A third day rose on the anxious city, and yet a fourth, and still the armies stood inactive. Communication with the new camp was easy, but as each day, and all day, a battle was expected, such news as we heard rather heightened than relieved our fears. On this fourth morning, I received a message from the Waldgrave, asking me to come to him in the camp; that he had something to say to me, and could not leave.
I was not unwilling to see for myself how things stood there; and I determined to go. I did not tell the Countess, however, nor Marie, thinking it useless to alarm them; but I left Steve in charge, and, bidding him be on his guard, promised to be back by noon at the latest. As I had no horse, I had to do the journey on foot, and soon was down in the plain myself, threading the orchards and plodding along the trampled roads, where so many thousands had preceded me. The ground in some spots was actually ploughed up; dust covered everything; the trees were bruised, the fences broken down. Old boots and shattered pike-staves marked the route, and here and there--saddest sight of all--dead horses, fast breeding the plague. The sky, for the first time for days, was clouded, and making the most of the coolness I gained the river bank by nine o'clock, and crossing found myself close to the new camp.
The army had just marched out, yet the lines seemed full. The King had strictly forbidden all women and camp-followers to cross the Rednitz; but an army in these days needs so many drivers and sutlers that I found myself one among thousands. I asked for the Waldgrave, and got as many answers as there were men within hearing. One said that he was with his regiment of horse on the left flank; another, that he was with Duke Bernard's staff; a third, that he was not with the army at all. Despairing of hearing anything in the confusion, I was in two minds about turning back; but in the end I took heart of grace and determined to seek him in the field.
Fortunately, the last regiments had barely cleared the lines, and a few minutes' rapid walking set me abreast of the rearmost, which was hastening into position. Here also at the first glance I saw nothing but confusion; but a second resolved the mass into two parts, and then I saw that the King's army lay in two long lines facing the heights. An interval of about three hundred paces divided the lines, but behind each was a small reserve. In the first were most of the German regiments, the second being composed of Finns, Swedes, and Northerners. The cavalry were grouped on the flanks, and seemed stronger on the left flank. In the rear of all, as well as in gaps left between the pikes and musketmen, were the King's ordnance--drakes, serpents, falcons, and cartows, with the light two- and four-pounders for which he was famous.
Such an array--so many thousand men, gay with steel, and a thousand pennons--seemed to the eye to be invincible; and I looked for the enemy. He was not to be seen, but fronting the lines at a distance of three or four hundred paces rose the Alta Veste--a steep, rugged hill, scarred and seamed, and planted thickly with pines and jagged stumps and undergrowth. Here and there among the trees great rocks peeped out, or dark holes yawned. The dry beds of two torrents furrowed this natural glacis; and opposite these I noticed that our strongest regiments were placed. But of the enemy I could see nothing, except here and there a sparkle of steel among the trees; I could hear nothing, except now and then the fall of a stone, that, slipping under an unseen foot, fell from ledge to ledge until it reached the plain.
Everywhere the hush of expectation stirred the heart; for in the presence of that great host silence seemed a thing supernatural. As the regiment I had joined, the last to arrive, wheeled into position in the middle of the right wing, I asked one of the officers, who stood near me, if the enemy had retired.
'Wait!' he said grimly--he spoke with a foreign accent--'and you will see. But to what regiment do you belong, comrade?'
'To none here,' I said.
He looked astonished, and asked me what I was doing there, then.
I had my lips apart to answer him, when a trumpet sounded, and in an instant, all along the line, the Swedish cannon began to fire, shaking the earth and filling the air round us with smoke, that in a twinkling hid everything. This lasted for two or three minutes with a deafening noise; but as far as I could hear, the enemy were still silent. I was wondering what would happen next, and hoping that they had given up the position, when my new friend touched my arm and pointed to the front. I peered through the smoke, and saw dimly that the regiment before us, a German brigade about eight hundred strong, was moving on at a run and making for the hill. A minute elapsed, the smoke rolled between. I listened, trembling. Afterwards I learned that at the same moment two other parties sprang forward and dashed to the assault.