The reigning Prince, Otto Johann Friedrich, a young man of imperfect
education, questionable valour, and no scintilla of capacity, has
fallen into entire public contempt. It was with difficulty that I
obtained an interview, for he is frequently absent from a court
where his presence is unheeded, and where his only role is to be a
cloak for the amours of his wife. At last, however, on the third
occasion when I visited the palace, I found this sovereign in the
exercise of his inglorious function, with the wife on one hand, and
the lover on the other. He is not ill-looking; he has hair of a
ruddy gold, which naturally curls, and his eyes are dark, a
combination which I always regard as the mark of some congenital
deficiency, physical or moral; his features are irregular, but
pleasing; the nose perhaps a little short, and the mouth a little
womanish; his address is excellent, and he can express himself with
point. But to pierce below these externals is to come on a vacuity
of any sterling quality, a deliquescence of the moral nature, a
frivolity and inconsequence of purpose that mark the nearly perfect
fruit of a decadent age. He has a worthless smattering of many
subjects, but a grasp of none. 'I soon weary of a pursuit,' he said
to me, laughing; it would almost appear as if he took a pride in his
incapacity and lack of moral courage. The results of his
dilettanteism are to be seen in every field; he is a bad fencer, a
second-rate horseman, dancer, shot; he sings - I have heard him -
and he sings like a child; he writes intolerable verses in more than
doubtful French; he acts like the common amateur; and in short there
is no end to the number of the things that he does, and does badly.
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