FATHER AND MOTHER 7 



night after the battle of Dettingen (June 16, 1743) 

 the bandmaster of the Guards, as the father had then 

 become, lay in a wet furrow, which sowed in him the 

 seeds of an illness that never left him during the rest 

 of his life. It spread a cloud of gloom over the family 

 circle for nearly twenty years. 



Isaac Herschel was a man of intelligence, qualified 

 to talk on higher matters than flute-playing or band 

 music. But he was not head of his own house. Like 

 many foolish fathers, he allowed the eldest son to 

 usurp his place, nor did he shield the younger children 

 from the eldest's bullying. Apparently the mother, 

 a woman of small intelligence, had also a favourite in 

 her eldest daughter, Sophia, who lived away from 

 home, and whom Caroline did not see till she came 

 back to be married to Griesbach, a musician of com- 

 monplace ability in the Guards' band. Sophia was 

 then about twenty-one, Caroline four or five. Caroline 

 liked neither her sister nor her sister's husband. But 

 the married daughter did not remain long away from 

 the family she left. War broke out, one of the inter- 

 minable wars of Frederick the Great, which drove her 

 back to her father's house. There the impatience of 

 her temper and her dislike of children drove Caroline 

 from little warmth or affection within the house to 

 cold and neglect outside. What neither father nor 

 mother would have allowed in a well-regulated family, 

 the child was forced to endure, with sullen and natural 

 resentment. An elder brother and an elder sister con- 

 sidered the position of household drudge good enough 

 for Caroline, without schooling, and even without 

 sewing. While the father and sons showed unusual 

 knowledge, and even developed somewhat of genius 



