He completed the first two volumes in 1856 and they were published in 1858. A wearied Carlyle lamented that it "seems worth nothing to me, or less than nothing"; Varnhagen von Ense relates, "Carlyle says that his book on Frederick the Great is the poorest, most troublesome and arduous piece of work he has ever undertaken: no satisfaction in it at all, only labour and sorrow. 'What the devil had I to do with your Friedrich?'"[7] Positive reception of the first two volumes encouraged him,[8] and he made a second trip to Germany, "a visit made primarily to study twelve of the battlefields of Frederick the Great in Silesia, Bohemia, and Saxony," which he documented in Journey to Germany, Autumn 1858.[9]