third brother, Frederick Eugene, who had been during his youth a canon
at Salzburg, but afterward became a general in the Prussian service,
married a princess of Brandenburg, and educated his children in the
Protestant faith in order to assimilate the religion of the reigning
family with that of the people. His mild government terminated in
1797. Frederick, his talented son and successor, mainly frustrated the
projected establishment of a Swabian republic, which was strongly
supported by the French, by his treatment of the provincial Estates,
the modification of the rights of chase, etc., on which occasion he
took the following oath: "I repeat the solemn vow, ever to hold the
constitution of this country sacred and to make the weal of my
subjects the aim of my life." He nevertheless appears, by the
magnificent fetes, masquerades, and pastoral festivals given by him,
as if in a time of the deepest peace, at Hohenheim, to have trusted
more to his connection with England, by his marriage with the princess
royal, Matilda,[10] with Russia, and with Austria (the emperor Paul,
Catherine's successor, having married the princess Maria of
Wurtemberg, and the emperor Francis II., her sister Elisabeth), than
to the constitution, which he afterward annihilated.

The weakness displayed by the empire and the increasing disunion
between Austria and Prussia encouraged the French to further
insolence. Not satisfied with garrisoning every fortification on the
left bank of the Rhine, they boldly attacked, starved to submission,
and razed to the ground, during peace time, the once impregnable
fortress of Ehrenbreitstein, on the right bank of the Rhine, opposite
Coblentz.[11] Not content with laying the Netherlands and Holland
completely waste, they compelled the Hanse towns to grant them a loan
of eighteen million livres. Lubeck refused, but Hamburg and Bremen,
more nearly threatened and hopeless of aid from Prussia, were