The clerks at these offices were generally paid from two to four hundred ducats per annum, by the French government; treble the amount of their regular salaries. Thus, the whole of Germany might be considered as being as completely upder the influence of that government, as if it had constituted so many prefectures of France.

THE views of Bonaparte, with respect to Prussia, were not difficult to be discovered; he used less reserve towards the Prussian cabinet than he did to any other; he was well assured, that he would not be effectually opposed.

To illustrate and prove this assertion, I must take a review of the organization of the Prussian Cabinet, and of the characters of the members of which it was composed.

The leading members were, the ministers for foreign affairs, and for the home department.

To the title of the latter was added, that of comptroller general of the kingdom. This title. was purposely created for Count Schulemberg Klaehnert. This nobleman is upwards of seventy years of age; had been a cabinet minister for upwards of forty years, and had been always considered as attached to England.

Mirabeau, in his Secret History of the Court of Berlin, speaks very highly of the talents of this

nobleman. And when every effort had been made, on the part of the French cabinet, after the death of the Great Frederic, to detach his successor from the English interest, Schulemberg, in conjunction with the late much lamented, and much to be lamented, Duke of Brunswick, resisted all solicitations.

But the situation of the affairs of Germany having been completely changed, by the usurpations of Bonaparte, and the Count's estates being situated within the newly erected kingdom of Westphalia, he was under the hard necessity of taking the oath of allegiance to Jerome Bonaparte.

The department for foreign affairs had been for many years under the direction of Count Haugwitz.

This nobleman is also upwards of seventy years of age; he possesses talents and wit; he has travelled much. In the reign of the Great Frederic, he was employed under the minister Hertzberg. Though his attachment to the French revolution was conspicuous, he was employed by his government to make a treaty with Austria, in 1792, and final arrangements for the conduct of the ensuing campaign: for these purposes he was sent to Vienna.

In 1804, he was dismissed from his situation of minister, but restored in 1806. Talleyrand, to flatter his vanity, wrote to him, that Bonaparte had called him the "Sully of Prussia."

The ordinary course of business was, that these

two ministers sent in their reports, not to the king direct, but to his two secretaries, Mr. Lombard*, for the foreign department, and Mr. Beymet, for the interior.

These two persons made their reports to the king, who gave his answers to them, expressive of his approbation or disapprobation, and they communicated his decision to the respective ministers; they had, of course, more influence than the ministers themselves. It was only on extraordinary occasions that a cabinet council was summoned, when the ministers could converse with their sovereign. It is easy to suppose, that, at the levees, no business was transacted.

I have thought proper to give this picture of the cabinet of this ill-fated monarch, as it will tend to elucidate many extraordinary cases, which have occurred in that country.

* Mr. Lombard had two brothers employed, the one in the war department, the other in the foreign office. These young men were the sons of a French hair-dresser of the present king's father, who had them well educated, and placed them all in high situations; in return for which, they betrayed their adopted country! The indignation of the Prussians against Lombard, the king's secretary, was very great. After the battle of Jena, he entered the town of Custrin, on foot: he was soon discovered, and the populace would have torn him to pieces, had it not been for the protection he received from some Prussian officers..

+ He had been one of the illuminati, and always considered a staunch friend to Republican France.

The Prussian sovereign was not more fortunate, in the constitution of his cabinet, than the Emperor Alexander; nor less unfortunate, in his accredited ambassador to Paris, than the Emperor Francis. The Marquis Lucchesini, an Italian by birth, was selected for this important trust. He was not more faithful, in the discharge of his duties, than Count Philip Cobentzel.

It appears to have formed a part of the system of Bonaparte, with respect to foreign nations, that the persons who are to fill the office of ambassador to his court, should be selected by himself, instead of being freely nominated by the sovereigns whose representatives they ought to be. We need not, therefore, be surprized, that he generally finds them favourable to his views.

From the peace of Basle, concluded between the Committee of Public Safety and the father of the present king, the government of Prussia received an annual subsidy of one million of rixdollars, (200,000l. sterling) as a price of neutrality.*

The cupidity of that monarch, his ministers and secretaries, has been the cause, that the continent of Europe is in that state of vassalage in which we see it. If, in the time of the Directory, when

* Bonaparte and Talleyrand have repeatedly said, that Prussia also received money from the coalition to remain neuter. The Prussian monarch has since amply reimbursed

his double subsidies.

the Russians were masters of Italy, and we were in possession of the Helder, Prussia had marched only half her army to join the Austrians on the Lower Rhine, every thing might then have been settled; but the king's attachment to his rixdollars, seconded by the ridiculous proposals of Sieyes, then minister at Berlin, to place a Prussian prince on the throne of France, and the Gallic influence of the king's ministers and secretaries, prevented this monarch from doing that which his honour and interest demanded.

Even when, after the return of Bonaparte from Egypt, he saw there was no likelihood of his brother being placed on the throne of the Bourbons, still he refused to join the coalition, under the pretext of his having signed the armed neutrality with the petty princes of Germany. We shall presently see the conduct of Prussia towards one of those princes*, whose independence she had guaranteed.

After the rupture of the treaty of Amiens, it was generally understood, that the French government intended to take possession of Hanover. I have heard it stated, and, I believe, from good authority, that, when the cabinet of St. James's were apprized of that intention, they proposed to Prussia the temporary occupation of the Elec

torate.

*The Elector of Hanover.