If D'Alembert's Visit was the germ of the Excise system, it will be curious to note,--and indeed whether or not, it will be chronologically serviceable to us here, and worth noting,--that there went on a small synchronous affair, still visible to everybody: namely, That in the very hours while Friedrich and D'Alembert were saluting mutually at Geldern (11th June, 1763), there was laid the foundation of what they call the NEUE PALAIS;New Palace of Sans-Souci: [Rodenbeck, ii. 219.] a sumptuous Edifice, in the curious LOUIS-QUINZE or what is called "Rococo"style of the time; Palace never much inhabited by Friedrich or his successors, which still stands in those ornamental Potsdam regions.
Why built, especially in the then down-pressed financial circumstances, some have had their difficulties to imagine.
It appears, this New Palace had been determined on before the War broke out; and Friedrich said to himself: "We will build it now, to help the mechanical classes in Berlin,--perhaps also, in part [think some, and why should not they, a little?] to show mankind that we have still ready money; and are nothing like so ruined as they fancy.""This NEUE PALAIS," says one recent Tourist, "is a pleasant quaint object, nowadays, to the stranger. It has the air DEGAGEPOCOCURANTE; pleasantly fine in aspect and in posture;--spacious expanses round it, not in a waste, but still less in a strict condition; and (in its deserted state) has a silence, especially a total absence of needless flunkies and of gaping fellow-loungers, which is charming. Stands mute there, in its solitude, in its stately silence and negligence, like some Tadmor of the Wilderness in small. The big square of Stables, Coach-houses, near by, was locked up,--probably one sleeping groom in it. The very CUSTOS of the grand Edifice (such the rarity of fees to him) I could not awaken without difficulty. In the gray autumn zephyrs, no sound whatever about this New Palace of King Friedrich's, except the rustle of the crisp brown leaves, and of any faded or fading memories you may have.
"I should say," continues he, "it somehow reminds you of the City of Bath. It has the cut of a battered Beau of old date; Beau still extant, though in strangely other circumstances; something in him of pathetic dignity in that kind. It shows excellent sound masonries; which have an over-tendency to jerk themselves into pinnacles, curvatures and graciosities; many statues atop,--three there are, in a kind of grouped or partnership attitude;'These,' said diligent scandal, 'note them; these mean Maria Theresa, Pompadour and CATIN DU NORD' (mere Muses, I believe, or of the Nymph or Hamadryad kind, nothing of harm in them). In short, you may call it the stone Apotheosis of an old French Beau.
Considerably weather-beaten (the brown of lichens spreading visibly here and there, the firm-set ashlar telling you, 'I have stood a hundred years');--Beau old and weather-beaten, with his cocked-hat not in the fresh condition, all his gold-laces tarnished;and generally looking strange, and in a sort tragical, to find himself, fleeting creature, become a denizen of the Architectural Fixities and earnest Eternities!"--From Potsdam Palace to the New Palace of Sans-Souci may be a mile distance; flat ground, parallel to the foot of Hills; all through arbors, parterres, water-works, and ornamental gardenings and cottagings or villa-ings,--Cottage-Villa for Lord Marischal is one of them. This mile of distance, taking the COTTAGE Royal of Sans-Souci on its hill-top as vertex, will be the base of an isosceles or nearly isosceles triangle, flatter than equilateral. To the Cottage Royal of Sans-Souci may be about three-quarters of a mile northeast from this New Palace, and from Potsdam Palace to it rather less. And the whole square-mile or so of space is continuously a Garden, not in the English sense, though it has its own beauties of the more artificial kind; and, at any rate, has memories for you, and footsteps of persons still unforgotten by mankind.--Here is a Notice of Lord Marischal; which readers will not grudge; the chronology of the worthy man, in these his later epochs, being in so hazy a state:--Lord Marischal, we know well and Pitt knows, was in England in 1761,--ostensibly on the Kintore Heritage; and in part, perhaps, really on that errand. But he went and came, at dates now uncertain; was back in Spain after that, had difficult voyagings about; [King's Letters to him, in <italic> OEuvres de Frederic, <end italic> xx. 282-285.]--and did not get to rest again, in his Government of Neufchatel, till April, 1762. There is a Letter of the King's, which at least fixes that point:--"BRESLAU, 10th APRIL, 1762. My nose is the most impertinent nose in the universe, MON CHER MYLORD [Queen-Dowager snuff, SPANIOL from the fountain-head, of Marischal's providing; quality exquisite, but difficult to get transmitted in the Storms of War]; I am ashamed of the trouble it costs you! I beg many pardons;--and should be quite abashed, did I not know how you compassionate the weak points of your friends, and that, for a long time past, you have a singular indulgence for my nose. I am very glad to know you happily returned to your Government, safe at Colombier (DOVE-COTE) in Neufchatel again." This is 10th April, 1762. There, as I gather, quiet in his Dove-cote, Marischal continued, though rather weary of the business, for about a year more; or till the King got home,--who delights in companionship, and is willing to let an old man demit for good.
