'When we die out, there is another Line of Wittelsbachers, plenty of other lines; and House-treaties many and old, settling all that, without help of you and Albert of the Three Crowns!' And accordingly there had never come the least fruit, or attempt at fruit, from these two Sigismund Sheepskins; which were still lying in the Vienna Archives, where they had lain since the creation of them, known to an Antiquary or two, but not even by them thought worthy of mention in this busy world.

This was literally all the claim that Austria had; and every by-stander admitted it to be, in itself, not worth a rush." "In itself perhaps not," thought Kaunitz; "but the free consent of Karl Theodor the Heir, will not that be a Title in full?
One would hope so; in the present state of Europe: France, England, Russia, every Nation weltering overhead in its own troubles and affairs, little at leisure for ours!" And it is with Karl Theodor, to make out a full Title for himself there, that Kaunitz has been secretly busy this long time back, especially in the late critical days of poor Kurfurst Max.
Karl Theodor of the Pfalz, now fallen Heir to Baiern, is a poor idle creature, of purely egoistic, ornamental, dilettante nature; sunk in theatricals, bastard children and the like; much praised by Voltaire, who sometimes used to visit him; and by Collini, to whom he is a kind master.

Karl Theodor cares little for the integrity of Baiern, much for that of his own skin.

Very long ago, in 1742, in poor Kaiser Karl's Coronation time, we saw him wedded, him and another, to two fair Sister Sulzbach Princesses, [Supra, viii.

119.] Grand-daughters of old Karl Philip, the then Kur-Pfalz, whom he has inherited.