interest whatever; had one unvarying course of conduct, that of punctually following Czarish Majesty in every respect; instructing his Minister at Warsaw always to second and reinforce the Russian one, as his one rule of policy in that Country,-whose distracted procedures, imbecilities and anarchies, are, beyond this point of keeping well with a grandiose Czarina concerned in it, of no apparent practical interest to Prussia or its King. Friedrich, for a long time, passed with the Public for contriver of the Catastrophe of Poland,-" felonious mortal," "monster of maleficence," and what not, in consequence. Rulhière, whose notion of him is none of the friendliest nor correctest, acquits him of this atrocity; declares him, till the very end, mainly or altogether passive in it. Which I think is a little more than the truth, and only a little, as perhaps may appear by and by. Beyond dispute, these Polish events did at last grow interesting enough to Prussia and its King;-and it will be our task, sufficient in this place, to extricate and riddle out what few of these had any cardinal or notable quality, and put them down (dated, if possible, and in intelligible form), as pertinent to throwing light on this distressing matter, with careful exclusion of the immense mass which can throw only darkness. Ex-Lover Poniatowski becomes King of Poland (7th Sept. 1764), and is crowned without Loss of his Hair. Warsaw, 7th September 1764. Stanislaus Poniatowski, by what management of an Imperial Catharine upon an anarchic Nation readers shall imagine ad libitum, was elected, what they 7th Sept.-25th Nov. 1764. call elected, King of Poland. Of course there had been preliminary Diets of Convocation, much dieting, demonstrating, and electing of imaginary members of Diet,-only "ten persons massacred" in the business. There was a Saxon Party; but no counter-candidate of that or any other nation. King Friedrich, solicited by a charming Electress-Dowager, decides to remain accurately passive. Polish emissaries came entreating him. A certain Mockranowski, who had been a soldier under him (never of much mark in that capacity, though now a flamingly conspicuous "General" and Politician, in the new scene he has got into), came passionately entreating (Potsdam, Summer of 1764, is all the date), "Donnez-nous le Prince Henri, Give us Prince Henri for a King!" the sound of which almost made Friedrich turn pale: "Have you spoken or hinted of this to the Prince?" "No, your Majesty." "Home then, instantly; and not a whisper of it again to any mortal!" which, they say, greatly irritated Prince Henri, and left a permanent sore-place in his mind, when he came to hear of it long after. 'A question rises here,' says one of my Notes, which perhaps I had better have burnt: 'At or about what dates did this glo'rious Poniatowski become Lover of the Grand-Duchess, and 'then become Ex-Lover? Nobody will say; or perhaps can ?25 'Would have been a small satisfaction to us, and it is denied! "Ritter Williams" (that is, Hanbury) must have produced him 6 at Petersburg some time in 1756; "11th January 1757,” finding it would suit, Poniatowski appeared there on his own footing as "Ambassador from Warsaw,"-(easy to get that kind of credential from a devoted Warsaw, if you are succeeding at the Court of Petersburg; 'Warsaw watchfully makes 'that the rule of distributing its honours; and, from freezing'point upwards, is the most delicate thermometer,' says Hermann somewhere). And this is our one date, 'Poniatowski in 'business, Spring 1757;' of 'Poniatowski fallen bankrupt,' date is totally wanting. 'Poniatowski's age is 32 gone;-how long out of Russia, 'readers have to guess. Made his first public appearance on the 24 Rulhière, ii. 268; Hermann, vi. 355-364. 25 Preuss (iv. 12) seems to try, but does not succeed. |