impatience, thus to risk a confiscation, when I was certain of receiving freedom, justification, and honour in three weeks. But such was my adverse fate, circumstances all tended to injure and persecute me, till at length I gave everyone reason to suppose I was a traitor, notwithstanding the purity of my intentions.
“Once more then I was in a dungeon, and no sooner was I there than I formed new projects of flight. I first gained the intimacy of my guards. I had money, and this, with the compassion I had inspired, might effect anything among discontented Prussian soldiers. Soon I had gained thirty-two men who were ready to execute, on the first signal, whatever I should command. Two or three excepted, they were unacquainted with each other, they consequently could not all betray me at once. One Nicholai, a subaltern, was chosen as the leader.
“The garrison consisted only of one hundred and twenty men from the garrison regiment—the rest being dispersed in the county of Glatz—and four officers their commanders, three of whom were in my interest. Everything was prepared, swords and pistols were concealed in the oven, which was in my prison. We intended to give liberty to all the prisoners, and retire with drums beating, into Bohemia.
“Unfortunately, an Austrian deserter, to whom Nicholai had imparted our design revealed our conspiracy. The governor instantly sent his adjutant to the citadel with orders that the officer on guard should arrest Nicholai, and with his men take possession of the casement.
“Nicholai was on the guard, and the lieutenant was my friend, and being in the secret gave the signal that all was discovered. Nicholai only knew all the conspirators, several of whom that day were on guard. He instantly formed his resolution, leaped into the casement, crying, ‘Comrades, to arms! we are betrayed;’ all followed to the guard-house, where they seized on the cartridges. The officer having only eight men, and threatening to fire on whoever should offer resistance, came to deliver me from prison, but the iron door was too strong and the time too short for that to be demolished. Nicholai, calling to me, bid me aid them, but in vain; and perceiving nothing more could be done for me, this brave man, heading nineteen others, marched to the gate of the citadel, where there was a sub-officer and ten soldiers, obliged these to accompany him, and thus arrived safely at Braunau, in Bohemia, for before the news was spread through the city, and men were collected for the pursuit, they were nearly half way on their journey.
“Two years after I met with this extraordinary man at Ofenburg, where he was a writer; he entered immediately into my service, and became my friend, but died some months after of a burning fever at my quarters in Hungary, at which I was deeply grieved, for his memory will ever be dear to me.
“Now was I exposed to all the storms of ill fortune; a prosecution was entered against me as a conspirator, who wanted to corrupt the officers and soldiers of the King. They commanded me to name the remaining conspirators; but to these questions I made no answer except by steadfastly declaring I was an innocent prisoner, an officer unjustly broken, because I had never been brought to trial,—that consequently I was released from all my engagements.
“A lieutenant, whose name was Bach, a Dane, mounted guard every fourth day, and was the terror of the whole garrison; for being a perfect master of arms, he was incessantly involved in quarrels, and generally left his marks behind him. He had served in two regiments, neither of which would associate with him for this reason, and he had been sent to the garrison regiment at Glatz as a punishment.
“Bach, one day sitting beside me, related how the evening before he had wounded a lieutenant, of the name of Schell in the arm. I replied, laughing, ‘Had I my liberty, I believe you would find some trouble in wounding me, for I have some skill in the sword.’ The blood instantly flew into his face. We split off a kind of a pair of foils from an old door, which had served me as a table, and at the first lunge I hit him on the breast.
“His rage became ungovernable, and he left the prison. What was my astonishment when, a moment after, I saw him return with two soldier’s swords, which he had concealed under his coat. ‘Now then, boaster, prove,’ said he, giving me one of them, ‘what thou art able to do.’ I endeavoured to pacify him, by representing the danger; but ineffectually. He attacked me with the utmost fury, and I wounded him in the arm.