child; trust in my management; only swear to me, on your eternal
salvation, that never, on any compulsion, will you marry another
than the Prince of Wales;--give me that oath!" [Wilhelmina,
i. 314.] Such was Queen Sophie's last proposal to Wilhelmina,--
night of the 27th of January, 1731, as is computable,--her Majesty
to leave for Potsdam on the morrow. They wept much together that
night, but Wilhelmina dexterously evaded the oath, on a religious
ground. Prince of Baireuth, whom Papa may like or may not like,
has never yet personally made appearance: who or what will make
appearance, or how things can or will turn, except a bad road, is
terribly a mystery to Wilhelmina.

What with chagrin and confinement, what with bad diet (for the
very diet is bad, quality and quantity alike unspeakable),
Wilhelmina sees herself "reduced to a skeleton;" no company but
her faithful Sonsfeld, no employment but her Books and Music;--
struggles, however, still to keep heart. One day, it is in
February, 1731, as I compute, they are sitting, her Sonsfeld and
she, at their sad mess of so-called dinner, in their remote upper
story of the Berlin Schloss, tramp of sentries the one thing
audible; and were "looking mournfully at one another, with nothing
to eat but a soup of salt and water, and a ragout of old bones
full of hairs and slopperies [nothing else; that was its real
quality, whatever fine name they might give it, says the vehement
Princess], we heard a sharp tapping at the window; and started up
in surprise, to see what it could be. It was a raven, carrying in
its beak a bit of bread, which it left on the window-sill, and
flew away." [Ib. i. 316.]

"Tears came into our eyes at this adventure." Are we become as