If Heaven will but please to grant it length of life! For there have already been two little Princekins, who are both dead; this Friedrich is the fourth child; and only one little girl, wise Wilhelmina, of almost too sharp wits, and not too vivacious aspect, is otherwise yet here of royal progeny.

It is feared the Hohenzollern lineage, which has flourished here with such beneficent effect for three centuries now, and been in truth the very making of the Prussian Nation, may be about to fail, or pass into some side branch.

Which change, or any change in that respect, is questionable, and a thing desired by nobody.
Five years ago, on the death of the first little Prince, there had surmises risen, obscure rumors and hints, that the Princess Royal, mother of the lost baby, never would have healthy children, or even never have a child more: upon which, as there was but one other resource,--a widowed Grandfather, namely, and except the Prince Royal no son to him,--said Grandfather, still only about fifty, did take the necessary steps: but they have been entirely unsuccessful; no new son or child, only new affliction, new disaster has resulted from that third marriage of his.

And though the Princess Royal has had another little Prince, that too has died within the year;--killed, some say on the other hand, by the noise of the cannon firing for joy over it! [Forster, _ Friedrich Wilhelm I., Konig von Preussen _ (Potsdam, 1834), i.

126 (who quotes Morgenstern, a contemporary reporter).