And now, if Berlin wants taste and magnificence, here’s Potzdam built on purpose, I believe, to shew that even with both a place may be very dismal and very disagreeable. The commonest buildings in this city look like the best side of Grosvenor-square in London, or Queen’s-square at Bath. I have not seen a street so narrow as Oxford Road, but many here are much wider, with canals up the middle, and a row of trees planted on each side, a gravel walk near the water for foot passengers, instead of a trottoir by the side of the houses. Every dwelling is ornamented to a degree of profusion; but to one’s question of, “Who lives in these palaces?” one hears that they are all empty space, or only occupied by goods never wanted, or corn there is nobody to feed with: this amazes one; and in fact here are no inhabitants of dignity at all proportioned to the residences provided for them; so that when one sees the copies of antique bas-reliefs, in no bad sculpture, decorating the doors whence dangle a shoulder of mutton, or a shoemaker’s last, it either shocks one or makes one laugh, like the old Bartholomew trick of putting a baby’s face upon an old man’s shoulders, or sticking a king’s crown upon a peasant’s head.

The churches are very fine on the outside, but strangely plain within: that, however, where the royal body reposes looked solemn and stately in its mourning dress. Black velvet, with silver fringe and tassels very rich and heavy, hung over the pulpit, family seat, &c. and every thing struck one with an air of melancholy dignity. The king of Prussia’s corpse, no longer animated by ambition, rests quietly in an unornamented solid silver coffin, placed in a sort of closet above ground, the door to which opens close to the pulpit’s feet, and shews the narrow space which now holds his body, beside that of his father, and the great elector, as he is still justly called.

My sepulchral tour is now nearly finished: we have in the course of this journey seen the last remains of many a celebrated mortal. Virgil, Raphael, Ariosto, Scipio, Galileo, Petrarch, Carlo Borromeo, and the king of Prussia. How different each from other in his life! How like each other now! But

I could have wished before my return to have paused a moment on the tomb of Melancthon, who might be said to have united in himself their separate perfections. Courage, genius, moderation, piety! persevering steadiness in the right way himself; candid acknowledgment of merit, even in his enemies, where he saw their intentions right, though he thought their tenets and their conduct wrong. But we are removed far from the dwelling of the peacemaker; let us at least look at the palace, now we have examined the coffin of him whose study and delight was war.

Sans Souci is surely an elegantly chosen spot, its architecture excellent, its furniture rich yet delicate, the gardens very happily disposed, the prospect from its windows agreeable, the pictures within an admirable collection. A hall built in imitation of the Colonna gallery shews Frederick’s taste at once and liberal spirit: the front seems borrowed from something at St. Peter’s; all is beautiful; the gilding of his long-room makes a very sudden and strong effect, nor are marbles of immense value wanting; here is a specimen of every thing I think, and two agate tables of prodigious size and beauty. The Silesian chrysopaz, and Carolina marble of a bright scarlet colour, quite luminous like the feathers of a fighting cock, struck me with their singular and splendid appearance. Rubens’s merit was not new to me, I hope; yet here is a resurrection of Lazarus, in which he has been lavish of it. The composition of this picture seems to have been intended to surpass every thing put together by other artists: its colouring glows like life.

The king’s town-house, however, is finer far than this his villa was designed to be; but I grew very tired walking over it: when one has dragged through twenty-four rooms variously hung with pink and silver, green and gold, &c. one grows cruelly weary with repeating the same ideas by drawling through forty-eight more. I wished to see his own private living apartments, and to mind with what books and pictures he adorned the dressing-room he always sate in: the first were chiefly works of Voltaire and Metastasio—the last were small landscapes of Albano and Watteau. At our desire they shewed us the little bed he slept, the chairs he sate in familiarly. Suetonius in French and Italian was the last author he looked into; they have made a mark at the death of Augustus, where he was reading when the same visitant called on him, quite unexpected by himself it seems, though all his attendants were well aware of his approach. As he expired he said, I give you a vast deal of trouble. We saw the spot he sate in at the moment; for Frederick no more died in his bed, than did the famous Flavius Vespasian; his servants wept as they repeated the particulars, caressing while they spoke his favourite dogs, one of which, a terrier, could hardly be prevailed upon to quit the body. It used to amuse the king to see them frighted when he would take them to a long room lined with French mirrors, which he did now and then to laugh at the effect.

Every thing at Potzdam shews a man in haste to enjoy what he had laboured so hard to procure; nor did he ever refuse himself, they say, any gratification that could make age less wearisome, or illness less afflictive. He had much taste of English ingenuity—combinations of convenience, and improvements in mechanism: his own writing-table, however, was contrived by himself; it stands on four legs, one pair longer than the other to make it slope; the covering is green velvet, with a square hole for the standish to drop in and not spill the ink: I liked the device exceedingly, but wondered he thought any device worth his preference. His conversation to his servants was affable and even gay; they loved his person, it is plain, and half adore his memory.

Such were the manners then, and such the death, of the far-famed philosopher of Sans Souci! And in truth, when he had so often set all present and future happiness to hazard, it would have been inconsistent not to hasten the enjoyment: nobody comes to inhabit his fine town, however, which has much the look of buildings in a stage perspective. Soldiers only, and such as sell wares necessary to soldiers, were all the human creatures I could see here; nor are families, or travellers of any sort indeed, better accommodated here than at inns of less pompous appearance on the outside.

For accommodations, however, I care but little; I have now walked over the oldest and the youngest cities in all Europe, and have left each with sincere admiration of their contents. Both are full of buildings and empty of inhabitants, nor am I desirous to add to the number in either. I was going to step forward into some room of the palace yesterday—“Madam, come back this instant,” exclaimed our Cicerone; “if that chamber is entered, my head will be off my shoulders in three days time.” Another well attested anecdote may be worth relating: A gentleman with whom we passed an agreeable evening at Berlin, whose lady invited to meet us whatever was most charming in the town, told the following story of a soldier who, being desirous of his body’s dissolution, but fearful of his soul’s rushing unprepared into eternity, caught and murdered a six months old baby; giving this strange account of his own feelings on the occasion, and adding, that he did not like to kill an adult, lest his own impatience of life’s insupportable torment might by that means precipitate his neighbour to perdition; but that a baptized infant would be sure of heaven, and he himself should gain time to prepare for following it—“And, Lord!” said my informer, “what reasoners this world has in it!” The soldier was hanged six weeks after the dreadful crime was committed; he made a very decent and penitential end.

On such facts what observations or reflections can result? I made none, but gave God thanks that I was born a subject of Great Britain.