Part 37 (2/2)

And in this respect I must say, to the credit of Berlin, that in these trying times I have met many of her citizens, Gotzkowsky the foremost among them, whose virtues, the old historians of Rome, had they lived at the present day, would have immortalized!”[3]

”Are you satisfied?” asked the king, as Gotzkowsky, having finished, handed him the paper. ”Oh, I see you are a modest man, and blush like a young girl. But tell me, now, what brings you here? What does the city of Berlin wish?”

”Her rights, your majesty,” said Gotzkowsky, seriously.

”And who is troubling her rights?”

”Your majesty.”

The king frowned, and cast an angry glance on the bold jester.

Gotzkowsky continued, calmly: ”Your majesty is depriving us of our good rights, in so far as you wish to prevent us from being honest people, and keeping our word sacred.”

”Oh, now I understand you,” said the king, laughing. ”You are speaking of the Russian war-tax. Berlin shall not pay it.”

”Berlin will pay it, in order that your majesty may retain her in your gracious favor; in order that the great Frederick may not have to blush for his faithless and dishonest town, which would not then deserve to be the residence of a king. How! would your majesty trust the men who refused to redeem their openly-pledged word? who look upon sworn contracts as a mouse-trap, to be escaped from as soon as the opportunity offers, and when the dangerous cat is no longer sitting at the door? Berlin will pay--that our sons may not have to blush for their fathers; that posterity may not say that Berlin had stamped herself with the brand of dishonor. We have pledged our word, and we must keep it.”

”You must not, for I do not wish you to do so,” cried Frederick, with anger-flas.h.i.+ng eyes. ”I will inst.i.tute reprisals. The imperial court has refused the payment of the Bamberg and Wurzburg bonds.”

”And your majesty considers that proceeding highly dishonest and unjust,” interrupted Gotzkowsky; ”and while you wish to punish the empire for its breach of faith, you punish doubly the town of Berlin by depriving her of the last thing that remained to her in her day of need and misfortune--her honorable name. You cannot be in earnest, sire? Punish, if you choose, the imperial judge, but do not make Berlin the dishonored Jack Ketch to carry out your sentence.”

”But are you so anxious to get rid of your money? What is the amount that you still owe?”

”A million and a half, sire.”

The king stepped back and looked at Gotzkowsky with astonishment. ”And the people of Berlin insist upon paying it?”

”Yes, because their word is pledged.”

The king shook his head thoughtfully. ”Hark ye,” said he, ”you seem to me to be a dangerous agitator, who wishes to turn my peaceful citizens of Berlin into true children of Haman. Some weeks ago, after the unfortunate fight of Kunnersdorf, when I sent an express courier to Berlin and ordered the Town Council to advise the rich and well-to-do to retire from the city with their portable property, my recommendation was not followed: you yourself excited the Council to disobedience. In your self-willed obstinacy you had the impudent a.s.surance to make your way through a country infested by the enemy; and if my colonel, Von Prittwitz, had not found you in those woods, and brought you to me in the village, your obstinate head would have adorned the lance of some Cossack or other. And what did you come for but to a.s.sure me that the well-to-do citizens of Berlin would prefer staying at home, and did not wish to run away? Yes, truly you are a queer diplomatist, and rush headlong into danger and trouble only to a.s.sure your king that his citizens will not obey him!”

The king had spoken with apparent displeasure, but around his lips there played a slight smile, and his large blue eyes were directed toward Gotzkowsky with an expression of indescribable kindness.

”In this case they do not wish to obey your majesty, because they wish to remain worthy of the name of your majesty's citizens and subjects.”

The king paced up and down several times, with folded arms, and then stopped before Gotzkowsky, looking steadily in his eyes. ”Now tell me, how did you manage to make the Berliners so obstinate and so lavish of their means?”

Gotzkowsky smiled. ”Please your majesty, the Berliners prize their honor above their life.”

The king shook his head impatiently. ”You may tell that to some one else. Tell _me_, how did you bring my Berliners up to that? But the truth--mind, you tell me the truth.”

”Well, then, your majesty shall know the truth,” said Gotzkowsky, after a pause.

”Yes, yes, the truth,” cried the king, nodding his head violently. ”I wish to know how you inspired the citizens of Berlin with such bold a.s.surance.”

”The truth is, sire, that this was only the courage of cowardice, and that the prudent magistracy and merchants were perfectly delighted with your majesty's orders not to pay these bonds, and that I gave myself an immense amount of trouble in vain to remind them of their pledged word and their compromised honor.”

”Oh! I know it,” said the king. ”My good Berliners love money as well as any other of the good-for-nothing children of men. Proceed!”

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