Not that he figured much in what is called Public History, or
desired to do so; for, though a vigilant ruler, he did not deal in
protocolling and campaining,--he let a minimum of that suffice
him. But in court soirees, where elegant empty talk goes on, and
of all materials for it scandal is found incomparably the most
interesting. I suppose there turned up no name oftener than that
of his Prussian Majesty; and during these twenty-seven years of
his Reign, his wild pranks and explosions gave food for continual
talk in such quarter.

For he was like no other King that then existed, or had ever been
discovered. Wilder Son of Nature seldom came into the artificial
world; into a royal throne there, probably never. A wild man,
wholly in earnest, veritable as the old rocks,--and with a
terrible volcanic fire in him too. He would have been strange
anywhere; but among the dapper Royal gentlemen of the Eighteenth
Century, what was to be done with such an Orson of a King?--Clap
him in Bedlam, and bring out the ballot-boxes instead? The modern
generation, too, still takes its impression of him from these
rumors,--still more now from Wilhelmina's Book; which paints the
outside savagery of the royal man, in a most striking manner;
and leaves the inside vacant, undiscovered by Wilhelmina or
the rumors.

Nevertheless it appears there were a few observant eyes even of
contemporaries, who discerned in him a surprising talent for
"National Economics" at least. One Leipzig Professor, Saxon, not
Prussian by nation or interest, recognizes in Friedrich Wilhelm
"DEN GROSSEN WIRTH (the great Manager, Husbandry-man, or Landlord)
of the epoch;" and lectures on his admirable "works, arrangements