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Another older one is swinging in the rocking chair, playing with some chips and bark, the only toys of the log house this single apartment serves the family for parlour, for kitchen, and hall the chamber above being merely used as a store room, or receptacle for lumber 'tis the state bed-room as well, and on the large airy-looking couch is displayed a splendid coverlet of home-spun wool, manufactured in a peculiar style, the possessing of which is the first ambition of a back-wood matron, and for which she will manoeuvre as much as a city lady would for some bijou of a chiffionier, or centre table Sybèl has gained her's by saving each year a portion of the wool, until she had enough to accomplish this sure mark of industry, and of getting along in the world; for if they are not getting along or improving in circumstances their farms will not raise sheep enough to yield the wool, and if they are not industrious the yarn will not be spun for this much-prized coverlet, which, despite the local importance attached to it, is a useful, handsome and valuable article in itself.
He drew up a careful memorandum which he presented to the monarch, pressing on him in the very strongest terms the acceptance of these conditions, Up to the last moment, however, there seems to have been a great reluctance; Sybel represents the difficulties as rising from the immoderate demands of the military party at Court; they were not prepared, after so great a victory, to leave Austria with undiminished territory; they wished at least to have part of Austrian Silesia.
25th Went to Aix with Helen Richardson. Over to Cologne and Kreuznach with the Watneys and Boothbys. Dined with Goldsmid at Bonn. Saw Professor Sybel there. The following letter, on a subject in which Mrs. Oliphant took much interest, was addressed to Reeve rather in his editorial than his personal capacity.
Those two names, Sybèl and Melancthon, had a strange sound in the same household, awaking, as they always did in my dreamy fancy, a train of such differing memories. Sybèl recalling the days of early Rome, the haughty Tarquin and his mysterious prophetess, while Melancthon brought back the "Reformation," and the best and most pious of its fathers.
"It was," says Von Sybel, the able German historian of the French Revolution, "a declaration of open war between arbitrary principles and existing rights." It was as if the House of Representatives in the United States, or the House of Commons in England, should declare themselves the representatives of the nation, ignoring the Senate or the House of Lords. Its logical sequence was revolution.
Headed by the capital, they began a series of addresses to the King; public meetings were organised; at Cologne a great festival was arranged to welcome Sybel and the other representatives from the Rhine. It was more serious that in so monarchical a country the discontent with the personal action of the King found public expression.
Nor would my own youthful impressions justify me in forming an independent opinion as to the motives of that remarkable and somewhat incomprehensible event; but, with the assistance of friends more intimately acquainted with the circumstances, I have of late obtained a not wholly superficial knowledge of them, which, with my own recollections, leads me to adopt the opinion of Heinrich von Sybel concerning the much discussed and still unanswered question, whether the Berlin revolution was the result of a long-prepared conspiracy or the spontaneous outburst of enthusiasm for liberty among the citizens.
It has been proved by the German historian, von Sybel, that the first serious suggestion to Prussia that she should take both the Duchies came secretly from Napoleon III. It was in vain that Lord John Russell suggested a sensible compromise, namely, the partition of Schleswig between Denmark and Germany according to the language-frontier inside the Duchy.
Her husband is from home, and the boys are gone to the frolic, so we will have a quiet evening to ourselves. The arrangement of this dwelling, although similar in feature to Sybèl Gray's, is yet, as it were, different in expression; for instance, there is not such a display made of the home-manufactured garments, which it is the pride of her heart to look upon.
Once it was said, in disparagement of Niebuhr and other historians, that when you ask a German for a black coat he offers you a white sheep, and leaves you to effect the transformation yourself. Sybel belongs to a later age, and can write well, but heavily, and without much light or air.
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