Miraheau^s Secret Mission to Berlin 253 those for whom others have been made discontented, now discontented J:hemselves ; all meritorious foreigners sent packing ; for the sake of appearing to rule alone only rapscallions promoted. ... I might remain here ten years without giving you any new facts, though doubtless many details. . . . What is to be my function in the future? Nothing useful ; but usefulness, and that great, immediate, direct, is the only thing that could make me longer tolerate this ambiguous position. Once more I repeat, what I deserve, what I can do, what I am worth, must now be decided by the King and his ministers. If I neither deserve, nor am capable of accomplishing anything, I am costing the King too much. If I do deserve and if I am capable of anything. . . I owe it to myself to ask for and to obtain some position, or to go back to my old trade of citizen of the world that will be less fatiguing to body and mind and less unfruitful of fame." A week later Mirabeau had written the last of his dispatches from Berlin and was on his way to Paris. He had accomplished nothing, but had learned much, and passed a diplomatic appren- ticeship that was soon to stand him in good stead. His keen political instinct had detected in the convoking of the Notables of France, then just decided on (perhaps at his advice), the first note of the revolution ; the time was fast approaching when his elo- quence was to sway the fortunes of King and of people from the tribune of the Assemblee Nationale. It is uncertain what prompted Mirabeau to publish his corres- pondence from Berlin two years later. Mr. Welschinger thinks that it was owing to pressure for money, and that would appear the best opinion. But it may be taken as certain that Mirabeau, then on the point of appealing to the people to support him against the Crown, had quite realized the impression these documents would produce of the incapacity of the French ministers and of their diplomatic agents, and also of his own superior ability. Whatever his motives, few who have read the dispatches will defend the act. No one before Mr. Welschinger had attempted the task he has so successfully accomplished. As an editor, he has left little for a successor to do ; it has perhaps been shown that, from the point of view of the historian, there is yet much to be done before the tangle of the hidden threads of the operations, diplomatic, financial, and social, of Mirabeau at Berlin is unravelled. R. M. Johnston.
