Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 128.djvu/282

272 of resistance left. On October 9th Amsterdam finally agreed to capitulate at discretion. But in consideration of its distinguished history and the proud spirit of its citizens, Brunswick generously spared it the humiliation of occupation, and contented himself with merely marching a detachment of his army within its walls; an example which was brought forward, and that successfully, in favour of conquered Paris four years and a half ago, showing forcibly that precedent has its claims in war no less than peace. On the political changes that followed it is unnecessary to dwell; for the great revolution none of the actors in the drama we have followed could have dreamed of was close upon them; and not many years elapsed after the Stadtholder's triumphant return to the shout of "Orange Boven," when he was once more driven from his hereditary dominions by the cry of "Vive la Republique," heralding the advance of the revolutionary troops pressed into Holland under Pichegru.

Perhaps those affected most powerfully by this campaign were the Prussians themselves. The army had done its work skilfully and rapidly; and as it returned by steady marches from Holland, the soldiers enjoying a grant voted by the States-General in gratitude for escaping war-contribution, and the officers well paid by the proceeds of the prize-fund raised from captured war-matériel they found themselves loaded with honours by their country. The enterprise that had proved so easy in execution was judged of rather by the supposed difficulties that had been conjured up for it. The national curiosity had been very great to see whether the army that under Frederick had been the admiration of Europe would retain its traditions of success under his successor. And even the military longings of Prussia were for the time gratified to the full. There is no more monstrous delusion among us as to our Continental neighbours than that which makes Englishmen speak of the Germans as essentially a pacific people. As applied to the lesser States, and especially those of central Germany, where division and weakness has caused them to live only upon sufferance for generations past, there may be some truth in the view. But if used of Prussia it ignores all the facts of history for the past two centuries, and the sentiment which grew up from these facts the feeling which every Prussian has at heart that it is to the sword his country owes its long and steady growth in the path of greatness. From the great elector's time until the thirty thousand picked troops from the crown-prince's army rode into the Champs Elysées in 1871 to typify the final and complete triumph of Berlin over Paris, Prussia has been, as she is to all appearance likely to remain, the most truly military nation of Europe, her people ready to make greater sacrifices than any other would to maintain a foremost position. The very work we have been reviewing bears testimony to the fact indirectly. So great was the exultation produced by the success of 1787, coming at the close of the Frederick era, that Baron Troschke especially tells us that it prepared the humiliation of Jena by the overconfidence it inspired. And he quotes Count Kalkreuth, for example, as writing to a friend not long after, just before the revolution broke out fully in France: "No war this time. What a glorious epoch it is for Prussia! She has just to tap her sword, and Europe comes to terms at once." But having begun his moral thus, our Prussian historian goes on to pursue, as though involuntarily, and certainly more fully than is usual, a line of thought familiar to his countrymen, and deserving study from those Englishmen who would trust them for the future peace of the world. The passage is so striking that we give it in full.

"Although," says Baron Troschke, "people have been accustomed to treat this catastrophe of Jena as a consequence of our stepping, during the events of 1787, out of the ordinary path of Prussian policy and its modest measure of firmness; yet it should not be forgotten that through it the foundation was laid for the reception of the teachings of history, out of which from the era of deepest humiliation grew the policy, as steadfast as successful, which we still find ourselves developing." Jena, in fact (so runs our historian's moral), was well worth suffering, as giving Scharnhorst and Stein their opportunity, and repaying Prussia with the glories of Leipsic, Sadowa, and Sedan, not to speak of those of the yet undeveloped future.

The rapidity with which its political results were swept away has contributed hardly less than the smallness of its dimensions to cause this campaign of 1787 to be little regarded by historians. Yet its military lessons would be important enough if they helped us to solve the problem of the possible defence of Holland against Germany in the event of that collision which no prudent statesman can