STATE PAPERS. 



201 



for the six frontier circles, who have 

 most need of defence, to assemble 

 immediately, for the purpose of 

 furnishing the said provisions pro- 

 visionally, until the diet has made 

 its conclusum. 



In consequence, I beg of your 

 highness, in the most pressing man- 

 ner, that your highness, in virtue of 

 your quality of arch-chancellor and 

 director of the circle, would im- 

 mediately convoke the said six 

 circles. 



The speedy convocation of the 

 six circles, and their furnishing my 

 army with provisions, is the only 

 means of saving Germany at this 

 grand crisis. Without this, it will 

 be impossible for me to make my 

 troops maintain the field any longer 

 against the enemy. I shall not fail, 

 though with regret, to order them 

 back into my states, for their own 

 defence, and to abandon the em- 

 pire to itself and to its fate. 



It is in the hands, therefore, of 

 your highness, that I put the safety 

 of the empire ; and, confident of 

 your wisdom and patriotism, I ex- 

 pect you will employ the means 

 which the laws of the empire give 

 •you, in such a manner that my 

 views, directed to the good of the 

 country, may be fulfilled ; and that, 

 by my troops being supplied with 

 provisions, I may be able to assure 

 the empire of the most efficacious 

 protection and defence. 



Declaration of the king of Prussia 

 to the diet of Ratisbon, made in 

 the leginning of Feb. 1794'. 



THE electoral minister of Bran- 

 denburg notifies to the diet, 

 flow assembled, that the king his 



master, perceiving the indispensable 

 necessity of continuing the war a- 

 gainst the common enemy, is not 

 adverse to the increase of his army 

 on the Rhine to 80,000 fighting 

 men ; but as the hostilities on the: 

 part of the French are rather direct- 

 ed against the empire, than against 

 his majesty's own territories, no- 

 thing more can be required of him 

 than his simple contingent. Being 

 willing, however, to forego all these 

 considerations, the king is ready to 

 fulfil his engagements, provided the 

 following demands are previously^ 

 complied with : 



1. That each of the princes and 

 states of the empire shall furnish im- 

 mediately, and without delay, the* 

 contingents of men prescribed. 



y. That the empire shall provide 

 for the subsistence of the Prussian 

 troops, by reserving for them 

 20,000 rations of bread, and 24>,00O 

 rations of hay and corn daily. 



If the Germanic body should re- 

 fuse to acquiesce in the just demands 

 of his majesty, so far from sending 

 any future force to the succour of 

 the empire, he will feel himself un- 

 der the necessity of recalling hi? 

 troop? on the Rhine, and leave no 

 more than the simple contingent 

 prescribed by the terms of aUiance 

 between the states of Germany. 



Memorial of M. de Dohm, the 

 Prussian minister, to the circles 

 of the Lower Rhine and fFest- 

 phalia, dated at Cologne, the ^jf^ 

 I2th of t'ebruary, 1794. 



THE war without exampe, 

 which his majesty the king 

 has maintained during two cam- 

 paigns, against a furious nation, 

 not upon the frontiers of his own 



donvinions. 



