"Most honored friend and brother,—According to promise I send these lines in the greatest haste to the post-office, thanking you first and foremost for the great kindness shown to me at Upsal. My highest wish is to find an opportunity by which I can repay it in some way or other. I only came here to-day. I could easily have arrived yesterday, had it not been for the darkness, and for the uncertainty of finding quarters for one in a blue dress.
"The Queen-dowager is still living; she is better to-day. . . . We have heard both the best and the worst news; only it has here and there been exaggerated and colored. Most people know nothing certain about the King's person. Some shut him up in Stralsund, and give him no means of escape; others vainly rejoice at his return, and expect him late this evening: carriages are in readiness at the Court to go to meet him. It is generally believed, however, that he has made his escape; that, after his horse had been shot under him, he ran two thousand paces on foot before he could procure another charger. This would again redound to his glory, as the Dutch say that the Swede would be the best soldier in the world, if he knew when to run away.
"Brother Gustav sends his love, and apologizes for not having written. With a hundred thousand kind remembrances to sister Anna, I remain, most honored brother, your most faithful brother and friend,
The Queen-dowager, Hedwig Eleonora, died three days after the date of this letter, in her eightieth year, deeply grieved at the unhappy fate of her Sweden, and in great anxiety for her grandson, Charles XII. She had survived both her son, Charles XI. who died in 1697, and his Queen, Ulrica Eleonora, who died in 1693. Gustav was Benzelius's brother.
Early in December, Emanuel writes again to his friend and brother, from Stockholm,—
"My literary occupations engage me every day. . . . With
