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cahnNot only are these posts still going, there is now (more) original research going on in them deciphering and translating letters in archives that apparently no one has bothered to look at before?? (Which has now conclusively exonerated Fritz's valet/chamberlain Fredersdorf from the charge that he was dismissed because of financial irregularities and died shortly thereafter "ashamed of his lost honor," as Wikipedia would have it. I'M JUST SAYING.)
A Reverend at Dear Old Wusterhausen: How to successfully save someone's life if you're five
Date: 2023-06-20 03:31 pm (UTC)Rex turned quiet for a while and then he exploded: If I could prove to him from the holy bible that hunting was a sin, he would promise never to use a gun again to shoot deer with it. I couldn't do anything else but point to the difference I already had made, and someone pointed to the old habit of hunting as described in Psalm 22, where Christ gets compared to a hind hunted early. Another tried to excuse par force hunting by saying that a deer shot would sometimes suffer longer than one which the dogs killed with their biting.
E: I can't judge this since I've never attended par force hunting; but I am sure that it's not right to torment an animal without need. I recalled the ox huntings which sometimes take place in Halle, and Rex asked who was doing this and where it happened and similar questions.
The other Prince provided a charming interlude when he started to kiss the King's hands and to stroke his cheeks. As R. asked: "You surely want something from me, don't you?"
Ille: Yes, Papa."
R: And what?
P: Please don't hang the long fellow who has run away.
R. smiled at that, but didn't reply in the positive. Regina signalled that she approved of this intercession. Generals Seckendorff and Grumbkow supported the little Prince. Whereupon Rex started to kiss the Prince and hold him in his arms for a long time. As the Queen without Rex noticing this has gestured at me with her head and arms to say something, I then said to the little Prince: "Your Highness, your advocacy will undoubtedly weigh stronger with your father's majesty than that of ten other supplicants. For mercy is always more glorious than judgment." This seemed please the Queen. Whereupon the King said: "It is a difficult case."
Ego: Blood crimes may not be pardonable, but in cases like this on, your Majesty could surely put mercy before judgment. To which the two Generals at my right and left side agreed. N.B. The Prince had been supposed to make his plea days earlier instructus a matre Regina, but as he was afraid that Papa, as he said, might bet very angry, he had avoided it and only offered caresses, despite the fact Generals Seckendorff and Grumbkow tried to prepare the way for him with questions and speeches like these: "The Prince surely wants something if he caresses you like that." item: "The Prince surely weighs something in his heart which he wants to say." it. "Just say what it is. If it's something good, we all will help you and plead with you." But he couldn't push himself to do it. Whereupon Regina threatened him after dinner that if he wouldn't say something this time, he'd be whipped, as she told me the following day, and said she was relying on the fact I was present and could add a word or two.
Princeps then had asked Oberhofmeisterin Kameke: What was happening when they hanged someone? Whether they put something around the neck? Whether this was hurting people? Whether one died of it? And then he stayed the course. But one could guess from the entire behaviour of the King that the plea would not have been in vain. He mentioned the next day (so I can describe this here anticipando), for then the King said: That he had pardoned the villain, and asked the Prince: how the fellow should be punished if he wasn't hanged? Whereupon the Prince said: He should be whipped. The Prince was immediately reminded to thank his Majesty, which he did by kissing his hand.
That's pretty much it. The next day, Freylinghausen talks some more theology with FW who has been through a blood letting and is relatively calm, and presents religious books for the entire royal family as farewell presents. FW, SD, the girls and AW say thank you most graciously, but Fritz isn't there, so SD says she'll accept Freylinghausen's present (a collection of Francke's sermons about the apostle letters) for him and give it him. That's also the occasion where she tells Freylinghausen the backstory of AW's plea from the previous day.
Re: A Reverend at Dear Old Wusterhausen: How to successfully save someone's life if you're five
Date: 2023-06-21 04:47 am (UTC)I... he was being sarcastic here, right?
P: Please don't hang the long fellow who has run away.
(sorry, I still find the mention of "long fellows" hilarious even in this context)
Ego: Blood crimes may not be pardonable, but in cases like this on, your Majesty could surely put mercy before judgment. To which the two Generals at my right and left side agreed.
GAH
despite the fact Generals Seckendorff and Grumbkow tried to prepare the way for him with questions and speeches like these: "The Prince surely wants something if he caresses you like that." item: "The Prince surely weighs something in his heart which he wants to say." it. "Just say what it is. If it's something good, we all will help you and plead with you." But he couldn't push himself to do it. Whereupon Regina threatened him after dinner that if he wouldn't say something this time, he'd be whipped, as she told me the following day, and said she was relying on the fact I was present and could add a word or two.
OMG that POOR KID. "We, the actual adults in this room, are too scared of FW, so we will ask you, the SMALL CHILD, to do this instead!" I mean, they're not wrong to be scared, and at least the fellow doesn't get hanged, but... argh.
Re: A Reverend at Dear Old Wusterhausen: How to successfully save someone's life if you're five
Date: 2023-06-21 10:03 am (UTC)No, I don't think so. Adorable child asking tough-but-loving monarch for someone's life and gets it is how he sees it, I'd bet.
OMG that POOR KID. "We, the actual adults in this room, are too scared of FW, so we will ask you, the SMALL CHILD, to do this instead!" I mean, they're not wrong to be scared, and at least the fellow doesn't get hanged, but... argh.
Argh indeed. I do find it interesting that Grumbkow & Seckendorf as well as SD are so invested in preventing FW from executing that particular deserter. It's not like there's anything in it for them - this appears to be a normal soldier, i.e. not someone from a noble family, so there is basically no other explanation than them feeling sorry for a guy who presumably was drafted/kidnapped due to his size. Putting on my evil hat, the only other thing I can come up with is that they might have regarded this as a test scenario, because as we all know, FW hates deserters. Now, AW is five years old at this point, so I take it he hasn't yet played mediator that often, for the age factor alone. So maybe SD, Grumbkow and Seckendorff regard this as a test case, i.e. can FW's love for little AW be used to get him to do something he normally wouldn't? (Because this means AW could subsequently be used as mediator more often. (And FW's relationship with Fritz is so different that there can't have been a precedent there.)