HISTORY OF FRIEDRICH II OF PRUSSIA, Volume 19
FREDERICK THE GREAT
by Thomas Carlyle
Contents
[ BOOK XIX.—FRIEDRICH LIKE TO BE OVERWHELMED IN THE SEVEN-YEARS WAR.—1759-1760. ]
[ Chapter I.—PRELIMINARIES TO A FOURTH CAMPAIGN. ]
[ DICTATOR WEDELL FIGHTS HIS BATTLE (Monday, 23d July, 1759), WITHOUT SUCCESS. ]
[ THE "REICHS ARMY" 80 CALLED HAS ENTERED SAXONY, UNDER FINE OMENS; DOES SOME FEATS OF SIEGING (August 7th-23d),—WITH AN EYE ON DRESDEN AS THE CROWNING ONE. ]
[ AUSTRIAN REICHS ARMY DOES ITS CROWNING FEAT (August 26th-September 4th): DIARY OF WHAT IS CALLED THE "SIEGE" OF DRESDEN. ]
[ DAUN, SOLTIKOF AND COMPANY AGAIN HAVE A COLLOQUY (Bautzen, September 15th); AFTER WHICH EVERYBODY STARTS ON HIS SPECIAL COURSE OF ACTION. ]
[ FRIEDRICH MANAGES (September 24th-October 24th) TO GET THE RUSSIANS SENT HOME; AND HIMSELF FALLS LAMED WITH GOUT. ]
[ SERENE HIGHNESS OF WURTEMBERG, AT FULDA (November 30th, 1759), IS JUST ABOUT "FIRING VICTORIA," AND GIVING A BALL TO BEAUTY AND FASHION, IN HONOR OF A CERTAIN EVENT;—BUT IS UNPLEASANTLY INTERRUPTED. ]
[ WHAT IS PERPETUAL PRESIDENT MAUPERTUIS DOING, ALL THIS WHILE? IS HE STILL IN BERLIN; OR WHERE IN THE UNIVERSE IS HE? ALAS, POOR MAUPERTUIS! ]
[ GRAND FRENCH INVASION-SCHEME COMES ENTIRELY TO WRECK (Quiberon Bay, 20th November, 1759): OF CONTROLLER-GENERAL SILHOUETTE, AND THE OUTLOOKS OF FRANCE, FINANCIAL AND OTHER. ]
[ FRIEDRICH, STRANGE TO SAY, PUBLISHES (March-June, 1760) AN EDITION OF HIS POEMS. QUESTION, "WHO WROTE Matinees du Roi de Prusse?"—FOR THE SECOND, AND POSITIVELY THE LAST TIME. ]
[ PEACE-NEGOTIATIONS HOPEFUL TO FRIEDRICH ALL THROUGH WINTER; BUT THE FRENCH WON'T. VOLTAIRE, AND HIS STYLE OF CORRESPONDING. ]
[ VOLTAIRE ON FRIEDRICH, TO DIFFERENT THIRD-PARTIES, DURING THIS WAR. ]
[ VOLTAIRE ON SURROUNDING OBJECTS, CHIEFLY ON MAUPERTUIS, AND THE BATTLES. ]
[ FRIEDRICH TO VOLTAIRE, BEFORE AND DURING THESE PEACE NEGOTIATIONS. ]
[ FRIEDRICH HAS SENT LORD MARISCHAL TO SPAIN: OTHER FOND HOPES OF FRIEDRICH'S. ]
BOOK XIX.—FRIEDRICH LIKE TO BE OVERWHELMED IN THE SEVEN-YEARS WAR.—1759-1760.
Chapter I.—PRELIMINARIES TO A FOURTH CAMPAIGN.
The posting of the Five Armies this Winter—Five of them in Germany, not counting the Russians, who have vanished to Cimmeria over the horizon, for their months of rest—is something wonderful, and strikes the picturesque imagination. Such a Chain of Posts, for length, if for nothing else! From the centre of Bohemia eastward, Daun's Austrians are spread all round the western Silesian Border and the southeastern Saxon; waited on by Prussians, in more or less proximity. Next are the Reichsfolk; scattered over Thuringen and the Franconian Countries; fronting partly into Hessen and Duke Ferdinand's outskirts:—the main body of Duke Ferdinand is far to westward, in Munster Country, vigilant upon Contades, with the Rhine between. Contades and Soubise,—adjoining on the Reichsfolk are these Two French Armies: Soubise's, some 25,000, in Frankfurt-Ems Country, between the Mayn and the Lahn, with its back to the Rhine; then Contades, onward to Maes River and the Dutch Borders, with his face to the Rhine,—and Duke Ferdinand observant of him on the other side. That is the "CORDON of Posts" or winter-quarters this Year. "From the Giant Mountains and the Metal Mountains, to the Ocean;—to the mouth of Rhine," may we not say; "and back again to the Swiss Alps or springs of Rhine, that Upper-Rhine Country being all either French or Austrian, and a basis for Soubise?" [Archenholtz, i. 306.] Not to speak of Ocean itself, and its winged War-Fleets, lonesomely hovering and patrolling; or of the Americas and Indies beyond!
"This is such a Chain of mutually vigilant Winter-quarters," says Archenholtz, "as was never drawn in Germany, or in Europe, before." Chain of about 300,000 fighting men, poured out in that lengthy manner. Taking their winter siesta there, asleep with one eye open, till reinforced for new business of death and destruction against Spring. Pathetic surely, as well as picturesque. "Three Campaigns there have already been," sighs the peaceable observer: "Three Campaigns, surely furious enough; Eleven Battles in them," [Stenzel, v. 185. This, I suppose, would be his enumeration: LOBOSITZ (1756); PRAG, KOLIN, Hastenbeck, Gross-Jagersdorf, ROSSBACH, Breslau, LEUTHEN, (1757); Crefeld, ZORNDORF, HOCHKIRCH (1758): "eleven hitherto in all.">[ a Prag, a Kolin, Leuthen, Rossbach;—must there still be others, then, to the misery of poor mankind?" thus sigh many peaceful persons. Not considering what are, and have been, the rages, the iniquities, the loud and silent deliriums, the mad blindnesses and sins of mankind; and what amount, of CALCINING these may reasonably take. Not calcinable in three Campaigns at all, it would appear! Four more Campaigns are needed: then there will be innocuous ashes in quantity; and a result unexpected, and worth marking in World-History.
It is notably one of Friedrich's fond hopes,—of which he keeps up several, as bright cloud-hangings in the haggard inner world he now has,—that Peace is just at hand; one right struggle more, and Peace must come! And on the part of Britannic George and him, repeated attempts were made,—one in the end of this Year 1759;—but one and all of them proved futile, and, unless for accidental reasons, need not be mentioned here. Many men, in all nations, long for Peace; but there are Three Women at the top of the world who do not; their wrath, various in quality, is great in quantity, and disasters do the reverse of appeasing it.
The French people, as is natural, are weary of a War which yields them mere losses and disgraces; "War carried on for Austrian whims, which likewise seem to be impracticable!" think they. And their Bernis himself, Minister of Foreign Affairs, who began this sad French-Austrian Adventure, has already been remonstrating with Kaunitz, and grumbling anxiously, "Could not the Swedes, or somebody, be got to mediate? Such a War is too ruinous!" Hearing which, the Pompadour is shocked at the favorite creature of her hands; hastens to dismiss him ("Be Cardinal then, you ingrate of a Bernis; disappear under that Red Hat!")—and appoints, in his stead, one Choiseul (known hitherto as STAINVILLE, Comte de Stainville, French Excellency at Vienna, but now made Duke on this promotion), Duc de Choiseul; [Minister of Foreign Affairs, "11th November, 1758" (Barbier, iv. 294).] who is a Lorrainer, or Semi-Austrian, by very birth; and probably much fitter for the place. A swift, impetuous kind of man, this Choiseul, who is still rather young than otherwise; plenty of proud spirit in him, of shifts, talent of the reckless sort; who proved very notable in France for the next twenty years.
French trade being ruined withal, money is running dreadfully low: but they appoint a new Controller-General; a M. de Silhouette, who is thought to have an extraordinary creative genius in Finance. Had he but a Fortunatus-Purse, how lucky were it! With Fortunatus Silhouette as purse-holder, with a fiery young Choiseul on this hand, and a fiery old Belleisle on that, Pompadour meditates great things this Year,—Invasions of England; stronger German Armies; better German Plans, and slashings home upon Hanover itself, or the vital point;—and flatters herself, and her poor Louis, that there is on the anvil, for 1759, such a French Campaign as will perhaps astonish Pitt and another insolent King. Very fixed, fell and feminine is the Pompadour's humor in this matter. Nor is the Czarina's less so; but more, if possible; unappeasable except by death. Imperial Maria Theresa has masculine reasons withal; great hopes, too, of late. Of the War's ending till flat impossibility stop it, there is no likelihood.
To Pitt this Campaign 1759, in spite of bad omens at the outset, proved altogether splendid: but greatly the reverse on Friedrich's side; to whom it was the most disastrous and unfortunate he had yet made, or did ever make. Pitt at his zenith in public reputation; Friedrich never so low before, nothing seemingly but extinction near ahead, when this Year ended. The truth is, apart from his specific pieces of ill-luck, there had now begun for Friedrich a new rule of procedure, which much altered his appearance in the world. Thrice over had he tried by the aggressive or invasive method; thrice over made a plunge at the enemy's heart, hoping so to disarm or lame him: but that, with resources spent to such a degree, is what he cannot do a fourth time: he is too weak henceforth to think of that.
Prussia has always its King, and his unrivalled talent; but that is pretty much the only fixed item: Prussia VERSUS France, Austria, Russia, Sweden and the German Reich, what is it as a field of supplies for war! Except its King, these are failing, year by year; and at a rate fatally SWIFT in comparison. Friedrich cannot now do Leuthens, Rossbachs; far-shining feats of victory, which astonish all the world. His fine Prussian veterans have mostly perished; and have been replaced by new levies and recruits; who are inferior both in discipline and native quality;—though they have still, people say, a noteworthy taste of the old Prussian sort in them; and do, in fact, fight well to the last. But "it is observable," says Retzow somewhere, and indeed it follows from the nature of the case, "that while the Prussian Army presents always its best kind of soldiers at the beginning of a war, Austria, such are its resources in population, always improves in that particular, and its best troops appear in the last campaigns." In a word, Friedrich stands on the defensive henceforth; disputing his ground inch by inch: and is reduced, more and more, to battle obscurely with a hydra-coil of enemies and impediments; and to do heroisms which make no noise in the Gazettes. And, alas, which cannot figure in History either,—what is more a sorrow to me here!
Friedrich, say all judges of soldiership and human character who have studied Friedrich sufficiently, "is greater than ever," in these four Years now coming. [Berenhorst, in Kriegskunst; Retzow; &c.] And this, I have found more and more to be a true thing; verifiable and demonstrable in time and place,—though, unluckily for us, hardly in this time or this place at all! A thing which cannot, by any method, be made manifest to the general reader; who delights in shining summary feats, and is impatient of tedious preliminaries and investigations,—especially of MAPS, which are the indispensablest requisite of all. A thing, in short, that belongs peculiarly to soldier-students; who can undergo the dull preliminaries, most dull but most inexorably needed; and can follow out, with watchful intelligence, and with a patience not to be wearied, the multifarious topographies, details of movements and manoeuvrings, year after year, on such a Theatre of War. What is to be done with it here! If we could, by significant strokes, indicate, under features true so far as they went, the great wide fire-flood that was raging round the world; if we could, carefully omitting very many things, omit of the things intelligible and decipherable that concern Friedrich himself, nothing that had meaning: IF indeed—! But it is idle preluding. Forward again, brave reader, under such conditions as there are!
Friedrich's Winter in Breslau was of secluded, silent, sombre character, this time; nothing of stir in it but from work only: in marked contrast with the last, and its kindly visitors and gayeties. A Friedrich given up to his manifold businesses, to his silent sorrows. "I have passed my winter like a Carthusian monk," he writes to D'Argens: "I dine alone; I spend my life in reading and writing; and I do not sup. When one is sad, it becomes at last too burdensome to hide one's grief continually; and it is better to give way to it by oneself, than to carry one's gloom into society. Nothing solaces me but the vigorous application required in steady and continuous labor. This distraction does force one to put away painful ideas, while it lasts: but, alas, no sooner is the work done, than these fatal companions present themselves again, as if livelier than ever. Maupertuis was right: the sum of evil does certainly surpass that of good:—but to me it is all one; I have almost nothing more to lose; and my few remaining days, what matters it much of what complexion they be?" ["Breslau, 1st March, 1759," To D'Argens (OEuvres de Frederic, xix. 56).]
The loss of his Wilhelmina, had there been no other grief, has darkened all his life to Friedrich. Readers are not prepared for the details of grief we could give, and the settled gloom of mind they indicate. A loss irreparable and immeasurable; the light of life, the one loved heart that loved him, gone. His passionate appeals to Voltaire to celebrate for him in verse his lost treasure, and at least make her virtues immortal, are perhaps known to readers: [ODE SUR LA MORT DE S. A. S. MADAME LA PRINCESSE DE BAREITH (in OEuvres de Voltaire, xviii. 79-86): see Friedrich's Letter to him (6th November, 1758); with Voltaire's VERSES in Answer (next month); Friedrich's new Letter (Breslau, 23d January 1759), demanding something more,—followed by the ODE just cited (Ib. lxxii. 402; lxxviii. 82, 92; or OEuvres de Frederic, xxiii. 20-24: &c.) alas, this is a very feeble kind of immortality, and Friedrich too well feels it such. All Winter he dwells internally on the sad matter, though soon falling silent on it to others.
The War is ever more dark and dismal to him; a wearing, harassing, nearly disgusting task; on which, however, depends life or death. This Year, he "expects to have 300,000 enemies upon him;" and "is, with his utmost effort, getting up 150,000 to set against them." Of business, in its many kinds, there can be no lack! In the intervals he also wrote considerably: one of his Pieces is a SERMON ON THE LAST JUDGMENT; handed to Reader De Catt, one evening:—to De Catt's surprise, and to ours; the Voiceless in a dark Friedrich trying to give itself some voice in this way! [OEuvres de Frederic, xv. 1-10 (see Preuss's PREFACE there; Formey, SOUVENIRS, i. 37; &c. &c.)] Another Piece, altogether practical, and done with excellent insight, brevity, modesty, is ON TACTICS; [REFLEXIONS SUR LA TACTIQUE: in OEuvres de Frederic, xxviii. 153-166.]—properly it might be called, "Serious very Private Thoughts," thrown on paper, and communicated only to two or three, "On the new kind of Tactics necessary with those Austrians and their Allies," who are in such overwhelming strength. "To whose continual sluggishness, and strange want of concert, to whose incoherency of movements, languor of execution, and other enormous faults, we have owed, with some excuse for our own faults, our escaping of destruction hitherto,"—but had better NOT trust that way any longer! Fouquet is one of the highly select, to whom he communicates this Piece; adding along with it, in Fouquet's case, an affectionate little Note, and, in spite of poverty, some New-year's Gift, as usual,—the "Widow's Mite [300 pounds, we find]; receive it with the same heart with which it was set apart for you: a small help, which you may well have need of, in these calamitous times." ["Breslau, 23d December, 1758;" with Fouquet's Answer, 2d January, 1759: in OEuvres de Frederic, xx. 114-117.] Fouquet much admires the new Tactical Suggestions;—seems to think, however, that the certainly practicable one is, in particular, the last, That of "improving our Artillery to some equality with theirs." For which, as may appear, the King has already been taking thought, in more ways than one.
Finance is naturally a heavy part of Friedrich's Problem; the part which looks especially impossible, from our point of vision! In Friedrich's Country, the War Budget does not differ from the Peace one. Neither is any borrowing possible; that sublime Art, of rolling over on you know not whom the expenditure, needful or needless, of your heavy-laden self, had not yet—though England is busy at it—been invented among Nations. Once, or perhaps twice, from the STANDE of some willing Province, Friedrich negotiated some small Loan; which was punctually repaid when Peace came, and was always gratefully remembered. But these are as nothing, in face of such expenses; and the thought how he did contrive on the Finance side, is and was not a little wonderful. An ingenious Predecessor, whom I sometimes quote, has expressed himself in these words:—
"Such modicum of Subsidy [he is speaking of the English Subsidy in 1758], how useful will it prove in a Country bred everywhere to Spartan thrift, accustomed to regard waste as sin, and which will lay out no penny except to purpose! I guess the Prussian Exchequer is, by this time, much on the ebb; idle precious metals tending everywhere towards the melting-pot. At what precise date the Friedrich-Wilhelm balustrades, and enormous silver furnitures, were first gone into, Dryasdust has not informed me: but we know they all went; as they well might. To me nothing is so wonderful as Friedrich's Budget during this War. One day it will be carefully investigated, elucidated and made conceivable and certain to mankind: but that as yet is far from being the case. We walk about in it with astonishment; almost, were it possible, with incredulity. Expenditure on this side, work done on that: human nature, especially British human nature, refuses to conceive it. Never in this world, before or since, was the like. The Friedrich miracles in War are great; but those in Finance are almost greater. Let Dryasdust bethink him; and gird his flabby loins to this Enterprise; which is very behooveful in these Californian times!"—
The general Secret of Prussian Thrift, I do fear, is lost from the world. And how an Army of about 200,000, in field and garrison, could be kept on foot, and in some ability to front combined Europe, on about Three Million Sterling annually ("25 million THALERS"=3,150,000 pounds, that is the steady War-Budget of those years), remains to us inconceivable enough;—mournfully miraculous, as it were; and growing ever more so in the Nugget-generations that now run. Meanwhile, here are what hints I could find, on the Origins of that modest Sum, which also are a wonder: [Preuss, ii. 388-392; Stenzel, v. 137-141.]—
"The hoarded Prussian Moneys, or 'TREASURES' [two of them, KLEINE SCHATZ, GROSSE SCHATZ, which are rigidly saved in Peace years, for incidence of War], being nearly run out, there had come the English Subsidy: this, with Saxony, and the Home revenues and remnants of SCHATZ had sufficed for 1758; but will no longer suffice. Next to Saxony, the English Subsidy (670,000 pounds due the second time this year) was always Friedrich's principal resource: and in the latter years of the War, I observe, it was nearly twice the amount of what all his Prussian Countries together, in their ravaged and worn-out state, could yield him. In and after 1759, besides Home Income, which is gradually diminishing, and English Subsidy, which is a steady quantity, Friedrich's sources of revenue are mainly Two:—
"FIRST, there is that of wringing money from your Enemies, from those that have deserved ill of you,—such of them as you can come at. Enemies, open or secret, even Ill-wishers, we are not particular, provided only they lie within arm's-length. Under this head fall principally three Countries (and their three poor Populations, in lieu of their Governments): Saxony, Mecklenburg (or the main part of it, Mecklenburg-SCHWERIN), and Anhalt; from these three there is a continual forced supply of money and furnishings. Their demerits to Friedrich differ much in intensity; nor is his wringing of them—which in the cases of Mecklenburg and Saxony increases year by year to the nearly intolerable pitch—quite in the simple ratio of their demerits; but in a compound ratio of that and of his indignation and of his wants.
"Saxony, as Prime Author of this War, was from the first laid hold of, collared tightly: 'Pay the shot, then, what you can' (in the end it was almost what you cannot)! As to Mecklenburg-Schwerin, the grudge against Prussia was of very old standing, some generations now; and the present Duke, not a very wise Sovereign more than his Ancestors, had always been ill with Friedrich; willing to spite and hurt him when possible: in Reichs Diet he, of all German Princes, was the first that voted for Friedrich's being put to Ban of the Reich,—he; and his poor People know since whether that was a wise step! The little Anhalt Princes, too, all the Anhalts, Dessau, Bernburg, Cothen, Zerbst [perhaps the latter partially excepted, for a certain Russian Lady's sake], had voted, or at least had ambiguously half-voted, in favor of the Ban, and done other unfriendly things; and had now to pay dear for their bits of enmities. Poor souls, they had but One Vote among them all Four;—and they only half gave it, tremulously pulling it back again. I should guess it was their terrors mainly, and over-readiness to reckon Friedrich a sinking ship; and to leap from the deck of him,—with a spurn which he took for insolent! The Anhalt-Dessauers particularly, who were once of his very Army, half Prussians for generations back, he reckoned to have used him scandalously ill.
"This Year the requisition on the Four Anhalts—which they submit to patiently, as people who have leapt into the wrong ship—is, in precise tale: of money, 330,000 thalers (about 50,000 pounds); recruits, 2,200; horses, 1,800. In Saxony, besides the fixed Taxes, strict confiscation of Meissen Potteries and every Royalty, there were exacted heavy 'Contributions,' more and more heavy, from the few opulent Towns, chiefly from Leipzig; which were wrung out, latterly, under great severities,—'chief merchants of Leipzig all clapt in prison, kept on bread-and-water till they yielded,'—AS great severities as would suffice, but NOT greater; which also was noted. Unfortunate chief merchants of Leipzig,—with Bruhl and Polish Majesty little likely to indemnify them! Unfortunate Country altogether. An intelligent Saxon, who is vouched for as impartial, bears witness as follows: 'And this I know, that the oppressions and plunderings of the Austrians and Reichsfolk, in Saxony, turned all hearts away from them; and it was publicly said, We had rather bear the steady burden of the Prussians than such help as these our pretended Deliverers bring.' [Stenzel (citing from KRIEGSKANZLEI, which I have not), v. 137 n.] Whereby, on the whole, the poor Country got its back broken, and could never look up in the world since. Resource FIRST was abundantly severe.
"Resource SECOND is strangest of all;—and has given rise to criticism enough! It is no other than that of issuing base money; mixing your gold and silver coin with copper,—this, one grieves to say, is the Second and extreme resource. A rude method—would we had a better—of suspending Cash-payments, and paying by bank-notes instead!' thinks Friedrich, I suppose. From his Prussian Mints, from his Saxon [which are his for the present], and from the little Anhalt-Bernburg Mint [of which he expressly purchased the sad privilege,—for we are not a Coiner, we are a King reduced to suspend Cash-payments, for the time being], Friedrich poured out over all Germany, in all manner of kinds, huge quantities of bad Coin. This, so long as it would last, is more and more a copious fountain of supply. This, for the first time, has had to appear as an item in War-Budget 1759: and it fails in no following, but expands more and more. It was done through Ephraim, the not lovely Berlin Jew, whom we used to hear of in Voltaire's time;—through Ephraim and two others, Ephraim as President: in return for a net Sum, these shall have privilege to coin such and such amounts, so and so alloyed; shall pay to General Tauentzien, Army Treasurer, at fixed terms, the Sums specified: 'Go, and do it; our Mint-Officers sharply watching you; Mint-Officers, and General Tauentzien [with a young Herr Lessing, as his Chief Clerk, of whom the King knows nothing]; Go, ye unlovely!' And Ephraim and Company are making a great deal of money by the unlovely job. Ephraim is the pair of tongs, the hand, and the unlovely job, are a royal man's. Alas, yes. And none of us knows better than King Friedrich, perhaps few of us as well, how little lovely a job it was; how shockingly UNkingly it was,—though a practice not unknown to German Kings and Kinglets before his time, and since down almost to ours. [In STENZEL (v. 141) enumeration of eight or nine unhappy Potentates, who were busy with it in those same years.] In fact, these are all unkingly practices;—and the English Subsidy itself is distasteful to a proud Friedrich: but what, in those circumstances, can any Friedrich do?
"The first coinages of Ephraim had, it seems, in them about 3-7ths of copper; something less than the half, and more than the third,"—your gold sovereign grown to be worth 28s. 6d. "But yearly it grew worse; and in 1762 [English Subsidy having failed] matters had got inverted; and there was three times as much copper as silver. Commerce, as was natural, went rocking and tossing, as on a sea under earthquakes; but there was always ready money among Friedrich's soldiers, as among no other: nor did the common people, or retail purchasers, suffer by it. 'Hah, an Ephraimite!' they would say, grinning not ill-humoredly, at sight of one of these pieces; some of which they had more specifically named 'BLUE-GOWNS' [owing to a tint of blue perceivable, in spite of the industrious plating in real silver, or at least "boiling in some solution" of it]; these they would salute with this rhyme, then current:—
"Von aussen schon, van innen schlimm;
Von aussen Friedrich, von innen Ephraim.
Outside noble, inside slim:
Outside Friedrich, inside Ephraim.
"By this time, whatever of money, from any source, can be scraped together in Friedrich's world, flows wholly into the Army-Chest, as the real citadel of life. In these latter years of the War, beginning, I could guess, from 1759, all Civil expenditures, and wages of Officials, cease to be paid in money; nobody of that kind sees the color even of bad coin; but is paid only in 'Paper Assignments,' in Promises to Pay 'after the Peace.' These Paper Documents made no pretence to the rank of Currency: such holders of them as had money, or friends, and could wait, got punctual payment when the term did arrive; but those that could not, suffered greatly; having to negotiate their debentures on ruinous terms,—sometimes at an expense of three-fourths.—I will add Friedrich's practical Schedule of Amounts from all these various Sources; and what Friedrich's own view of the Sources was, when he could survey them from the safe distance.
"SCHEDULE OF AMOUNTS [say for 1761]. To make up the Twenty-five Million thalers, necessary for the Army, there are:—
"From our Prussian Countries, ruined, harried as THALERS
they have been,.......... 4 millions only.
From Saxony and the other Wringings, ..... 7 millions.
English Subsidy (4 of good gold; becoppered
into double),........... 8 "
From Ephraim and his Farm of the Mint
(MUNZ-PATENT), .......... 7 "
In sum Twenty-six Millions; leaving you one Million of margin,—and always a plenty of cash in hand for incidental sundries. [Preuss, ii. 388.]
"Friedrich's own view of these sad matters, as he closes his History of the Seven-Years War [at "Berlin, 17th December, 1763">[, is in these words: 'May Heaven grant,—if Heaven deign to look down on the paltry concerns of men,—that the unalterable and flourishing destiny of this Country preserve the Sovereigns who shall govern it from the scourges and calamities which Prussia has suffered in these times of trouble and subversion; that they may never again be forced to recur to the violent and fatal remedies which we (L'ON) have been obliged to employ in maintenance of the State against the ambitious hatred of the Sovereigns of Europe, who wished to annihilate the House of Brandenburg, and exterminate from the world whatever bore the Prussian name!'" [OEuvres de Frederic, v. 234.]
OF THE SMALL-WAR IN SPRING, 1759. THERE ARE FIVE DISRUPTIONS OF THAT GRAND CORDON (February-April); AND FERDINAND OF BRUNSWICK FIGHTS HIS BATTLE OF BERGEN (April 13th).
Friedrich, being denied an aggressive course this Year, by no means sits idly expectant and defensive in the interim; but, all the more vigorously, as is observable, from February onwards, strikes out from him on every side: endeavoring to spoil the Enemy's Magazines, and cripple his operations in that way. So that there was, all winter through, a good deal of Small-War (some of it not Small), of more importance than usual,—chiefly of Friedrich's originating, with the above view, or of Ferdinand his Ally's, on a still more pressing score. And, on the whole, that immense Austrian-French Cordon, which goes from the Carpathians to the Ocean, had by no means a quiet time; but was broken into, and violently hurled back, in different parts: some four, or even five, attacks upon it in all; three of them by Prince Henri,—in two of which Duke Ferdinand's people co-operated; the business being for mutual behoof. These latter Three were famous in the world, that Winter; and indeed are still recognizable as brilliant procedures of their kind; though, except dates and results, we can afford almost nothing of them here. These Three, intended chiefly against Reichs people and their Posts and Magazines, fell out on the western and middle part of the Cordon. Another attack was in the extreme eastward, and was for Friedrich's own behoof; under Fouquet's management;—intended against the Austrian-Moravian Magazines and Preparations, but had little success. Still another assault, or invasive outroad, northward against the Russian Magazines, there also was; of which by and by. Besides all which, and more memorable than all, Duke Ferdinand, for vital reasons of his own, fought a Battle this Spring, considerable Battle, and did NOT gain it; which made great noise in the world.
It is not necessary the reader should load his memory with details of all these preliminary things; on the contrary, it is necessary that he keep his memory clear for the far more important things that lie ahead of these, and entertain these in a summary way, as a kind of foreground to what is coming. Perhaps the following Fractions of Note, which put matters in something of Chronological or Synoptical form, will suffice him, or more than suffice. He is to understand that the grand tug of War, this Year, gradually turns out not to be hereabouts, nor with Daun and his adjacencies at all, but with the Russians, who arrive from the opposite Northern quarter; and that all else will prove to be merely prefatory and nugatory in comparison.
JANUARY 2d, 1759: FRANKFURT-ON-MAYN, THOUGH IT IS A REICHSTADT, FINDS ITSELF SUDDENLY BECOME FRENCH. "Prince de Soubise lies between Mayn and Lahn, with his 25,000; beautifully safe and convenient,—though ill off for a place-of-arms in those parts. Opulent Frankfurt, on his right; how handy would that be, were not Reichs Law so express! Marburg, Giessen are outposts of his; on which side one of Ferdinand's people, Prince von Ysenburg, watches him with an 8 or 10,000, capable of mischief in that quarter.
"On the Eve of New-year's day, or on the auspicious Day itself, Soubise requests, of the Frankfurt Authorities, permission for a regiment of his to march through that Imperial City. To which, by law and theory, the Imperial City can say Yes or No; but practically cannot, without grave inconvenience, say other than Yes, though most Frankfurters wish it could. 'Yes,' answer the Frankfurt Magnates; Yes surely, under the known conditions. Tuesday, January 2d, about 5 in the morning, while all is still dark in Frankfurt, regiment Nassau appears, accordingly, at the Sachsenhausen Gate, Town-guard people all ready to receive it and escort it through; and is admitted as usual. Quite as usual: but instead of being escorted through, it orders, in calm peremptory voice, the Town-guard, To ground arms; with calm rapidity proceeds to admit ten other regiments or battalions, six of them German; seizes the artillery on the Walls, seizes all the other Gates:—and poor Frankfurt finds itself tied hand and foot, almost before it is out of bed! Done with great exactitude, with the minimum of confusion, and without a hurt skin to anybody. The Inhabitants stood silent, gazing; the Town-guard laid down their arms, and went home. Totally against Law; but cleverly done; perhaps Soubise's chief exploit in the world; certainly the one real success the French have yet had.
"Soubise made haste to summon the Magistrates: 'Law of Necessity alone, most honored Sirs! Reichs Law is clear against me. But all the more shall private liberties, religions, properties, in this Imperial Free-Town, be sacred to us. Defence against any aggression: and the strictest discipline observed. Depend on me, I bid you!'—And kept his word to an honorable degree, they say; or in absence, made it be kept, during the Four Years that follow. Most Frankfurters are, at heart, Anti-French: but Soubise's affability was perfect; and he gave evening parties of a sublime character; the Magistrates all appearing there, in their square perukes and long gowns, with a mournful joy." [Tempelhof, iii. 7-8; Stenzel, v. 198-200.]
Soubise soon went home, to assist in important businesses,—Invasion of England, no less; let England look to itself this Summer!—and Broglio succeeded him, as Army-Captain in the Frankfurt parts; with laurels accruing, more or less. Soubise, like Broglio, began with Rossbach; Soubise ends with Frankfurt, for the present; where Broglio also gains his chief laurels, as will shortly be seen. Frankfurt is a great gain to France, though an illicit one. It puts a bar on Duke Ferdinand in that quarter; secures a starting-point for attacks on Hessen, Hanover; for co-operation with Contades and the Lower Rhine. It is the one success France has yet had in this War, or pretty much that it ever had in it. Due to Prince de Soubise, in that illegal fashion.—A highly remarkable little Boy, now in his tenth year, Johann Wolfgang Goethe, has his wondering eyes on these things: and, short while hence, meets daily, on the stairs and lobbies at home, a pleasant French Official Gentlemen who is quartered there; between whom and Papa occur rubs,—as readers may remember, and shall hear in April coming.
GRAND CORDON DISRUPTED: ERFURT COUNTRY, 16th FEBRUARY-2d MARCH. "About six weeks after this Frankfurt achievement, certain Reichsfolk and Austrian Auxiliaries are observed to be cutting down endless timber, '18,800 palisades, 6,000 trees of 60 feet,' and other huge furnishings, from the poor Duke of Gotha's woods; evidently meaning to fortify themselves in Erfurt. Upon which Prince Henri detaches a General Knobloch thitherward, Duke Ferdinand contributing 4,000 to meet him there; which combined expedition, after some sharp knocking and shoving, entirely disrooted the Austrians and Reichsfolk, and sent them packing. Had them quite torn out by the end of the month; and had planned to 'attack them on two sides at once' (March 2d), with a view of swallowing them whole,—when they (these Reichs Volscians, in such a state of flutter) privately hastened off, one and all of them, the day before." [Narrative, in Helden-Geschichte, v. 1022 et seq.]
This was BREAKAGE FIRST of the Grand Cordon; an explosive hurling of it back out of those Erfurt parts. Done by Prince Henri's people, in concert with Duke Ferdinand's,—who were mutually interested in the thing.
BREAKAGE SECOND: ERFURT-FULDA COUNTRY, 31st MARCH-8th APRIL. "About the end of March, these intrusive Austrian Reichsfolk made some attempt to come back into those Countries; but again got nothing but hard knocks; and gave up the Erfurt project. For, close following on this FIRST, there was a SECOND still deeper and rougher Breakage, in those same regions; the Hereditary Prince of Brunswick dashing through, on a special Errand of Ferdinand's own [of which presently], with an 8 or 10,000, in his usual fiery manner; home into the very bowels of the Reich (April 3d, and for a week onward); and returning with 'above 2,000 prisoners' in hand; especially with a Reich well frightened behind him;—still in time for Duke Ferdinand's Adventure [in fact, for his Battle of Bergen, of which we are to hear]. Had been well assisted by Prince Henri, who 'made dangerous demonstrations in the distance,' and was extremely diligent—though the interest was chiefly Ferdinand's this time." [Tempelhof, iii. 19-22.]—Contemporary with that FIRST Erfurt Business, there went on, 300 miles away from it, in the quite opposite direction, another of the same;—too curious to be omitted.
ACROSS THE POLISH FRONTIER: FEBRUARY, 24th-MARCH 4th. "In the end of February, General Wobersnow, an active man, was detached from Glogau, over into Poland, Posen way, To overturn the Russian provision operations thereabouts; in particular, to look into a certain high-flying Polack, a Prince Sulkowski of those parts; who with all diligence is gathering food, in expectation of the Russian advent; and indeed has formally 'declared War against the King of Prussia;' having the right, he says, as a Polish Magnate, subject only to his own high thought in such affairs. The Russians and their wars are dear to Sulkowski. He fell prisoner in their cause, at Zorndorf, last Autumn; was stuck, like all the others, Soltikoff himself among them, into the vaulted parts of Custrin Garrison: 'I am sorry I have no Siberia for you,' said Friedrich, looking, not in a benign way, on the captive Dignitaries, that hot afternoon; 'go to Custrin, and see what you have provided for yourselves!' Which they had to do; nothing, for certain days, but cellarage to lodge in; King inexorable, deaf to remonstrance. Which possibly may have contributed to kindle Sulkowski into these extremely high proceedings.
"At any rate, Wobersnow punctually looks in upon him: seizes his considerable stock of Russian proviants; his belligerent force, his high person itself; and in one luckless hour snuffs him out from the list of potentates. His belligerent force, about 1,000 Polacks, were all compelled, 'by the cudgel, say my authorities, to take Prussian service [in garrison regiments, and well scattered about, I suppose]; his own high person found itself sitting locked in Glogau, left to its reflections. Sat thus 'till the War ended,' say some; certainly till the Sulkowski War had been sufficiently exploded by the laughter of mankind." Here are, succinctly, the dates of this small memorability:—
"End of February, Wobersnow gathers, at Glogau, a force of about 8,000 horse and foot. Marches, 24th FEBRUARY, over Oder Bridge, straight into Poland; that same night, to the neighborhood of Lissa and Reisen (Sulkowski's dominion), about thirty miles northeast of Glogau. Sulkowski done next day;—part of the capture is 'fifteen small guns.' Wobersnow goes, next, for Posen; arrives, 28th FEBRUARY; destroys Russian Magazine, ransoms Jews. Shoots out other detachments on the Magazine Enterprise;—detaches Platen along the Warta, where are picked up various items, among others 'eighty tuns of brandy,'—but himself proceeds no farther than Posen. MARCH 4th, sets out again from Posen, homewards." [NACHRICHT VON DER UNTERNEHMUNG DES GENERAL-MAJORS VON WOBERSNOW IN POLEN, IM FEB. UND MARZ. 1759: in Seyfarth, Beylagen, ii. 526-529. Helden-Geschichte, v. 829.] We shall hear again of Wobersnow, in a much more important way, before long.
To the Polish Republic so called, Friedrich explained politely, not apologetically: "Since you allow the Russians to march through you in attack of me, it is evident to your just minds that the attacked party must have similar privilege." "Truly!" answered they, in their just minds, generally; and I made no complaint about Sulkowski (though Polish Majesty and Primate endeavored to be loud about "Invasion" and the like):—and indeed Polish Republic was lying, for a long while past, as if broken-backed, on the public highway, a Nation anarchic every fibre of it, and under the feet and hoofs of travelling Neighbors, especially of Russian Neighbors; and is not now capable of saying much for itself in such cases, or of doing anything at all.
FRANKFURT COUNTRY, APRIL 13th: DUKE FERDINAND'S BATTLE OF BERGEN. "Duke Ferdinand, fully aware what a stroke that seizure of Frankfurt was to him, resolved to risk a long march at this bad season, and attempt to drive the French out. Contades was absent in Paris,—no fear of an attack from Contades's Army; Broglio's in Frankfurt, grown now to about 35,000, can perhaps be beaten if vigorously attacked. Ferdinand appoints a rendezvous at Fulda, of various Corps, Prince Ysenburg's and others, that lie nearest, Hessians many of them, Hanoverians others; proceeds, himself, to Fulda, with a few attendants "Ferdinand stayed hardly a day in Fulda, ranking himself and getting on the road. Did his long march of above 100 miles without accident or loss of time;—of course, scaring home the Broglio Outposts in haste enough, and awakening Broglio's attention in a high degree;—and arrives, Thursday, April 12th, at Windecken, a Village about fifteen miles northeast of Frankfurt; where he passes the night under arms; intending Battle on the morrow. Broglio is all assembled, 35,000 strong; his Assailant, with the Hereditary Prince come in, counts rather under 30,000. Broglio is posted in, and on both sides of, Bergen, a high-lying Village, directly on Ferdinand's road to Frankfurt. Windecken is about fifteen miles from Frankfurt; Bergen about six:—idle Tourists of our time, on their return from Homburg to that City, leave Bergen a little on their left. The ground is mere hills, woody dales, marshy brooks; Broglio's position, with its Village, and Hill, and ravines and advantages, is the choicest of the region; and Broglio's methods, procedures and arrangements in it are applauded by all judges. "FRIDAY, 13th APRIL, 1759, Ferdinand is astir by daybreak; comes on, along one of those woody balleys, pickeering, reconnoitring;—in the end, directly up the Hill of Bergen; straight upon the key-point. It is about 10 A.M., when the batteries and musketries awaken there; very loud indeed, for perhaps two hours or more. Prince von Ysenburg is leader of Ferdinand's attacking party. Their attack is hot and fierce, and they stick to it steadily; though garden-hedges, orchards and impediments are many, and Broglio, with, much cannon helping, makes vigorous defence. These Ysenburgers fought till their cartridges were nearly spent, and Ysenburg himself lay killed; but could not take Bergen. Nor could the Hereditary Prince; who, in aid of them, tried it in flank, with his own usual impetuosity rekindling theirs, and at first with some success; but was himself taken in flank by Broglio's Reserve, and obliged to desist. No getting of Bergen by that method. "Military critics say coolly, 'You should have smashed it well with cannon, first [which Ferdinand had not in stock here]; and especially have flung grenadoes into it, till it was well in flame: impossible otherwise!' [Mauvillon, ii. 19.] The Ysenburgers and Hereditary Prince withdraw. No pursuit of them; or almost less than none; for the one or two French regiments that tried it (against order), nearly got cut up. Broglio, like a very Daun at Kolin, had strictly forbidden all such attempts: 'On no temptation quit your ground!' "The Battle, after this, lay quiet all afternoon; Ferdinand still in sight; motioning much, to tempt French valor into chasing of him. But all in vain: Broglio, though his subalterns kept urging, remonstrating, was peremptory not to stir. Whereupon, towards evening, across certain woody Heights, perhaps still with some hope of drawing him out, Ferdinand made some languid attempt on Broglio's wing, or wings;—and this also failing, had to give up the affair. He continued cannonading till deep in the night; withdrew to Windecken: and about two next morning, marched for home,—still with little or no pursuit: but without hope of Frankfurt henceforth. And, in fact, has a painful Summer ahead. "Ferdinand had lost 5 cannon, and of killed and wounded 2,500; the French counted their loss at about 1,900. [Mauvillon, ii. 10-19; Tempelhof, iii. 26-31.] The joy of France over this immense victory was extraordinary. Broglio was made Prince of the Reich, Marechal de France; would have been raised to the stars, had one been able,—for the time being. 'And your immense victory,' so sneered the by-standers, 'consists in not being beaten, under those excellent conditions;—perhaps victory is a rarity just now!'" This is the Battle which our Boy-Friend Johann Wolfgang watched with such interest, from his garret-window, hour after hour; all Frankfurt simmering round him, in such a whirlpool of self-contradictory emotions; till towards evening, when, in long rows of carts, poor wounded Hessians and Hanoverians came jolting in, and melted every heart into pity, into wailing sorrow, and eagerness to help. A little later, Papa Goethe, stepping downstairs, came across the Official French Gentleman; who said radiantly: "Doubtless you congratulate yourself and us on this victory to his Majesty's arms." "Not a whit (KEINESWEGS)," answers Papa Goethe, a stiff kind of man, nowise in the mood of congratulating: "on the contrary, I wish they had chased you to the Devil, though I had had to go too!" Which was a great relief to his feelings, though a dangerous one in the circumstances. [Goethe's WERKE (Stuttgart und Tubingen, 1829), xxiv. (DICHTUNG UND WAHRHEIT, i.), 153-157.] BREAKAGE THIRD: OVER THE METAL MOUNTAINS INTO BOHMEN (APRIL 14th-20th). "Ferdinand's Battle was hardly ending, when Prince Henri poured across the Mountains,—in two columns, Hulsen leading the inferior or rightmost one,—into Leitmeritz-Eger Country; and made a most successful business of the Austrian Magazines he found there. Magazines all filled; Enemy all galloping for Prag:—Daun himself, who is sitting vigilant, far in the interior, at Jaromirtz this month past, was thrown into huge flurry, for some days! Speedy Henri (almost on the one condition of BEING speedy) had his own will of the Magazines: burnt, Hulsen and he, 'about 600,000 pounds worth' of Austrian provender in those parts, 'what would have kept 50,000 men five months in bread' (not to mention hay at all); gave the Enemy sore slaps (caught about 3,000 of him, NOT yet got on gallop for Prag); burnt his 200 boats on the Elbe:—forced him to begin anew at the beginning; and did, in effect, considerably lame and retard certain of his operations through the Summer. Speedy Henri marched for home April 20th; and was all across the Mountains April 23d: a profitable swift nine days." [Tempelhof iii. 47-53; Helden-Geschichte, v. 963-966.]—And on the sixth day hence he will have something similar, and still more important, on foot. A swift man, when he must! BREAKAGE FOURTH: INTO MAHREN (APRIL 16th-21st). "This is Fouquet's attempt, alluded to above; of which—as every reader must be satisfied with Small-War—we will give only the dates. Fouquet, ranking at Leobschutz, in Neisse Country, did break through into Mahren, pushing the Austrians before him; but found the Magazines either emptied, or too inaccessible for any worth they had;—could do nothing on the Magazines; and returned without result; home at Leobschutz again on the fifth day." [ Helden-Geschichte, v. 958-963; Tempelhof, iii. 44-47.] This, however, had a sequel for Fouquet; which, as it brought the King himself into those neighborhoods, we shall have to mention, farther on. BREAKAGE FIFTH: INTO FRANKEN (MAY 5th-JUNE 1st). "This was Prince Henri's Invasion of the Bamberg-Nurnberg Countries; a much sharper thing than in any former Year. Much the most famous, and," luckily for us, "the last of the Small-War affairs for the present. Started,—from Tschopau region, Bamberg way,—April 29th-May 5th. In Three Columns: Finck leftmost, and foremost (Finck had marched April 29th, pretending to mean for Bohemia); after whom Knobloch; and (May 5th) the Prince himself. Who has an eye to the Reichs Magazines and Preparations, as usual;—nay, an eye to their Camp of Rendezvous, and to a fight with their miscellaneous Selves and Auxiliaries, if they will stand fight. 'You will have to leave Saxony, and help us with the Russians, soon: beat those Reichs people first!' urged the King; 'well beaten, they will not trouble Saxony for a while.' If they will stand fight? But they would not at all. They struck their tents everywhere; burnt their own Magazines, in some cases; and only went mazing hither and thither,—gravitating all upon Nurnberg, and an impregnable Camp which they have in that neighborhood. Supreme Zweibruck was himself with them; many Croats, Austrians, led by Maguire and others; all marching, whirling at a mighty rate; with a countenance sometimes of vigor, but always with Nurnberg Camp in rear. There was swift marching, really beautiful manoeuvring here and there; sharp bits of fighting, too, almost in the battle-form:—Maguire tried, or was for trying, a stroke with Finck; but made off hastily, glad to get away. [Templehof, iii. 64.] May 11th, at Himmelskron in Baireuth, one Riedesel of theirs had fairly to ground arms, self and 2,500, and become prisoners of war." Much of this manoeuvring and scuffling was in Baireuth Territory. Twice, or even thrice, Prince Henri was in Baireuth Town: "marched through Baireuth," say the careless Old Books. Through Baireuth:—No Wilhelmina now there, with her tremulous melodies of welcome! Wilhelminn's loves, and terrors for her loved, are now all still. Perhaps her poor Daughter of Wurtemberg, wandering unjustly disgraced, is there; Papa, the Widower Margraf, is for marrying again: [Married 20th September, 1759 (a Brunswick Princess, Sister's-daughter of his late Wife); died within four years.]—march on, Prince Henri! "In Bamberg," says a Note from Archenholtz, "the Reichs troops burnt their Magazine; and made for Nurnberg, as usual; but left some thousand or two of Croats, who would not yet. Knobloch and his Prussians appeared shortly after; summoned Bamberg, which agreed to receive them; and were for taking possession; but found the Croats determined otherwise. Fight ensued; fight in the streets; which, in hideousness of noises, if in nothing else, was beyond parallel. The inhabitants sat all quaking in their cellars; not an inhabitant was to be seen: a City dead,—and given up to the demons, in this manner. Not for some hours were the Croats got entirely trampled out. Bamberg, as usual, became a Prussian place-of-arms; was charged to pay ransom of 40,000 pounds;—'cannot possibly!'—did pay some 14,000 pounds, and gave bills for the remainder." [Archenholtz. i. 371-373.] Which bills, let us mark withal, the Kaiser in Reichs Diet decreed to be invalid: "Don't pay them!" A thing not forgotten by Friedrich;—though it is understood the Bambergers, lest worse might happen, privately paid their bills. "The Expedition lasted, in whole, not quite four weeks: June 1st, Prince Henri was at the Saxon frontier again; the German world all ringing loud,—in jubilation, counter-jubilation and a great variety of tones,—with the noise of what he had done. A sharp swift man; and, sure enough, has fluttered the Reichs Volscians in their Corioli to an unexpected degree." [Seyfarth, Beylagen, ii. 537-563; BERICHT VON DER UNTERNEHMUNG DES PRINZEN HEINRICH IN FRANKEN, IM JAHR, 1759; Helden-Geschichte, v. 1033-1039; Tempelhof,????, et seq.]—-[COPY ILLEGIBLE PAGE 203,] A Colonel Wunsch (Lieutenant-Colonel of the Free Corps WUNSCH) distinguished himself in this Expedition; The beginning of notably great things to him in the few following months. Wunsch is a Wurtemberger by birth; has been in many services, always in subaltern posts, and, this year, will testify strangely how worthy he was of the higher. What a Year, this of 1759, to stout old Wunsch! In the Spring, here has he just seen his poor son, Lieutenant Wunsch, perish in one of these scuffles; in Autumn, he will see himself a General, shining suddenly bright, to his King and to all the world; before Winter, he will be Prisoner to Austria, and eclipsed for the rest of this war!—Kleist, of the GREEN HUSSARS, also made a figure here; and onwards rapidly ever higher; to the top of renown in his business:—fallen heir to Mayer's place, as it were. A Note says: "Poor Mayer of the Free Corps does not ride with the Prince on this occasion. Mayer, dangerously worn down with the hard services of last Year, and himself a man of too sleepless temper, caught a fever in the New-year time; and died within few days: burnt away before his time; much regretted by his Brethren of the Army, and some few others. Gone in this way; with a high career just opening on him at the long last! Mayer was of Austrian, of half Spanish birth; a musical, really melodious, affectionate, but indignant, wildly stormful mortal; and had had adventures without end. Something of pathos, of tragedy, in the wild Life of him. [Still worth reading: in Pauli (our old watery BRANDENBURG-HISTORY Friend). Leben grosser Helden (Halle, 1759-1764, 9 vols.), iii. 142-188;—much the best Piece in that still rather watery (or windy) Collection, which, however, is authentic, and has some tolerable Portraits.] A man of considerable genius, military and other:—genius in the sleepless kind, which is not the best kind; sometimes a very bad kind. The fame of Friedrich invites such people from all sides of the world; and this was no doubt a sensible help to him."—But enough of all this. Here, surely, is abundance of preliminary Small-War, on the part of a Friedrich reduced to the defensive!—Fouquet's Sequel, hinted at above, was to this effect. On Fouquet's failing to get hold of the Moravian Magazines, and returning to his Post at Leobschutz, a certain rash General Deville, who is Austrian chief in those parts, hastily rushed through the Jagerndorf Hills, and invaded Fouquet. Only for a few days; and had very bad success, in that bit of retaliation. The King, who is in Landshut, in the middle of his main cantonments, hastened over to Leobschutz with reinforcement to Fouquet; in the thought that a finishing-stroke might be done on this Deville;—and would have done it, had not the rash man plunged off again (May 1st, or the night before); homewards, at full speed. So that Friedrich, likewise at full speed, could catch nothing of him; but merely cannonade him in the Passes of Zuckmantel, and cut off his rear-guard of Croats. Poor forlorn of Croats, whom he had left in some bushy Chasm; to gain him a little time, and then to perish if THEY must! as Tempelhof remarks. [Tempelhof, iii. 56.] Upon which Friedrich returned to Landshut; and Fouquet had peace again. It was from this Landshut region, where his main cantonments are, that Friedrich had witnessed all these Inroads, or all except the very earliest of them; the first Erfurt one, and the Wobersnow-Sulkowski. He had quitted Breslau in the end of March, and gone to his cantonments; quickened thither, probably, by a stroke that had befallen him at Griefenberg, on his Silesian side of the Cordon. At Griefenberg stood the Battalion Duringshofen, with its Colonel of the same name,—grenadier people of good quality, perhaps near 1,000 in whole. Which Battalion, General Beck, after long preliminary study of it, from his Bohemian side,—marching stealthily on it, one night (March 25-26th), by two or more roads, with 8,000 men, and much preliminary Croat-work,—contrived to envelop wholly, and carry off with him, before help could come up. This, I suppose, had quickened Friedrich's arrival. He has been in that region ever since,—in Landshut for the last week or two; and returns thither after the Deville affair. And at Landshut,—which is the main Pass into Bohemia or from it, and is the grand observatory-point at present,—he will have to remain till the first days of July; almost three months. Watching, and waiting on the tedious Daun, who has the lifting of the curtain this Year! Daun had come to Jaromirtz, to his cantonments, "March 24th" (almost simultaneously with Friedrich to his); expecting Friedrich's Invasion, as usual. Long days sat Daun, expecting the King in Bohemia:—"There goes he, at last!" thought Daun, on Prince Henri's late flamy appearance there (BREAKAGE THIRD we labelled it);—and Daun had hastily pushed a Division thitherward, double-quick, to secure Prag; but found it was only the Magazines. "Above four millions worth [600,000 pounds, counting the THALERS into sterling], above four millions worth of bread and forage gone to ashes, and the very boats burnt? Well; the poor Reichsfolk, or our poor Auxiliaries to them, will have empty haversacks:—but it is not Prag!" thinks Daun. At what exact point of time Daun came to see that Friedrich was not intending Invasion, and would, on the contrary, require to be invaded, I do not know. But it must have been an interesting discovery to Daun, if he foreshadowed to himself what results it would have on him: "Taking the defensive, then? And what is to become of one's Cunctatorship in that case!" Yes, truly. Cunctatorship is not now the trade needed; there is nothing to be made of playing Fabius-Cunctator:—and Daun's fame henceforth is a diminishing quantity. The Books say he "wasted above five weeks in corresponding with the Russian Generals." In fact, he had now weeks enough on hand; being articulately resolved (and even commanded by Kriegshofrath) to do nothing till the Russians came up;—and also (INarticulately and by command of Nature) to do as little as possible after! This Year, and indeed all years following, the Russians are to be Daun's best card. Waiting for three months here till the curtain rose, it was Friedrich that had to play Cunctator. A wearisome task to him, we need not doubt. But he did it with anxious vigilance; ever thinking Daun would try something, either on Prince Henri or on him, and that the Play would begin. But the Play did not. There was endless scuffling and bickering of Outposts; much hitching and counter-hitching, along that Bohemian-Silesian Frontier,—Daun gradually hitching up, leftwards, northwards, to be nearer his Russians; Friedrich counter-hitching, and, in the end, detaching against the Russians, as they approached in actuality. The details of all which would break the toughest patience. Not till July came, had both parties got into the Lausitz; Daun into an impregnable Camp near Mark-Lissa (in Gorlitz Country); Friedrich, opposite and eastward of him, into another at Schmottseifen:—still after which, as the Russians still were not come, the hitching (if we could concern ourselves with it), the maze of strategic shuffling and counter-dancing, as the Russians get nearer, will become more intricate than ever. Except that of General Beck on Battalion Duringshofen,—if that was meant as retaliatory, and was not rather an originality of Beck's, who is expert at such strokes,—Daun, in return for all these injurious Assaults and Breakages, tried little or no retaliation; and got absolutely none. Deville attempted once, as we saw; Loudon once, as perhaps we shall see: but both proved futile. For the present absolutely none. Next Year indeed, Loudon, on Fouquet at Landshut—But let us not anticipate! Just before quitting Landshut for Schmottseifen, Friedrich himself rode into Bohemia, to look more narrowly; and held Trautenau, at the bottom of the Pass, for a day or two—But the reader has had enough of Small-War! Of the present Loudon attempt, Friedrich, writing to Brother Henri, who is just home from his Franconian Invasion (BREAKAGE FIFTH), has a casual word, which we will quote. "Reich-Hennersdorf" is below Landshut, farther down the Pass; "Liebau" still farther down,—and its "Gallows," doubtless, is on some knoll in the environs! REICH-HENNERSDORF, 9th JUNE. "My congratulations on the excellent success you have had [out in Frankenland yonder]! Your prisoners, we hear, are 3,000; the desertion and confusion in the Reichs Army are affirmed to be enormous:—I give those Reichs fellows two good months [scarcely took so long] to be in a condition to show face again. As for ourselves, I can send you nothing but contemptibilities. We have never yet had the beatific vision of Him with the Hat and Consecrated Sword [Papal Daun, that is]; they amuse us with the Sieur Loudon instead;—who, three days ago [7th July, two days] did us the honor of a visit, at the Gallows of Liebau. He was conducted out again, with all the politeness imaginable, on to near Schatzlar," well over the Bohemian Border; "where we flung a score of cannon volleys into the"—into the "DERRIERE of him, and everybody returned home." [In SCHONING, ii. 65: "9th June, 1759.">[ Perhaps the only points now noticeable in this tedious Landshut interim, are Two, hardly noticed then at all by an expectant world. The first is: That in the King's little inroad down to Trautenau, just mentioned, four cannon drawn by horses were part of the King's fighting gear,—the first appearance of Horse Artillery in the world. "A very great invention," says the military mind: "guns and carriages are light, and made of the best material for strength; the gunners all mounted as postilions to them. Can scour along, over hill and dale, wherever horse can; and burst out, on the sudden, where nobody was expecting artillery. Devised in 1758; ready this Year, four light six-pounders; tried first in the King's raid down to Trautenau [June 29th-30th]. Only four pieces as yet. But these did so well, there were yearly more. Imitated by the Austrians, and gradually by all the world." [Seyfarth, ii. 543.] The second fact is: That Herr Guichard (Author of that fine Book on the War-methods of the Greeks and Romans) is still about Friedrich, as he has been for above a year past, if readers remember; and, during those tedious weeks, is admitted to a great deal of conversation with the King. Readers will consent to this Note on Guichard; and this shall be our ultimatum on the wearisome Three Months at Landshut. MAJOR QUINTUS ICILIUS. "Guichard is by birth a Magdeburger, age now thirty-four; a solid staid man, with a good deal of hard faculty in him, and of culture unusual for a soldier. A handy, sagacious, learned and intelligent man; whom Friedrich, in the course of a year's experience, has grown to see willingly about him. There is something of positive in Guichard, of stiff and, as it were, GRITTY, which might have offended a weaker taste; but Friedrich likes the rugged sense of the man; his real knowledge on certain interesting heads; and the precision with which the known and the not rightly known are divided from one another, in Guichard. "Guichard's business about the King has been miscellaneous, not worth mention hitherto; but to appearance was well done. Of talk they are beginning to have more and more; especially at Landshut here, in these days of waiting; a great deal of talk on the Wars of the Ancients, Guichard's Book naturally leading to that subject. One night, datable accidentally about the end of May, the topic happened to be Pharsalia, and the excellent conduct of a certain Centurion of the Tenth Legion, who, seeing Pompey's people about to take him in flank, suddenly flung himself into oblique order [SCHRAGE STELLUNG, as we did at Leutheu], thereby outflanking Pompey's people, and ruining their manoeuvre and them. 'A dexterous man, that Quintus Icilius the Centurion!' observed Friedrich. 'Ah, yes: but excuse me, your Majesty, his name was Quintus Caecilius,' said Guichard. 'No, it was Icilius,' said the King, positive to his opinion on that small point; which Guichard had not the art to let drop; though, except assertion and counter-assertion, what could be made of it there? Or of what use was it anywhere? "Next day, Guichard came with the book [what "Book" nobody would ever yet tell me], and putting his finger on the passage, 'See, your Majesty: Quintus CAEcilius!' extinguished his royal opponent. 'Hm,' answered Friedrich: 'so?—Well, you shall be Quintus Icilius, at any rate!' And straightway had him entered on the Army Books 'as Major Quintus Icilius;' his Majorship is to be dated '10th April, 1758' (to give him seniority); and from and after this '26th May, 1759,' he is to command the late Du Verger's Free-Battalion. All which was done:—the War-Offices somewhat astonished at such advent of an antique Roman among them; but writing as bidden, the hand being plain, and the man an undeniable article. Onward from which time there is always a 'Battalion Quintus' on their Books, instead of Battalion Du Verger; by degrees two Batallions Quintus, and at length three, and Quintus become a Colonel:—at which point the War ended; and the three Free-Battalions Quintus, like all others of the same type, were discharged." This is the authentic origin of the new name Quintus, which Guichard got, to extinction of the old; substantially this, as derived from Quintus himself,—though in the precise details of it there are obscurities, never yet solved by the learned. Nicolai, for example, though he had the story from Quintus in person, who was his familiar acquaintance, and often came to see him at Berlin, does not, with his usual punctuality, say, nor even confess that he has forgotten, what Book it was that Quintus brought with him to confute the King on their Icilius-Caecilius controversy; Nicolai only says, that he, for his part, in the fields of Roman Literature and History, knows only three Quintus-Iciliuses, not one of whom is of the least likelihood; and in fact, in the above summary, I have had to INVERT my Nicolai on one point, to make the story stick together. [Nicolai, Anekdoten, vi. 129-145.] "Quintus had been bred for the clerical profession; carefully, at various Universities, Leyden last of all; and had even preached, as candidate for license,—I hope with moderate orthodoxy;—though he soon renounced that career. Exchanged it for learned and vigorous general study, with an eye to some College Professorship instead. He was still hardly twenty-three, when, in 1747, the new Stadtholder," Prince of Orange, whom we used to know, "who had his eye upon him as a youth of merit, graciously undertook to get him placed at Utrecht, in a vacancy which had just occurred there,—whither the Prince was just bound, on some ceremonial visit of a high nature. The glad Quintus, at that time Guichard and little thinking of such an alias, hastened to set off in the Prince's train; but could get no conveyance, such was the press of people all for Utrecht. And did not arrive till next day,—and found quarter, with difficulty, in the garret of some overflowing Inn. "In the lower stories of his Inn, solitary Guichard, when night fell, heard a specific GAUDEAMUS going on; and inquired what it was. 'A company of Professors, handselling a newly appointed Professor;'—appointed, as the next question taught, to the very Chair poor Quintus had come for! Serene Highness could not help himself; the Utrechters were so bent on the thing. Quintus lay awake, all night, in his truckle-bed; and gloomily resolved to have done with Professorships, and become a soldier. 'If your Serene Highness do still favor me,' said Quintus next day, 'I solicit, as the one help for me, an ensign's commission!'—And persisted rigorously, in spite of all counsellings, promises and outlooks on the professorial side of things. So that Serene Highness had to grant him his commission; and Quintus was a soldier thenceforth. Fought, more or less, in the sad remainder of that Cumberland-Saxe War; and after the Peace of 1748 continued in the Dutch service. Where, loath to be idle, he got his learned Books out again, and took to studying thoroughly the Ancient Art of War. After years of this, it had grown so hopeful that he proceeded to a Book upon it; and, by degrees, determined that he must get to certain Libraries in England, before finishing. In 1754, on furlough, graciously allowed and continued, he came to London accordingly; finished his manuscript there (printed at the Hague 1757 [Memoires Militaires sur les &c. (a La Haye, 1757: 2 vols. 4to);—was in the 5th edition when I last heard of it.]): and new War having now begun, went over (probably with English introductions) as volunteer to Duke Ferdinand. By Duke Ferdinand he was recommended to Friedrich, the goal of all his efforts, as of every vagrant soldier's in those times:—and here at last, as Quintus Icilius, he has found permanent billet, a Battalion and gradually three Battalions, and will not need to roam any farther. "They say, what is very credible, that Quintus proved an active, stout and effectual soldier, in his kind; and perhaps we may hear of some of his small-war adventures by and by: that he was a studious, hard-headed, well-informed man, and had written an excellent Book on his subject, is still abundantly clear. Readers may look in the famous Gibbon's Autobiography, or still better in the Guichard Book itself, if they want evidence. The famous Gibbon was drilling and wheeling, very peaceably indeed, in the Hampshire Militia, in those wild years of European War. Hampshire Militia served as key, or glossary in a sort, to this new Book of Guichard's, which Gibbon eagerly bought and studied; and it, was Guichard, ALIAS Quintus Icilius, who taught Gibbon all he ever knew of Ancient War, at least all the teaching he ever had of it, for his renowned DECLINE AND FALL." [See Gibbon's Works (4to, London, 1796: Memoirs of my Life and Writings], i. 97; and (Extraits de mes Lectures), ii. 52-54, of dates May 14th-26th, 1762,—during which days Gibbon is engaged in actual reading of the Memoires Militaires; and already knows the Author by his ALIAS of Quintus Icilius, "a man of eminent sagacity and insight, who was in the Dutch, and is now, I believe, in the Prussian service." It was in the last days of June that Daun, after many litchings, got into more decisive general movement northward; and slowly but steadily planted himself at Mark-Lissa in the Lausitz: upon which, after some survey of the phenomenon, Friedrich got to Schmottseifen, opposite him, July 10th. Friedrich, on noticing such stir, had ridden down to Trautenau (June 29th-30th), new Horse-Artillery attending, to look closer into Daun's affairs; and, seeing what they were, had thereupon followed. Above a month before this, Friedrich had detached a considerable force against the Russians,—General Dohna, of whom in next Chapter:—and both Daun and he again sit waiting, till they see farther. Rapid Friedrich is obliged to wait; watching Daun and the Dohna-Russian adventure: slow Daun will continue to wait and watch there, long weeks and months, after that is settled, that and much else, fully to his mind! Each is in his impregnable Camp; and each, Daun especially, has his Divisions and Detachments hovering round him, near or far, on different strategic errands; each Main-Camp like a planet with various moons—Mark-Lissa especially, a kind of sun with planets and comets and planetary moons:—of whose intricate motions and counter-motions, mostly unimportant to us, we promised to take no notice, in face of such a crisis just at hand. By the 6th of July, slow Daun had got hitched into his Camp of Mark-Lissa; and four days after, Friedrich attending him, was in Schmottseifen: where again was pause; and there passed nothing mentionable, even on Friedrich's score; and till July was just ending, the curtain did not fairly rise. Panse of above two weeks on Friedrich's part, and of almost three months on Daun's. Mark-Lissa, an impregnable Camp, is on the Lausitz Border; with Saxony, Silesia, Bohemia all converging hereabouts, and Brandenburg itself in the vicinity,—there is not a better place for waiting on events. Here, accordingly, till well on in September, Daun sat immovable; not even hitching now,—only shooting out Detachments, planetary, cometary, at a great rate, chiefly on his various Russian errands. Daun, as we said, had been uncomfortably surprised to find, by degrees, that Invasion was not Friedrich's plan this Year; that the dramatic parts are redistributed, and that the playing of Fabius-Cunctator will not now serve one's turn. Daun, who may well be loath to believe such a thing, clings to his old part, and seems very lazy to rise and try another. In fact, he does not rise, properly speaking, or take up his new part at all. This Year, and all the following, he waits carefully till the Russian Lion come; will then endeavor to assist,—or even do jackal, which will be safer still. The Russians he intends shall act lion; he himself modestly playing the subaltern but much safer part! Diligent to flatter the lion; will provide him guidances, and fractional sustenances, in view of the coming hunt; will eat the lion's leavings, once the prey is slaughtered. This really was, in some sort, Daun's yearly game, so long as it would last!— July ending, and the curtain fairly risen, we shall have to look at Friedrich with our best eyesight. Preparatory to which, there is, on Friedrich's part, ever since the middle of June, this Anti-Russian Dohna adventure going on:—of which, at first, and till about the time of getting to Schmottseifen, he had great hopes; great, though of late rapidly sinking again:—into which we must first throw a glance, as properly the opening scene. Fouquet has been left at Landshut, should the Daun remnants still in Bohemia think of invading. Fouquet is about rooting himself rather firmly into that important Post; fortifying various select Hills round Landshut, with redoubts, curtains, communications; so as to keep ward there, inexpugnable to a much stronger force. There for about a year, with occasional short sallies, on errands that arise, Fouquet sat successfully vigilant; resisting the Devilles, Becks, Harsches; protecting Glatz and the Passes of Silesia: in about a year we shall hear of his fortunes worsening, and of a great catastrophe to him in that Landshut Post. Friedrich allowed the Reichsfolk "two good months," after all that flurrying and havoc done on them, "before they could show face in Saxony." They did take about that time; and would have taken more, had not Prince Henri been called away by other pressing occasions in Friedrich's own neighborhood; and Saxony, for a good while (end of June to beginning of September), been left almost bare of Prussian troops. Which encourages the Reichs Army to hurry afield in very unprepared condition,—still rather within the two months. End of July, Light people of them push across to Halberstadt or Halle Country; and are raising Contributions, and plundering diligently, if nothing else. Of which we can take no notice farther: if the reader can recollect it, well; if not, also well. The poor Reichs Army nominally makes a figure this Year, but nominally only; the effective part of it, now and henceforth, being Austrian Auxiliaries, and the Reichs part as flaccid and insignificant as ever. Prince Henri's call to quit Saxony was this. Daun, among the numerous Detachments he was making, of which we can take no notice, had shot out Two (rather of COMETARY type, to use our old figure),—which every reader must try to keep in mind. Two Detachments, very considerable: Haddick (who grew at last to 20,000), and Loudon (16,000); who are hovering about mysteriously over the Lausitz;—intending what? Their intention, Friedrich thinks, especially Haddick's intention, may be towards Brandenburg, and even Berlin: wherefore he has summoned Henri to look after it. Henri, resting in cantonments about Tschopau and Dresden, after the late fatigues, and idle for the moment, hastens to obey; and is in Bautzen neighborhood, from about the end of June and onward. Sufficiently attentive to Haddick and Loudon: who make no attempt on Brandenburg; having indeed, as Friedrich gradually sees, and as all of us shall soon see, a very different object in view!— The Russian Lion, urged by Vienna and Versailles, made his entry, this Year, earlier than usual,—coming now within wind of Mark-Lissa, as we see;—and has stirred Daun into motion, Daun and everybody. From the beginning of April, the Russians, hibernating in the interior parts of Poland, were awake, and getting slowly under way. April 24th, the Vanguard of 10,000 quitted Thorn; June 1st, Vanguard is in Posen; followed by a First Division and a Second, each of 30,000. They called it "Soltikof crossing the Weichsel with 100,000 men;" but, exclusive of the Cossack swarms, there were not above 76,000 regulars: nor was Soltikof their Captain just at first; our old friend Fermor was, and continued to be till Soltikof, in a private capacity, reached Posen (June 29th), and produced his new commission. At Fermor's own request, as Fermor pretended,—who was skilled in Petersburg politics, and with a cheerful face served thenceforth as Soltikof's second. At Posen, as on the road thither, they find Sulkowski's and the other burnt provenders abundantly replaced: it is evident they intend, in concert with Daun, to enclose Friedrich between two fires, and do something considerable. Whether on Brandenburg or Silesia, is not yet known to Friedrich. Friedrich, since the time they crossed Weichsel, has given them his best attention; and more than once has had schemes on their Magazines and them,—once a new and bigger Scheme actually afoot, under Wobersnow again, our Anti-Sulkowski friend; but was obliged to turn the force elsewhither, on alarms that rose. He himself cannot quit the centre of the work; his task being to watch Daun, and especially, should Daun attempt nothing else, to prevent junction of Soltikof and him. Daun still lies torpid, or merely hitching about; but now when the Russians are approaching Posen, and the case becomes pressing, Friedrich, as is usual to him, draws upon the Anti-Swedish resource, upon the Force he has in Pommern. That is to say, orders General Dohna, who has the Swedes well driven in at present, to quit Stralsund Country, to leave the ineffectual Swedes with some very small attendance; and to march—with certain reinforcements that are arriving (Wobersnow already, Hulsen with 10,000 out of Saxony in few days)—direct against the Russians; and at once go in upon them. Try to burn their Magazines again; or, equally good, to fall vigorously on some of their separate Divisions, and cut them off in the vagrant state;—above all, to be vigorous, be rapid, sharp, and do something effectual in that quarter. These were Dohna's Instructions. Dohna has 18,000; Hulsen, with his 10,000, is industriously striding forward, from the farther side of Saxony; Wobersnow, with at least his own fine head, is already there. Friedrich, watching in the Anti-Junction position, ready for the least chance that may turn up. Dohna marched accordingly; but was nothing like rapid enough: an old man, often in ill health too; and no doubt plenty of impediments about him. He consumed some time rallying at Stargard; twelve days more at Landsberg, on the Warta, settling his provision matters: in fine, did not get to Posen neighborhood till June 23d, three weeks after the Russian Vanguard of 10,000 had fixed itself there, and other Russian parties were daily dropping in. Dohna was 15,000, a Wobersnow with him: had he gone at once on Posen, as Wobersnow urged, it is thought he might perhaps have ruined this Vanguard and the Russian Magazine; which would have been of signal service for the remaining Campaign. But he preferred waiting for Hulsen and the 10,000, who did not arrive for seven or eight days more; by which time Soltikof and most of the Russian Divisions had got in;—and the work was become as good as hopeless, on those languid terms. Dohna did try upon the Magazine, said to be ill guarded in some Suburb of Posen; crossed the Warta with that view, found no Magazine; recrossed the Warta; and went manoeuvring about, unable to do the least good on Soltikof or his Magazines or operations. Friedrich was still in Landshut region, just about quitting it,—just starting on that little Trautenau Expedition, with his Four Pieces of Horse-Artillery (June 29th), when the first ill news of Dohna came in; which greatly disappointed Friedrich, and were followed by worse, instead of better. The end was, Soltikof, being now all ready, winded himself out of Posen one day, veiled by Cossacks; and, to Dohna's horror, had got, or was in the act of getting, between Dohna and Brandenburg; which necessitated new difficult manoeuvres from Dohna. Soltikof too can manoeuvre a little: Soltikof edges steadily forward; making for Crossen-on-Oder, where he expects to find Austrians (Haddick and Loudon, if Friedrich could yet guess it), with 30,000 odd, especially with provision, which is wearing scarce with him. Twice or so there was still a pretty opportunity for Dohna on him; but Dohna never could resolve about it in time. Back and ever back goes Dohna; facing Soltikof; but always hitching back; latterly in Brandenburg ground, the Russians and he;—having no provision, he either. In fine, July 17th (one week after Friedrich had got to Schmottseifen), Dohna finds himself at the little Town of Zullichau (barely in time to snatch it before Soltikof could), within thirty miles of Crossen; and nothing but futility behind and before. [Tempelhof, iii, 78-88; Helden-Geschichte, v. 835-847.] We can imagine Friedrich's daily survey of all this; his gloomy calculations what it will soon amount to if it last. He has now no Winterfeld, Schwerin, no Keith, Retzow, Moritz:—whom has he? His noblest Captains are all gone; he must put up with the less noble. One Wedell, Lieutenant-General, had lately recommended himself to the royal mind by actions of a prompt daring. The royal mind, disgusted with these Dohna hagglings, and in absolute necessity of finding somebody that had resolution, and at least ordinary Prussian skill, hoped Wedell was the man. And determined, the crisis being so urgent, to send Wedell in the character of ALTER-EGO, or "with the powers of a Roman Dictator," as the Order expressed it. [Given in Preuss, ii. 207, 208; in Stenzel, v. 212, other particulars.] Dictator Wedell is to supersede Dohna; shall go, at his own swift pace, fettered by nobody;—and, at all hazards, shall attack Soltikof straightway, and try to beat him. "You are grown too old for that intricate hard work; go home a little, and recover your health," the King writes to Dohna. And to the Dohna Army, "Obey this man, all and sundry of you, as you would myself;" the man's private Order being, "Go in upon Soltikof; attack him straightway; let us have done with this wriggling and haggling." Date of this Order is "Camp at Schmottseifen, 20th July, 1759." The purpose of such high-flown Title, and solemnity of nomination, was mainly, it appears, to hush down any hesitation or surprise among the Dohna Generals, which, as Wedell was "the youngest Lieutenant-General of the Army," might otherwise have been possible. Wedell, furnished with some small escort and these Documents, arrives in Camp Sunday Evening, 22d July:—poor Dohna has not the least word or look of criticism; and every General, suppressing whatever thoughts there may be, prepares to yield loyal obedience to Dictator Wedell. "Wobersnow was the far better soldier of the two!" murmured the Opposition party, then and long afterwards, [Retzow, &c.]—all the more, as Wobersnow's behavior under it was beautiful, and his end tragical, as will be seen. Wobersnow I perceive to have been a valiant sharp-striking man, with multifarious resources in his head; who had faithfully helped in these operations, and I believe been urgent to quicken them. But what I remember best of him is his hasty admirable contrivance for field-bakery in pressing circumstances,—the substance of which shall not be hidden from a mechanical age:— "You construct six slight square iron frames, each hinged to the other; each, say, two feet square, or the breadth of two common tiles, and shaped on the edges so as to take in tiles;—tiles are to be found on every human cottage. This iron frame, when you hook it together, becomes the ghost of a cubic box, and by the help of twelve tiles becomes a compact field-oven; and you can bake with it, if you have flour and water, and a few sticks. The succinctest oven ever heard of; for your operation done, and your tiles flung out again, it is capable of all folding flat like a book." [Retzow, ii. 82 n.] Never till now had Wobersnow's oven been at fault: but in these Polish Villages, all of mere thatched hovels, there was not a tile to be found; and the Bakery, with astonishment, saw itself unable to proceed. Wedell arrived Sunday evening, 22d July; had crossed Oder at Tschischerzig,—some say by Crossen Bridge; no matter which. Dohna's Camp is some thirty miles west of Crossen; in and near the small Town called Zullichau, where his head-quarter is. In those dull peaty Countries, on the right, which is thereabouts the NORTHERN (not eastern), bank of Oder; between the Oder and the Warta; some seventy miles south-by-east of Landsberg, and perhaps as far southwest of Posen: thither has Dohna now got with his futile manoeuvrings. Soltikof, drawn up amid scrubby woods and sluggish intricate brooks, is about a mile to east of him. Poor Dohna demits at once; and, I could conjecture, vanishes that very night; glad to be out of such a thing. Painfully has Dohna manoeuvred for weeks past; falling back daily; only anxious latterly that Soltikof, who daily tries it, do not get to westward of him on the Frankfurt road, and so end this sad shuffle. Soltikof as yet has not managed that ultimate fatality; Dohna, by shuffling back, does at least contrive to keep between Frankfurt and him;—will not try attacking him, much as Wobersnow urges it. Has agreed twice or oftener, on Wobersnow's urgency: "Yes, yes; we have a chance," Dohna would answer; "only let us rest till to-morrow, and be fresh!" by which time the opportunity was always gone again. Wedell had arrived with a grenadier battalion and some horse for escort; had picked up 150 Russian prisoners by the way. Retzow has understood he came in with a kind of state; and seemed more or less inflated; conscious of representing the King's person, and being a Roman Dictator,—though it is a perilously difficult office too, and requires more than a Letter of Instructions to qualify you for it! This is not Leonidas Wedell, whom readers once knew; poor Leonidas is dead long since, fell in the Battle of Sohr, soon after the heroic feat of Ziethen's and his at Elbe-Teinitz (Defence of Elbe against an Army); this is Leonidas's elder Brother. Friedrich had observed his fiery ways on the day of Leuthen: "Hah, a new Winterfeld perhaps?" thought Friedrich, "All the Winterfeld I now have!"—which proved a fond hope. Wedell's Dictatorship began this Sunday towards sunset; and lasted—in practical fact, it lasted one day. Monday morning early, Wedell is on the heights, reconnoitring Soltikof; cannot see much of him, the ground being so woody; does see what he takes to be Soltikof's left wing; and judges that Soltikof will lie quiet for this day. Which was far from a right reading of Soltikof; the fact being that Soltikof, in long columns and divisions, beginning with his right wing, was all on march since daybreak; what Wedell took for Soltikof's "left wing" being Soltikof's rear-guard and baggage, waiting till the roads cleared. Wedell, having settled everything on the above footing, returns to Zullichau about 10 o'clock; and about 11, Soltikof, miles long, disengaged from the bushy hollows, makes his appearance on the open grounds of Palzig: he, sure enough (though Wedell can hardly believe it),—five or six miles to northeast yonder; tramping diligently along, making for Crossen and the Oder Bridge;—and is actually got ahead of us, at last! This is what Wedell cannot suffer, cost what it may. Wedell's orders were, in such case, Attack the Russians. Wedell instantly took his measures; not unskilfully, say judges,—though the result proved disappointing; and Wobersnow himself earnestly dissuaded: "Too questionable, I should doubt! Soltikof is 70,000, and has no end of Artillery; we are 26,000, and know not if we can bring a single gun to where Soltikof is!" [Tempelhof, iii. 132-134.] Wedell's people have already, of their own accord, got to arms again; stand waiting his orders on this new emergency. No delay in Wedell or in them. "May not it be another Rossbach (if we are lucky)?" thinks Wedell: "Cannot we burst in on their flank, as they march yonder, those awkward fellows; and tumble them into heaps?" The differences were several-fold: First, that Friedrich and Seidlitz are not here. Many brave men we have, and skilful; but not a master and man like these Two. Secondly, that there is no Janus Hill to screen our intentions; but that the Russians have us in full view while we make ready. Thirdly, and still more important, that we do not know the ground, and what hidden inaccessibilities lie ahead. This last is judged to have been the killing circumstance. Between the Russians and us there is a paltry little Brook, or line of quagmire; scarcely noticeable here, but passable nowhere except at the Village-Mill of Kay, by one poor Bridge there. And then, farther inwards, as shelter of the Russians, there is another quaggy Brook, branch of the above, which is without bridge altogether. Hours will be required to get 26,000 people marched up there, not to speak of heavy guns at all. The 26,000 march with their usual mathematical despatch: Manteuffel and the Vanguard strike in with their sharpest edge, foot and horse, direct on the Head of the Russian Column, Manteuffel leading on, so soon as his few battalions and squadrons are across. Head means BRAIN (or life) to this Russian Column; and these Manteuffel people go at it with extraordinary energy. The Russian Head gives way; infantry and cavalry:—their cavalry was driven quite to rear, and never came in sight again after this of Manteuffel. But the Russians have abundance of Reserves; also of room to manoeuvre in,—no lack of ground open, and ground defensible (Palzig Village and Churchyard, for example);—above all, they have abundance of heavy guns. Well in recoil from Manteuffel and his furies, the beaten Russians succeed in forming "a long Line behind Palzig Village," with that Second, slighter or Branch Quagmire between them and us; they get the Village beset, and have the Churchyard of it lined with batteries,—say seventy guns. Manteuffel, unsupported, has to fall back;—unwillingly, and not chased or in disorder,—towards Kay-Mill again; where many are by this time across. Hulsen, with the Centre, attacks now, as the Vanguard had done; with a will, he too: Wobersnow, all manner of people attack; time after time, for about four hours coming: and it proves all in vain, on that Churchyard and new Line. Without cannon, we are repulsed, torn away by those Russian volcano-batteries; never enough of us at once! Hulsen, Wobersnow, everybody in detail is repulsed, or finds his success unavailing. Poor Wobersnow did wonders; but he fell, killed. Gone he; and has left so few of his like: a man that could ill be spared at present!—Day is sinking; we find we have lost, in killed, wounded and prisoners, some 6,000 men. "About sunset,"—flaming July sun going down among the moorlands on such a scene,—Wedell gives it up; retires slowly towards Kay Bridge. Slowly; not chased, or molested; Soltikof too glad to be rid of him. Soltikof's one aim is, and was, towards Crossen; towards Austrian Junction, and something to live upon. Soltikof's loss of men is reckoned to be heavier even than Wedell's: but he could far better afford it. He has gained his point; and the price is small in comparison. Next day he enters Crossen on triumphant terms. Poor Wedell had returned over Kay-Mill Bridge, in the night-time after his Defeat. On the morrow (Tuesday, 24th, day of Soltikof's glad entry), Wedell crosses Oder; at Tschischerzig, the old place of Sunday evening last,—in how different a humor, this time!—and in a day more, posts himself opposite to Crossen Bridge, five or six miles south; and again sits watchful of Soltikof there. At Crossen, triumphant Soltikof has found no Austrian Junction, nor anything additional to live upon. A very disappointing circumstance to Soltikof; "Austrian Junction still a problem, then; a thing in the air? And perhaps the King of Prussia taking charge of it now!" Soltikof, more and more impatient, after waiting some days, decided Not to cross Oder by that Bridge;—"shy of crossing anywhere [think the French Gentlemen, Montazet, Montalembert], to the King of Prussia's side!" [Stenzel, iv. 215 (indistinct, and giving a WRONG citation of "Montalembert, ii. 87").] Which is not unlikely, though the King is above 100 miles off him, and has Daun on his hands. Certain enough, keeping the River between him and any operations of the King, Soltikof set out for Frankfurt, forty or fifty miles farther down. In the hope probably of finding something of human provender withal? July 30th, one week after his Battle, the vanguard of him is there. Thus, in two days, or even in one, has Wedell's Dictatorship ended. Easy to say scoffingly, "Would it had never begun!" Friedrich knows that, and Wedell knows it;—AFTER the event everybody knows it! Friedrich said nothing of reproachful; the reverse rather,—"I dreaded something of the kind; it is not your fault;" [TO WEDELL, FROM THE KING, "Schmottseifen, July 24th. 1759" (in Schoning, ii. 118).]—ordered Wedell to watch diligently at Crossen Bridge, and be ready on farther signal. The Wedell Problem, in such ruined condition, has now fallen to Friedrich himself. This is the BATTLE OF ZULLICHAU (afternoon of 23d July, 1759); the beginning of immense disasters in this Campaign. Battle called also of KAY and of PALZIG, those also being main localities in it. It was lost, not by fault of Wedell's people, who spent themselves nobly upon it, nor perhaps by fault of Wedell himself, but principally, if not solely, by those two paltry Brooks, or threads of Quagmire, one of which turns Kay-Mill; memorable Brooks in this Campaign, 1759. [Tempelhof, iii. 125-131.] Close in the same neighborhood, there is another equally contemptible Brook, making towards Oder, and turning the so-called Krebsmuhle, which became still more famous to the whole European Public twenty years hence. KREBS-MUHLE (Crab-Mill), as yet quite undistinguished among Mills; belonging to a dusty individual called Miller Arnold, with a dusty Son of his own for Miller's Lad: was it at work this day? Or had the terrible sound from Palzig quenched its clacking?— Some three weeks ago (4th-6th JULY), there occurred a sudden sharp thing at Havre-de-Grace on the French Coast, worth a word from us in this place. The Montazets, Montalemberts, watching, messaging about, in the Austrian-Russian Courts and Camps, assiduously keeping their Soltikofs in tune, we can observe how busy they are. Soubise with his Invasion of England, all the French are very busy; they have conquered Hessen from Duke Ferdinand, and promise themselves a glorious Campaign, after that Seizure of Frankfurt. Soubise, intent on his new Enterprise, is really making ardent preparations: at Vanues in the Morbihan, such rendezvousing and equipping;—especially at Havre, no end of flat-bottomed boats getting built; and much bluster and agitation among the weaker sorts in both Nations. Whereupon,— "JULY 1st [just in the days while Friedrich was first trying Horse Artillery], Rear-Admiral Rodney sails from Portsmouth with a few Frigates, and Six Bomb-ketches [FIREDRAKE, BASILISK, BLAST, and such nomenclatures [List of him, in Beatson, Naval and Military Memoirs (London, 1804), ii. 241; his Despatch excellently brief, ib. ii. 323]; and in the afternoon of Tuesday, 3d, arrives in the frith or bay of Havre. Steers himself properly into 'the Channel of Honfleur' before dark; and therefrom, with his Firedrake, Basilisk and Company, begins such a bombardment of Havre and the flat-bottomed manufactories as was quite surprising. Fifty-two incessant hours of it, before he thought poor Havre had enough. Poor Havre had been on fire six times; the flat manufactory (unquenchable) I know not how many; all the inhabitants off in despair; and the Garrison building this battery to no purpose, then that; no salvation for them but in Rodney's 'mortars getting too hot.' He had fired of shells 1,900, of carcasses, 1,150: from Wednesday about sunrise till Friday about 8 A.M.,—about time now for breakfast; which I hope everybody had, after such a stretch of work. 'No damage to speak of,' said the French Gazetteers; 'we will soon refit everything!' But they never did; and nothing came of Havre henceforth. Vannes was always, and is now still more, to be the main place; only that Hawke—most unexpectedly, for one fancied all their ships employed in distant parts—rides there with a Channel Fleet of formidable nature; and the previous question always is: 'Cannot we beat Hawke? Can we! Or will not he perhaps go, of himself, when the rough weather comes?'" Before Wedell's catastrophe, the Affair of those Haddick-Loudon Detachments had become a little plainer to Friedrich. The intention, he begins to suspect, is not for Berlin at all; but for junction with Soltikof,—at Crossen, or wherever it may be. This is in fact their real purpose; and this, beyond almost Berlin itself, it is in the highest degree important to prevent! Important; and now as if become impossible! Prince Henri had come to Bautzen with his Army, specially to look after Loudon and Haddick; and he has, all this while, had Finck with some 10,000 diligently patrolling to westward of them, guarding Berlin; he himself watching from the southern side,—where, as on the western, there was no danger from them. Some time before Wedell's affair, Friedrich had pushed out Eugen of Wurtemberg to watch these people on the eastern side;—suspicious that thitherward lay their real errand. Eugen had but 6,000; and, except in conjunction with Finck and Henri, could do nothing,—nor can, now when Friedrich's suspicion turns out to be fatally true. Friedrich had always the angry feeling that Finck and Prince Henri were the blameworthy parties in what now ensued; that they, who were near, ought to have divined these people's secret, and spoiled it in time; not have left it to him who was far off, and so busy otherwise. To the last, that was his fixed private opinion; by no means useful to utter,—especially at present, while attempting the now very doubtful enterprise himself, and needing all about him to be swift and zealous. This is one of Friedrich's famous labors, this of the Haddick-Loudon junction with Soltikof; strenuous short spasm of effort, of about a week's continuance; full of fiery insight, velocity, energy; still admired by judges, though it was unsuccessful, or only had half success. Difficult to bring home, in any measure, to the mind of modern readers, so remote from it. Friedrich got the news of Zullichau next day, July 24th;—and instantly made ready. The case is critical; especially this Haddick-Loudon part of it: add 30 or 36,000 Austrians to Soltikof, how is he then to be dealt with? A case stringently pressing:—and the resources for it few and scattered. For several days past, Haddick, and Loudon under him, whose motions were long enigmatic, have been marching steadily eastward through the Lausitz,—with the evident purpose of joining Soltikof; unless Wedell could forbid. Wedell ahead was the grand opposition;—Finck, Henri, Wurtemberg, as good as useless;—and Wedell being now struck down, these Austrians will go, especially Loudon will, at a winged rate. They are understood to be approaching Sagan Country; happily, as yet, well to westward of it, and from Sagan Town well NORTH-westward;—but all accounts of them are vague, dim: they are an obscure entity to Friedrich, but a vitally important one. Sagan Town may be about 70 miles northward of where Friedrich now is: from Sagan, were they once in the meridian of Sagan, their road is free eastward and northward;—to Crossen is about 60 miles north-by-east from Sagan, to Frankfurt near 100 north. Sagan is on the Bober; Bober, in every event, is between the Austrians and their aim. Friedrich feels that, however dangerous to quit Daun's neighborhood, he must, he in person, go at once. And who, in the interim, will watch Daun and his enterprises? Friedrich's reflections are: "Well, in the crisis of the moment, Saxony—though there already are marauding Bodies of Reichsfolk in it—must still be left to itself for a time; or cannot Finck and his 10,000 look to it? Henri, with his Army, now useless at Bautzen, shall instantly rendezvous at Sagan; his Army to go with me, against the Russians and their Haddick-Loudons; Henri to Schmottseifen, instead of me, and attend to Daun; Henri, I have no other left! Finck and his 10,000 must take charge of Saxony, such charge as he can:—how lucky those Spring Forays, which destroyed the Reichs Magazines! Whereby there is no Reichs Army yet got into Saxony (nothing but preliminary pulses and splashings of it); none yet, nor like to be quite at once." That is Friedrich's swift plan. Henri rose on the instant, as did everybody concerned: July 29th, Henri and Army were at Sagan; Army waiting for the King; Henri so far on his road to Schmottseifen. He had come to Sagan "by almost the rapidest marches ever heard of,"—or ever till some others of Henri's own, which he made in that neighborhood soon. Punctual, he, to his day; as are Eugen of Wurtemberg's people, and all Detachments and Divisions: Friedrich himself arrives at Sagan that same 29th, "about midnight,"—and finds plenty of work waiting: no sleep these two nights past; and none coming just yet! A most swift rendezvous. The speed of everybody has been, and needs still to be, intense. This rendezvous at Sagan—intersection of Henri and Friedrich, bound different roads (the Brothers, I think, did not personally meet, Henri having driven off for Schmottseifen by a shorter road)—was SUNDAY, JULY 29th. Following which, are six days of such a hunt for those Austrian reynards as seldom or never was! Most vehement, breathless, baffling hunt; half of it spent in painfully beating cover, in mere finding and losing. Not rightly successful, after all. So that, on the eighth day hence, AUGUST 6th, at Mullrose, near Frankfurt, 80 miles from Sagan, there is a second rendezvous,—rendezvous of Wedell and Friedrich, who do not now "intersect," but meet after the hunt is done;—and in the interim, there has been a wonderful performance, though an unsuccessful. Friedrich never could rightly get hold of his Austrians. Once only, at Sommerfeld, a long march northwest of Sagan, he came upon some outskirts of them. And in general, in those latter eight days, especially in the first six of them, there is, in that Kotbus-Sagan Country, such an intersecting, checking, pushing and multifarious simmering of marches, on the part of half a dozen Strategic Entities, Friedrich the centre of them, as—as, I think, nobody but an express soldier-student, well furnished with admiration for this particular Soldier, would consent to have explained to him. One of the maziest, most unintelligible whirls of marching; inextricable Sword Dance, or Dance of the Furies,—five of them (that is the correct number: Haddick, Loudon, Friedrich, Wurtemberg, Wedell);—and it is flung down for us, all in a huddle, in these inhuman Books (which have several errors of the press, too): let no man rashly insist with himself on understanding it, unless he have need! Humanly pulled straight, not inhumanly flung down at random, here the essentials of it are,—in very brief state:— "SAGAN, MONDAY, 30th JULY. Friedrich is at Sagan, since midnight last, busier and busier;" beating cover, as we termed it, and getting his hounds (his new Henri-Army) in leash; "endeavoring, especially, to get tidings of those Austrian people; who are very enigmatic,—Loudon a dexterous man,—and have hung up such a curtain of Pandours between Friedrich and them as is nearly impenetrable. In the course of this Monday Friedrich ascertains that they are verily on the road; coming eastward, for Sommerfeld,—'thence for Crossen!' he needs no ghost to tell him. Wherefore, "TUESDAY, SAGAN TO NAUMBURG. Tuesday before daybreak Friedrich too is on the road: northwestward; in full march towards Naumburg on Bober, meaning to catch the Bridge from them there. March of the swiftest; he himself is ahead, as usual, with the Vanguard of Horse. He reaches Naumburg (northward, a march of 20 miles); finds, not Haddick or Loudon, but a Detachment of theirs: which he at once oversets with his cavalry, and chases,—marking withal that 'westward is the way they run.' Westward; and that we are still ahead, thank Heaven! "Before his Infantry are all up, or are well rested in Naumburg, Friedrich ascertains, on more precise tidings, that the Austrians are in Sommerfeld, to westward (again a 20 miles); and judges That, no doubt, they will bear off more to leftward, by Guben probably, and try to avoid him,—unless he can still catch them in Sommerfeld. About nightfall he marches for Sommerfeld, at his swiftest; arrives Wednesday early; finds—alas!— "SOMMERFELD, WEDNESDAY MORNING, AUGUST 1st, Friedrich finds that Loudon was there last night,—preterite tense, alas; the question now being, Where is he!" In fact, Loudon had written yesterday to Daun (Letter still extant, "Sommerfeld, July 31st"), That "being swift and light," consisting of horse for most part, "he may probably effect Junction this very night;"—but has altered his mind very much, on sight of these fugitives from Naumburg, since! And has borne off more to leftward. Straight north now, and at a very brisk pace; being now all of horse;—and has an important conference with Haddick at Guben, when they arrive there. "Not in Sommerfeld?" thinks Friedrich (earnestly surveying, through this slit he has made in the Pandour veil): "Gone to Guben most likely, bearing off from us to leftward?"—Which was the fact; though not the whole fact. And indeed the chase is now again fallen uncertain, and there has to be some beating of covers. For one thing, he learns to-day (August 1st) that the Russians are gone to Frankfurt: "Follow them, you Wedell,"—orders Friedrich: them we shall have to go into,—however this hunt end!— "To Markersdorf, Thursday, August 2d. Friedrich takes the road for Guben; reaches Markersdorf (twenty miles' march, still seven or eight from Guben); falls upon—What phenomenon is this? The Austrian heavy Train; meal-wagons not a few, and a regiment of foot in charge of it;—but going the wrong way, not TOWARDS the Russians, but from them! What on earth can this be? This is Haddick,—if Friedrich could yet clearly know it,—Haddick and Train, who for his own part has given up the junction enterprise. At Guben, some hours ago, he had conference with Loudon; and this was the conclusion arrived at: 'Impossible, with that King so near! You, Herr Loudon, push on, without heavy baggage, and with the Cavalry altogether: you can get in, almost 20,000 strong; I, with the Infantry, with the meal and heavy guns, will turn, and make for the Lausitz again!' "This mysterious Austrian Train, going the wrong way, Friedrich attacks, whatever it be (hoping, I suppose, it might be the Austrians altogether); chases it vigorously; snatches all the meal-wagons, and about 1,000 prisoners. Uncertain still what it is,—if not the Austrians altogether? To his sorrow, he finds, on pushing farther into it, that it is only Haddick and the Infantry; that Loudon, with the 20,000 Horse, will have gone off for Frankfurt;—irretrievably ahead, the swift Loudon,—ever careering northward all this while, since that afternoon at Sommerfeld, when the fugitives altered his opinion: a now unattainable Loudon. In the course of Thursday night, Friedrich has satisfied himself that the Loudon junction is a thing as good as done;—in effect, Loudon did get to Frankfurt, morning of August 3d, and joined the Russians there; and about the same time, or only a few hours sooner, Friedrich, by symptoms, has divined that his hunt has ended, in this rather unsuccessful way; and that chasing of Haddick is not the road to go." [Tempelhof, iii. 135-139.] Not Haddick now; with or without their Austrians, it shall be the Russians now! Two days ago (Wednesday, as was mentioned), before sight of those enigmatic meal-wagons, Friedrich had learned that the Russians were to be in Frankfurt again; and had ordered Wedell to march thitherward, at any rate. Which Wedell is doing, all this Thursday and the four following days. As does likewise, from and after "FRIDAY, AUGUST 3d, 1 A.M." (hunt then over), Friedrich himself,—renouncing Haddick and the hunt. Straight towards Frankfurt thenceforth; head-quarters Beeskow that night; next night, Mullrose, whither Wedell is appointed, within twelve miles of Frankfurt. This is the end of Friedrich's sore Chase and March; burnt deeply into his own weary brain, if ours still refuse it admittance! Here, of utterly fatigued tone, is a Note of his, chiefly on business, to Minister Finkenstein. Indeed there are, within the next ten days, Three successive Notes to Finkenstein, which will be worth reading in their due places. This is the First of them:— THE KING TO GRAF VON FINKENSTEIN (at Berlin). "BEESKOW, 3d August,1759." "I am just arrived here, after cruel and frightful marchings [CHECKS HIMSELF, HOWEVER]. There is nothing desperate in all that; and I believe the noise and disquietude this hurly-burly has caused will be the worst of it. Show this Letter to everybody, that it may be known the State is not undefended. I have made above 1,000 prisoners from Haddick. All his meal-wagons have been taken. Finck, I believe, will keep an eye on him," and secure Berlin from attempts of his. "This is all I can say. "To-morrow I march to within two leagues of Frankfurt [to Mullrose, namely]. Katte [the Minister who has charge of such things] must send me instantly Two Hundred Wispels [say tons] of Meal, and Bakers One Hundred, to Furstenwalde. I shall encamp at Wulkow. I am very tired. For six nights I have not closed an eye. Farewell.—F." During the above intricate War-Dance of Five,—the day while Friedrich was at Sommerfeld, the day before he came in sight of Haddick's meal-wagons going the wrong road,—there went on, at Minden, on the Weser, three hundred miles away, a beautiful feat of War, in the highest degree salutary to Duke Ferdinand and Britannic Majesty's Ministry; feat which requires a word from us here. A really splendid Victory, this of Minden, August 1st: French driven headlong through the Passes there; their "Conquest of Hanover and Weser Country" quite exploded and flung over the horizon; and Duke Ferdinand relieved from all his distresses, and lord of the ascendant again in those parts. Highly interesting to Friedrich;—especially to Prince Henri; whose apprehensions about Ferdinand and the old Richelieu Hastenbeck-Halberstadt time returning on us, have been very great; and who now, at Schmottseifen, fires FEU-DE-JOIE for it with all his heart. This is a Battle still of some interest to English readers. But can English readers consent to halt in this hot pinch of the Friedrich crisis; and read the briefest thing which is foreign to it? Alas, I fear they can;—and will insert the Note here:— BATTLE OF MINDEN: WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 1st, 1759.—-"Ever since Bergen, things have gone awry with Ferdinand, and in spite of skilful management, of hard struggles and bright sparkles of success, he has had a bad Campaign of it. The French, it would seem, are really got into better fighting order; Belleisle's exertions as War-Minister have been almost wonderful,—in some respects, TOO wonderful, as we shall hear!—and Broglio and Contades, in comparison with Clermont and Soubise, have real soldier qualities. Contades, across Rhine again, in those Weser Countries, who is skilful in his way, and is pricked on by emulation of Broglio, has been spreading himself out steadily progressive there; while Broglio, pushing along from Frankfurt-on-Mayn, has conquered Hessen; is into Hanover; on the edge of conquering Hanover,—which how is Ferdinand to hinder? Ferdinand has got two, if not three Armies to deal with, and in number is not much superior to one. If he run to save Hanover from Broglio, he loses Westphalia: Osnabruck (his magazine)? Munster, Lippstadt,—Contades, if left to himself, will take these, after short siege; and will nestle himself there, and then advance, not like a transitory fever-fit, but like visible death, on Hanover. Ferdinand, rapid yet wary, manoeuvred his very best among those interests of his, on the left bank of Weser; but after the surprisal of Minden from him (brilliantly done by Broglio, and the aid of a treacherous peasant), especially after the capture of Osnabruck, his outlooks are gloomy to a degree: and at Versailles, and at Minden where Contades has established himself, 'the Conquest of Hanover' (beautiful counterweight to all one's losses in America or elsewhere) is regarded as a certainty of this Year. "For the last ten days of July, about Minden, the manoeuvring, especially on Ferdinand's part, had been intense; a great idea in the head of Ferdinand, more or less unintelligible to Contades. Contades, with some 30,000, which is the better half of his force, has taken one of the unassailablest positions. He lies looking northward, his right wing on the Weser with posts to Minden (Minden perhaps a mile northeastward there), on his left impassable peat-bogs and quagmires; in front a quaggy River or impassable black Brook, called the Bastau, coming from the westward, which disembogues at Minden: [Sketch of Plan, p. 238]—there lies Contades, as if in a rabbit-hole, say military men; for defence, if that were the sole object, no post can be stronger. Contades has in person say 30,000; and round him, on both sides of the Weser, are Broglio with 20,000; besides other Divisions, I know not how many, besieging Munster, capturing Osnabruck (our hay magazine), attempting Lippstadt by surprise (to no purpose), and diligently working forward, day by day, to Ferdinand's ruin in those Minden regions. Three or four Divisions busy in that manner;—and above all, we say, he has Broglio with a 20,000 on the right or east bank of the Weser,—who, if Ferdinand quit him even for a day, seems to have Hanover at discretion, and can march any day upon Hanover City, where his light troops have already been more than once. Why does n't Ferdinand cross Weser, re-cross Weser; coerce Broglio back; and save Hanover? cry the Gazetteers and a Public of weak judgment. Pitt's Public is inclined to murmur about Ferdinand; Pitt himself never. Ferdinand persists in sticking by Minden neighborhood,—and, in a scarcely accountable way, manoeuvring there, shooting out therefrom what mischief he can upon the various Contades people in their sieges and the like. "On Contades himself he can pretend to do nothing,—except hoodwink him, entice him out, and try to get a chance on him. But for his own subsistence and otherwise, he is very lively;—snatches, by a sudden stroke, Bremen City: 'Yes truly, Bremen is a Reichstadt; nor shall YOU snatch it, as you did Frankfurt; but I will, instead; and my English proviant-ships shall have a sure haven henceforth!' Snatches Bremen by one sudden stroke; RE-snatches Osnabruck by another ('our magazine considerably INCREASED since you have had it, many thanks!'); does lose Munster, to his sorrow; but nevertheless sticks by his ground here;—nay detaches his swift-cutting Nephew, the Hereditary Prince, who is growing famous for such things, to cut out Contades's strong post to southward (Gohfeld, ten miles up the Weser), which guards his meal-wagons, after their long journey from the south. That is Contades's one weak point, in this posture of things: his meal is at Cassel, seventy miles off. Broglio and he see clearly, 'Till we can get a new magazine much nearer Hanover, or at lowest, can clear out these people from infesting us here, there is no moving northward!' To both Contades and Broglio that is an evident thing: the corollary to which is, They must fight Ferdinand; must watch lynx-like till a chance turn up of beating him in fight. That is their outlook; and Ferdinand knows it is,—and manoeuvres accordingly. Military men admire much, not his movements only, but his clear insight into Contades's and Broglio's temper of mind, and by what methods they were to be handled, they and his own affairs together, and brought whither he wanted them. [In MAUVILLON (ii. 41-44) minute account of all that.] "This attempt on Gohfeld was a serious mischief to Contades, if it succeeded. But the detaching of the Prince of Brunswick on it, and weakening one's too weak Army, 'What a rashness, what an oversight!' thinks Contades (as Ferdinand wished him to do): 'Is our skilful enemy, in this extreme embarrassment, losing head, then? Look at his left wing yonder [General Wangenheim, sitting behind batteries, in his Village of Todtenhausen, looking into Minden from the north]:—Wangenheim's left leans on the Weser, yes; but Wangenheim's right, observe, has no support within three miles of it: tear Wangenheim out, Ferdinand's flank is bare!' These things seemed to Contades the very chance he had been waiting for; and brought him triumphantly out of his rabbit-hole, into the Heath of Minden, as Ferdinand hoped they would do. "And so, TUESDAY EVENING, JULY 31st, things being now all ripe, upwards of 50,000 French are industriously in motion. Contades has nineteen bridges ready on the Bastau Brook, in front of him; TATTOO this night, in Contades's Camp, is to mean GENERAL MARCH, 'March, all of you, across these nineteen Bridges, to your stations on the Plain or Heath of Minden yonder,—and be punctual, like the clock!' Broglio crosses Weser by the town Bridge, ranks himself opposite Todtenhausen; and through the livelong night there is, on the part of the 50,000 French, a very great marching and deploying. Contades and Broglio together are 51,400 foot and horse. Ferdinand's entire force will be near 46,000; but on the day of Battle he is only 36,000,—having detached the Hereditary Prince on Gohfeld, in what view we know.—The BATTLE OF MINDEN, called also of TONHAUSEN (meaning TODTENhausen), which hereupon fell out, has still its fame in the world; and, I perceive, is well worth study by the soldier mind: though nothing but the rough outline of it is possible here. "Ferdinand's posts extend from the Weser river and Todtenhausen round by Stemmern, Holzhausen, to Hartum and the Bog of Bastau (the chief part of him towards Bastau),—in various Villages, and woody patches and favorable spots; all looking in upon Minden, from a distance of five or seven miles; forming a kind of arc, with Minden for centre. He will march up in eight Columns; of course, with wide intervals between them,—wide, but continually narrowing as he advances; which will indeed be ruinous gaps, if Ferdinand wait to be attacked; but which will coalesce close enough, if he be speedy upon Contades. For Contades's line is also of arc-like or almost semicircular form, behind it Minden as centre; Minden, which is at the intersection of Weser and the Brook; his right flank is on Weser, Broglio VERSUS Wangenheim the extreme right; his left, with infantry and artillery, rests on that black Brook of Bastau with its nineteen Bridges. As the ground on both wings is rough, not so fit for Cavalry, Contades puts his Cavalry wholly in the centre: they are the flower of the French Army, about 10,000 horse in all; firm open ground ahead of them there, with strong batteries, masses of infantry to support on each flank; batteries to ply with cross-fire any assailant that may come on. Broglio, we said, is right wing; strong in artillery and infantry. Broglio is to root out Waugenheim: after which,—or even before which, if Wangenheim is kept busy and we are nimble,—what becomes of Ferdinand's left flank, with a gap of three miles between Wangenheim and him, and 10,000 chosen horse to take advantage of it! Had the French been of Prussian dexterity and nimbleness in marching, it is very possible something might have come of this latter circumstance: but Ferdinand knows they are not; and intends to take good care of his flank. "Contades and his people were of willing mind; but had no skill in 'marchiug up:' and, once got across the Bastau by their nineteen Bridges, they wasted many hours:—'Too far, am I? not far enough? Too close? not close enough?'—and broiled about, in much hurry and confusion, all night. Fight was to have begun at 5 in the morning. Broglio was in his place, silently looking into Wangenheim, by five o'clock; but unfortunately did nothing upon Wangenheim ('Not ready you, I see!'), except cannonade a little;—and indeed all through did nothing ('Still not ready you others!'); which surely was questionable conduct, though not reckoned so at Versailles, when the case came to be argued there. As to the Contades people, across those nineteen Bridges, they had a baffling confused night; and were by no means correctly on their ground at sunrise, nor at 7 o'clock, nor at 8; and were still mending themselves when the shock came, and time was done. "The morning is very misty; but Ferdinand has himself been out examining since the earliest daybreak: his orders last night were, 'Cavalry be saddled at 1 in the morning,'—having a guess that there would be work, as he now finds there will. From 5 A.M. Ferdinand is issuing from his Camp, flowing down eastward, beautifully concentric, closing on Contades; horse NOT in centre, but English Infantry in centre (Six Battalions, or Six REGIMENTS by English reckoning); right opposite those 10,000 Horse of Contades's, the sight of whom seems to be very animating to them. The English Cavalry stand on the right wing, at the Village of Hartum: Lord George Sackville had not been very punctual in saddling at 1 o'clock; but he is there, ranked on the ground, at 8,—in what humor nobody knows; sulky and flabby, I should rather guess. English Tourists, idle otherwise, may take a look at Hartum on the south side, as the spot where a very ugly thing occurred that day. "Soon after 8 the Fight begins: attack, by certain Hessians, on Hahlen and its batteries; attempt to drive the French out of Hahlen, as the first thing,—which does not succeed at once (indeed took three attacks in all); and perhaps looks rather tedious to those Six English Battalions. Ferdinand's order to them was, 'You shall march up to attack, you Six, on sound of drum;' but, it seems, they read it, 'BY sound of drum;' 'Beating our own drums; yes, of course!'—and, being weary of this Hahlen work, or fancying they had no concern with it, strode on, double-quick, without waiting for Hahlen at all! To the horror of their Hanoverian comrades, who nevertheless determined to follow as second line. 'The Contades cross-fire of artillery, battery of 30 guns on one flank, of 36 on the other, does its best upon this forward-minded Infantry, but they seem to heed it little; walk right forward; and, to the astonishment of those French Horse and of all the world, entirely break and ruin the charge made on them, and tramp forward in chase of the same. The 10,000 Horse feel astonished, insulted; and rush out again, furiously charging; the English halt and serry themselves: 'No fire till they are within forty paces;' and then such pouring torrents of it as no horse or man can endure. Rally after rally there is, on the part of those 10,000; mass after mass of them indignantly plunges on,—again, ever again, about six charges in all;—but do not break the English lines: one of them (regiment Mestrede-Camp, raised to a paroxysm) does once get through, across the first line, but is blown back in dreadful circumstances by the second. After which they give it up, as a thing that cannot be done. And rush rearward, hither, thither, the whole seventy-five squadrons of them; and 'between their two wings of infantry are seen boiling in complete disorder.' "This has lasted about an hour: this is essentially the soul of the Fight,—though there wanted not other activities, to right of it and to left, on both sides; artilleries going at a mighty rate on both wings; and counter-artilleries (superlative practice 'by Captain Phillips' on OUR right wing); Broglio cannonading Wangenheim very loudly, but with little harm done or suffered, on their right wing. Wangenheim is watchful of that gap between Ferdinand and him, till it close itself sufficiently. Their right-wing Infantry did once make some attempt there; but the Prussian Horse—(always a small body of Prussians serve in this Allied Army)—shot out, and in a brilliant manner swept them home again. PLAN OF BATTLE HERE—PAGE 239,—— Artillery and that pretty charge of Prussian Horse are all one remembers, except this of the English and Hanover Foot in the centre: 'an unsurpassable thing,' says Tempelhof (though it so easily might have been a fatal!)—which has set Contades's centre boiling, and reduced Contades altogether to water, as it were. Contades said bitterly: 'I have seen what I never thought to be possible,—a single line of infantry break through three lines of cavalry ranked in order of battle, and tumble them to ruin!' [Stenzel, v. 204.] "This was the feat, this hour's work in the centre, the essential soul of the Fight:—and had Lord George Sackville, General of the Horse, come on when galloped for and bidden, here had been such a ruin, say all judges, as seldom came upon an Army. Lord George—everlasting disgrace and sorrow on the name of him—could not see his way to coming on; delayed, haggled; would not even let Granby, his lieutenant, come; not for a second Adjutant, not for a third; never came on at all; but rode to the Prince, asking, 'How am I to come on?' Who, with a politeness I can never enough admire, did not instantly kill him, but answered, in mild tone, 'Milord, the opportunity is now past!' Whereby Contades escaped ruin, and was only beaten. By about 10 in the morning all was over. When a man's centre is gone to water, no part of him is far from the fluid state. Contades retreated into his rabbit-hole by those nineteen bridges,—well tormented, they say, by Captain Phillips's artillery, till he got beyond the knolls again. Broglio, who had never been in musket-fire at all, but had merely barked on Wangenheim all morning, instead of biting, covered the retreat, and withdrew into Minden. And we are a beaten Army,—thanks to Lord George, not an annihilated one. Our loss being only 7,086 (with heavy guns, colors, cavalry flags and the like); theirs being 2,822,—full half of it falling on those rash Six Battalions. [Mauvillon, ii. 44-60; Tempelhof, iii. 154-179, &c. &c.: and Proceedings of a Court-Martial, held at the Horse-Guards, 7th-24th March and 25th March-5th April, 1760, in Trial of Lord George Sackville (London, 1760)]. In Knesebeck, Ferdinand wahrend des siebenjahrigen Krieges (i. 395), Ferdinand's Letter to Friedrich of "July 31st;" and (i. 398-418 and ii. 33-36) many special details about Sackville and "August 1st." "And what is this one hears from Gohfeld in the evening? The Hereditary Prince, busy there on us during the very hours of Minden, has blown our rear-guard division to the winds there;—and we must move southward, one and all of us, without a moment's delay! Out of this rabbit-hole the retreat by rearward is through a difficult country, the Westphalian Gates so called; fatal to Varus's Legions long ago. Contades got under way that very night; lost most of his baggage, all his conquests, that shadow-conquest of Hanover, and more than all his glories (Versailles shrieking on him, 'Resign you; let Broglio be chief,);—and, on the whole, jumbled homeward hither and thither, gravitating towards the Rhine, nothing but Wesel to depend on in those parts, as heretofore. Broglio retreated Frankfurt-way, also as usual, though not quite so far; and at Versailles had clearly the victory. Zealous Belleisle could not protect his Contades; it is not known whether he privately blamed Contades or blamed Broglio for loss of Minden. Zealous old man, what a loss to himself withal had Minden been! That shadow-conquest of Hanover is quite vanished: and worse, in Ferdinand's spoil were certain LETTERS from Belleisle to Contades, inculcating strange things;—for example, 'IL FAUT FAIRE UN DESERT DU PAYS [all Hessen, I think, lest Ferdinand advance on you] DEVANT L'ARMEE,' and the like. Which Ferdinand saw good to publish, and which resounded rather hideously through the general mind." [Were taken at Detmold (Tempelhof, iii. 223); Old Newspapers full of Excerpts from them, in the weeks following.] Ignominious Sackville was tried by Court-martial; cashiered, declared incapable of again serving his Majesty "in any military capacity;"—perhaps a mild way of signifying that he wanted the common courage of a soldier? Zealous Majesty, always particular in soldier matters, proclaimed it officially to be "a sentence worse than death;" and furthermore, with his own royal hand, taking the pen himself, struck out Sackville from the List of Privy-Councillors. Proper surely, and indispensable;—and should have been persisted in, like Fate; which, in a new Reign, it was not! For the rest, there was always, and is, something of enigma in Sackville's palpably bad case. It is difficult to think that a Sackville wanted common courage. This Sackville fought duels with propriety; in private life, he was a surly, domineering kind of fellow, and had no appearance of wanting spirit. It is known, he did not love Duke Ferdinand; far from it! May not he have been of peculiarly sour humor that morning, the luckless fool; sulky against Ferdinand, and his "saddling at one o'clock;" sulky against himself, against the world and mankind; and flabbily disinclined to heroic practices for the moment? And the moment came; and the man was not there, except in that foggy, flabby and forever ruinous condition! Archenholtz, alone of Writers, judges that he expressly wanted to spoil the Battle of Minden and Ferdinand's reputation, and to get appointed Commander in his stead. Wonderful; but may have some vestige of basis, too! True, this Sackville was as fit to lead the courses of the stars as to lead armies. But such a Sackville has ambition, and, what is fatally more peculiar to him, a chance for unfolding it;—any blockhead has an ambition capable, if you encourage it sufficiently, of running to the infinite. Enough of this particular blockhead; and may it be long before we see his like again!— The English Cavalry was in a rage with Sackville. Of the English Infantry, Historians say, what is not now much heard of in this Country, "That these unsurpassable Six [in industrious valor unsurpassable, though they mistook orders, and might have fared badly!] are ever since called the Minden Regiments; that they are the 12th, 20th, 23d, 25th, 37th and 51st of the British Line; and carry 'Minden' on their colors," [Kausler, Schlachter, &c. p, 587.]—with silent profit, I hope! Fancy how Pitt's public, lately gloomy and dubious, blazed aloft into joyful certainty again! Pitt's outlooks have been really gloomy all this season; nor are the difficulties yet ended, though we hope they will end. Let us add this other bit of Synchronism, which is still of adverse aspect, over Seas; and will be pungently interesting to Pitt and England, when they come to hear of it. "BEFORE QUEBEC, JULY 31st, 1759. This same Evening, at Quebec, on the other side of the Atlantic,—evening at Quebec, 9 or 10 at night for Contades and his nineteen Bridges,—there is a difficult affair going on. Above and below the Falls of Montmorenci, and their outflow into the St. Lawrence: attempt on General Wolfe's part to penetrate through upon the French, under Marquis de Montcalm, French Commander-in-chief, and to get a stroke at Quebec and him. From the south side of the St. Lawrence, nothing can be done upon Quebec, such the distance over. From Isle d'Orleans and the north side, it is also impossible hitherto. Easy enough to batter the Lower Town, from your ships and redoubts: but the High Town towers aloft on its sheer pinnacles, inaccessible even to cannon; looks down on the skilfulest British Admiral and Fleet as if with an air of indifference,—trying him on dark nights with fire-ships, fire-rafts, the cunningest kinds of pyrotechny, which he skilfully tows aside. "A strenuous thing, this of Wolfe's; though an unsuccessful. Towards evening, the end of it; all Quebec assembled on the southern ramparts, witnessing with intense interest; the sublime Falls of Montmorenci gushing on, totally indifferent. For about a month past, General Wolfe, with the proper equipments, and about 10,000 men, naval and military, who was expressly selected by Pitt to besiege Quebec, and is dying to succeed, has been trying every scheme to get into contact with it:—to no purpose, so lofty, chasmy, rocky is the ground, cut by mountainous precipices and torrent streams, branches of the grand St. Lawrence River; so skilfully taken advantage of by Montcalm and his people, who are at home here, and in regulars nearly equal Wolfe, not to speak of Savages and Canadians, Wolfe's plan of the 31st was not ill laid; and the execution has been zealous, seamen and landsmen alike of willing mind;—but it met with accidents. Accidents in boating; then a still worse accident on landing; the regiment of grenadiers, which crossed below the Falls, having, so soon as landed, rushed off on the redoubt there on their own score, without waiting for the two brigades that were to cross and co-operate ABOVE the Falls! Which cut Wolfe to the heart; and induced him, especially as the tide was making again, to give up the enterprise altogether, and recall everybody, while it was yet time. [Gentleman's Magazine for 1759, pp. 470-473; Thackeray, i. 488.] Wolfe is strict in discipline; loves the willing mind, none more, and can kindle it among those about him; but he loves discipline withal, and knows how fatal the too willing may be. For six weeks more there is toil on the back of toil everywhere for poor Wolfe. He falls into fevers, into miseries, almost into broken heart;—nothing sure to him but that of doing his own poor utmost to the very death. After six weeks, we shall perhaps hear of him again. Gliding swiftly towards death; but also towards victory and the goal of all his wishes." And now, after this flight half round the world, it is time we return to Oder Country, and a Friedrich on the edge of formidable things there. Next day after Beeskow, where we left him, he duly arrived at Mullrose; was joined by Wedell there, August 6th; and is now at Wulkow,—"encamped between Lebus and Wulkow," as we hear elsewhere;—quite in the environs of Frankfurt and of great events. FRIEDRICH TO GRAF VON FINKENSTEIN (Second Note). WULKOW, 8th August, 1759. "If you hear of firing to-morrow, don't be surprised; it is our rejoicing for the Battle of Minden. I believe I shall have to keep you in suspense some days yet. I have many arrangements to make; I find great difficulties to surmount,—and it is required to save our Country, not to lose it: I ought both to be more prudent and more enterprising than ever. In a word, I will do and undertake whatever I find feasible and possible. With all that, I see myself in the necessity of making haste, to check the designs Haddick may have on Berlin. Adieu, MON CHER. In a little, you will have either a DE PROFUNDIS or a TE DEUM.—F." [OEuvres de Frederic, xxv. 305, 306.] Sunday, July 29th, at Frankfurt-on-Oder divine worship was broken in upon, and the poor City thrown into consternation, by actual advent, or as good as advent, of the Russians: "On the Crossen road, close by; coming, come!" And they did undeniably appear, next morning, in force; on the opposite, eastern or Kunersdorf side of the River, on the top of the Oder-Dam there; and demanded instant admission, under penalty of general death by fire. Within the Town stood Major Arnim, a Veteran of those parts, with 400 militia; these, with their muskets and with two cannon, are the only defence of Frankfurt, The Town has Gates; but its walls, I doubt, are mainly garden-walls and house-walls. On the eastern side, the River, especially if you have cannon on the Bridge, gives it something of protection; but on the western and all other sides, it is overhung by heights. This Frankfurt, like its bigger Namesake on the Mayn, is known as a busy trading place, its Fairs much frequented in those Eastern parts; and is believed by the Russians to be far richer than it is. The reader, as there happens to be ocular testimony extant, [Johann Zudwig Kriele, SCHLACHT BEI KUNERSDORF, MIT &C. (Berlin, 1801). Kriele was subsequent Pastor in the Parish, an excellent intelligent man: has compiled in brief form, with an elaborate Chart too, a clear account of everything, in the Battle and before and after it.] may like to see a little how they behaved there. "Arnim, taking survey of the Russian Party, values it, or what he can see of it, at 1,000 [they really were 6,000]; keeps his Drawbridge up; and answers stoutly enough, 'No.' Upon which, from the Oder-Dam, there flies off one fiery grenado; one and no more,—which alighted in the house of 'Mrs. Thielicke, a Baker's Widow, who was standing at the door;'—killed poor Mrs. Thielicke, blew the house considerably to wreck, but did not set fire to it. Amim, all the Magistrates entreating him for the love of Heaven to leave them, is secretly shoving off his two cannon to the Northern Gate; and in fact is making his packages with full speed: 'Push for Custrin,' thinks Arnim, and save selves and cannon, since no good is to be done here!' "It was about 11 A.M. when the Thielicke grenado fell: obstinate Arnim would by no means go; only packed all the faster. A second summons came: still, No. For the third and last time the Russians then summon: 'Grenadoes, a hundred more of them lie ready, unless—!' 'We will, we will; O merciful servant of Czarish Majesty!' passionately signify the Magistrates. But Arnim is still negative, still keeps the Bridge up. One of the hundred does go, by way of foretaste: this lighted 'near the Ober Kirche, in the chimney of the Town Musikus;' brought the chimney crashing down on him [fancy a man with some fineness of ear]; tore the house a good deal to pieces, but again did not set it on fire. 'Your obstinate Town can be bombarded, then,—cannot it?' observed the Russian Messenger.—'Give us Free Withdrawal!' proposes Amim. 'No; you to be Prisoners of War; Town at Czarish Majesty's discretion.' 'Never,' answers Arnim (to the outward ear).—'Go, oh, for the love of Heaven, go!' cry all Official people. "Arnim, deaf to clamor, but steadily diligent in getting ready, does at last go; through the Lebus Suburb, quick march; steady, yet at his best step;—taking the Town-keys in his pocket, and leaving the Drawbridge up. One is sorry for poor Arnim and his 400 Militia; whose conduct was perfect, under difficulties and alarms; but proved unsuccessful. The terrified Magistrates, finding their Keys gone, and the conflagrative Russians at their gates, got blacksmiths on the instant; smote down, by chisel and mallet, the locked Drawbridge, smote open the Gates: 'Enter, O gracious Sirs; and may Czarish Majesty have mercy on us!' So that Arnim had small start for marchers on foot; and was overtaken about half-way. Would not yield still, though the odds were overwhelming; drew himself out on the best ground discoverable; made hot resistance; hot and skilful; but in vain. About six in the evening, Arnim and Party were brought back, Prisoners, to Frankfurt again,—self, surviving men, cannons and all (self in a wounded state);—and 'were locked in various Brew-houses;' little of careful surgery, I should fear. Poor Arnim; man could do no more; and he has been unfortunate." It is by no means our intention to describe the Iliad of miseries, the agitations, terrors and disquietudes, the tribulation and utter harrowing to despair, which poor Frankfurt underwent, incessantly from that day forward, for about five weeks to come. "The furnishings of victual [Russian stock quite out] were to an inconceivable amount; surrender of arms, of linens, cloths, of everything useful to a hungry Army; above all things, of horses, so that at last there were but four horses left in all Frankfurt; and"—But we must not go into details. "On the second day, besides all this," what will be significant of it all, "there was exacted 'ransom of 600,000 thalers (90,000 pounds), or you shall be delivered to the Cossacks!' Frankfurt has not above 12,000 inhabitants within its bounds; here is a sudden poll-tax of 7 pounds 10s. per head. Frankfurt has not such a sum; the most rigorous collection did not yield above the tenth part of it. And more than once those sanguinary vagabonds were openly drawn out, pitch-link in hand: 'The 90,000 pounds or—!' Civic Presidency Office in Frankfurt was not a bed of roses. The poor Magistrates rushed distractedly about; wrung out moneys to the last drop; moneys, and in the end plate from those that had it; went in tearful deputation to General Soltikof,—a severe proud kind of man, capable perhaps of being flattered,—who usually locked them up instead. Magistrates were locked in Russian ward, at one time, for almost a week; sat in the blazing sun; if you try for the shade of a tree, the sentry handles arms upon you;—and were like to die. To me, Kriele, it is a miracle how the most of us lived; nay we never really wanted food, so kind was Providence, so generous our poor neighbors out of all the Towns round. The utmost of money that could be raised was 6,000 pounds; nothing but some little of plate, and our Bill for the remainder. Soltikof, a high kind of gentleman, saw at last how it stood; let the Magistrates out of ward; sent back the plate—'Nothing of that!'—nay, Czarish Majesty was herself generous; and FORGAVE the Bill, on our petition, next Year. Cossacks, indeed, were a plunderous wild crew; but the Russians kept them mostly without the gates. The regular Russians were civil and orderly, officers and men,—greatly beyond the Austrians in behavior." [Kriele, Schlacht bei Kunersdorf; pp. 1-15 (in compressed state).] By these few traits conceive Frankfurt: this, now forgotten in most books, is a background on which things were transacted still memorable to everybody. "Friday, August 3d, General Loudon came to hand: arrived early, in the Guben (or Western) Suburb, his 18,000 and he. In high spirits naturally, and somewhat exultant to have evaded Friedrich; but found a reception that surprised him. The Russians had been living in the hope of junction; but still more vividly in that of meal. 'Auxiliaries; humph,—only 18,000 of them; how much welcomer had been as many hundredweights of meal!' Loudon had pushed his baggage direct into Frankfurt; and likewise a requisition of such and such proviants, weights of meal and the like, in exuberant amount, to be furnished straightway by the City: neither of which procedures would the Russians hear of for a moment. 'Out with you!' said they roughly to the baggage-people: 'quarter in the Guben Suburb, or where you like; not here!' And with regard to the requisition of proviant, they answered in a scornful angry key, 'Proviant? You too without it? You have not brought us meal, according to covenant; instead of meal, you bring us 18,000 new eaters, most of them on horse-back,—Satan thank you! From Frankfurt be very certain you can get no ounce of meal; Frankfurt is our own poor meal-bag, dreadfully scanty: stay outside, and feed where and how you can!' "All this, Loudon, though of hot temper, easily capable of rising to the fierce point, had to endure in silence, for the common interest. Loudon's own table is furnished from Frankfurt; no other Austrian man's: all others have to shift how they can. Sad requisitioning needed, and sad plunder to supplement it: the Austrian behavior was very bad, say the Frankfurters; 'in particular, they had burnt gradually all the corn-mills in the country; within many miles not one mill standing when they left us,'—and four horses all the conveyance power we had. Soltikof lodges in great pomp, much soldiery and cannon parading before his doors; not an undignified man, or an inhuman or essentially foolish, but very high in his ways, and distasteful to Austrian dignitaries." The Russian Army lies mainly across Oder; encamped on the Judenberg, and eastward there, along the Heights, near three miles, to Kunersdorf and beyond. They expect Friedrich at the gates of Frankfurt shortly; know well that they cannot defend Frankfurt. They calculate that Friedrich will attack them in their Judenberg Encampment, but hope they are nearly ready for him there. Loudon, from the Guben Suburb, will hasten across, at any moment;—welcome on such fighting occasion, though ill seen when the question is of eating! The Russians have their Wagenburg on an Island southward, farther up the River; they have three Pontoon Bridges leading thither, a free retreat should they be beaten. And in the mean while are intrenching themselves, as only Daun would,—cannon and redoubts all round those Heights;—and except it be screwing Frankfurt to do its impossible duty, and carting provender with all the horses except four, have not much farther to do but wait till the King come. Which will be speedily, it is probable!— Wednesday, August 8th, Russian and Austrian Generals, a cheerful party of them, had rendezvoused at FISCHERS MUHLE; a Mill not yet burnt, and a pleasant Tavern as well; in one of the prettiest valleys in the Western Environs;—intending to dine there, and have a pleasant day. But the Miller's Boy runs in upon them, wide-eyed, "HIMMEL UND ERDE, Prussian Hussars!" It was in verity Prussian Hussars; the King of Prussia with them in person. He is come out reconnoitring,—the day after his arrival in those parts. The pleasuring Generals, Russian and Austrian, sprang to horseback at their swiftest,—hope of dinner gone futile, except to the intervening Prussian Hussars;—and would have all been captured, but for that Miller's Boy; whose Mill too was burnt before long. This gallop home of the undined Generals into Frankfurt was the first news we poor Frankfurters had of the King's arrival. The King has been punctual to his reckoning: he picked up Wedell at Mullrose,—not too cordial to Wedell's people: "None of you speak to those beaten wretches," ordered he; "till perhaps they wipe off their Zullichau stain!" On the 7th, Friedrich advanced to Frankfurt neighborhood; took Camp between Wulkow and Lebus;—and has just been out reconnoitring. And has raised, fancy what emotion in poor Frankfurt lying under its nightmare! "Next day, August 9th, from Wulkow-Lebus hand, we" of Frankfurt, "heard a great firing; cannon-salvos, musket-volleys: 'Nothing of fight,' the Russian Officers told us; 'it is the King of Prussia doing joy-fire for Minden,' of which we till now knew nothing." Friedrich, on survey of this Russian-Austrian Army, some 90,000 in number, with such posts, artilleries, advantages, judges that he, counting only 40,000, is not strong enough. And, indeed, had so anticipated, and already judged; and, accordingly, has Finck on march hitherward again,—Berlin must take its risk, Saxony must shift for itself in the interim. Finck is due in two days,—not here at Lebus precisely, but at another place appointed; Finck will raise him to 50,000; and then business can begin! Contrary to Russian expectation, Friedrich does not attack Frankfurt; seems quite quiet in his cantonments;—he is quietly (if one knew it) making preparations farther down the River. About Reitwein, between this and Custrin, there arrangements are proceeding, by no means of a showy sort. The Russian-Austrian Army quits Frankfurt, leaving only some hundreds of garrison: Loudon moves across, Soltikof across; to the Oder-Dam and farther; and lie, powerfully intrenched, on those Kunersdorf Heights, and sandy Moorlands, which go eastward at right-angles to Oder-Dam. One of the strongest Camps imaginable. All round there, to beyond Kunersdorf and back again, near three miles each way, they have a ring of redoubts, and artillery without end. And lie there, in order of battle, or nearly so; ready for Friedrich, when he shall attack, through Frankfurt or otherwise. They face to the North (Reitwein way, as it happens); to their rear, and indeed to their front, only not so close, are woods and intricate wilds. Loudon has the left flank; that is to say, Loudon's left hand is towards the Oder-Dam and Frankfurt; he lies at the ROTHE VORWERK ("Red Grange," a Farmstead much mentioned just now); rather to northwestward of the Jew Hill and Jew Churchyard (JUDENBERG and JUDENKIRCHHOF, likewise much mentioned); and in advance of the general Mass. Soltikof's head-quarter, I rather understand, is on the right wing; probably in Kunersdorf itself, or beyond that Village; there, at least, our highly important Russian right wing is; there, elaborately fortified; and, half a mile farther, ends,—on the edge of steep dells; the Russian brink of which is strongly fringed with cannon, while beyond, on the farther brink, they have built an abatis; so making assurance doubly sure. Looking to the northward all these 90,000; their left rather southward of Frankfurt Bridge, over which Friedrich will probably arrive. Leftward, somewhat to rearward, they have bridges of their own; should anything sinister befall; three bridges which lead into that Oder Island, and the Russian Wagenburg there. August 10th, Finck, punctual to time, arrives in the neighborhood of Reitwein (which is some ten miles down stream from Lebus, from Frankfurt perhaps fifteen); Friedrich, the same day, is there before him; eager to complete the Bridges, and get to business. One Bridge is of pontoons; one of "Oder-boats floated up from Custrin." Bridges are not begun till nightfall, lest eyes be abroad; are ready in the minimum of time. And so, during the same night of the 10th, all the Infantry, with their artilleries and battle-furnitures, pour over in two columns; the Cavalry, at the due point of time, riding by a ford short way to the right. And at four, in the gray of the August morning (Saturday, 11th August, 1759), all persons and things find themselves correctly across; ranked there, in those barren, much-indented "Pasture-grounds of Goritz" or of OEtscher; intending towards Kunersdorf; ready for unfolding into order of battle there. They leave their heavy baggage at Goritz, Wunsch to guard the Bridges and it; and, in succinct condition, are all under way. At one in the afternoon we are got to Leissow and Bischofsee; scrubby hamlets (as the rest all are), not above two miles from Kunersdorf. The August day is windless, shiny, sultry; man and horse are weary with the labors, and with the want of sleep: we decide to bivouac here, and rest on the scrubby surface, heather or whatever it is, till to-morrow. Finck is Vanguard, ahead short way, and with his left on a bit of lake or bog; the Army is in two lines, with its right on Leissow, and has Cavalry in the kind of wood which there is to rear. Friedrich, having settled the positions, rides out reconnoitring; hither, thither, over the Heights of Trettin. "The day being still hot, he suffers considerably from thirst [it is our one Anecdote] in that arid tract: at last a Peasant does bring him, direct from the fountain, a jug of pure cold water; whom, lucky man, the King rewarded with a thaler; and not only so, but, the man being intelligent of the localities, took with him to answer questions." Readers too may desire to gain some knowledge of the important ground now under survey. "Frankfurt, a very ancient Town, not a very beautiful," says my Note, "stands on an alluvium which has been ground down from certain clay Hills on the left bank of Oder. It counted about 12,000 inhabitants in Friedrich's time; has now perhaps about 20,000; not half the bulk of its namesake on the Mayn; but with Three great Fairs annually, and much trade of the rough kind. On this left or west bank of Oder the country is arable, moderately grassy and umbrageous, the prospect round you not unpleasant; but eastward, over the River, nothing can be more in contrast. Oder is of swift current, of turbid color, as it rolls under Frankfurt Bridge,—Wooden Bridge, with Dam Suburb at the end;—a River treeless, desolate, as you look up and down; which has, evidently, often changed its course, since grinding down that alluvium as site for Frankfurt; and which, though now holding mainly to northward, is still given to be erratic, and destructive on the eastern low grounds,—had not the Frankfurters built an 'Oder-Dam' on that side; a broad strong Earth-mound, running for many miles, and confining its floods. Beyond the Dam there are traces of an 'Old Oder (ALTE ODER);' and, in fact, Oder, in primeval and in recent time, has gone along, many-streamed; indenting, quarrying, leaving lakelets, quagmires, miscellaneous sandy tumult, at a great rate, on that eastern shore. Making of it one of the unloveliest scenes of chaotic desolation anywhere to be met with;—fallen unlovelier than ever in our own more recent times. "What we call the Heights of Kunersdorf is a broad Chain of Knolls; coming out, at right-angles, or as a kind of spur, from the eastern high grounds; direct towards Oder and Frankfurt. Mill-Hill (MUHLBERG) is the root or easternmost part of this spur. From the Muhlberg, over Kunersdorf, to Oder-Dam, which is the whole length of the spur, or Chain of Knolls, will be little short of four miles; the breadth of the Chain is nowhere one mile,—which is its grand defect as a Camp: 'too narrow for manoeuvring in.' Here, atop and on the three sides of this Block of Knolls, was fought the furious Battle of Kunersdorf [to be fought to-morrow], one of the most furious ever known. A Block of Knolls memorable ever since. "To all appearance: it was once some big Island or chain of Islands in the Oder deluges: it is still cut with sudden hollows,—KUHGRUND (Cow-Hollow), TIEFE WEG (Deep Way), and westernmost of all, and most important for us here, HOHLE GRUND (Big Hollow, let us call it; 'LOUDON'S Hollow' people subsequently called it);—and is everywhere strangely tumbled up into knolls blunt or sharp, the work of primeval Oder in his rages. In its highest knolls,—of which let readers note specially the Spitzberg, the Muhlberg, the Judenberg,—it rises nowhere to 150 feet; perhaps the general height of it may be about 100. On each side of it, especially on the north, the Country is of most intricate character: bushy, scraggy, with brooklets or muddy oozings wandering about, especially with a thing called the HUNERFLIESS (Hen-Floss), which springs in the eastern woods, and has inconceivable difficulty to get into Oder,—if it get at all! This was a sore Floss to Friedrich to-morrow. Hen-Floss struggles, painfully meandering and oozing, along the northern side (sometimes close, sometimes not) of our Chain of Knolls: along the south side of it (in our time, through the middle of it) goes the Highway to Reppen ["From that Highway will his attack come!" thought the Russians, always till to-day]: on the north, to Leissow, to Trettin," where Friedrich is now on survey, "go various wheel-tracks, but no firm road. A most intricate unlovely Country. Withered bent-grasses, heath, perhaps gorse, and on both sides a great deal of straggling Forest-wood, reaching eastward, and especially southward, for many miles. "For the rest," to our ill-luck in this place, "the Battlefield of Kunersdorf has had a peculiar fate in the world; that of being blown away by the winds! The then scene of things exists no longer; the descriptions in the Old Books are gone hopelessly irrecognizable. In our time, there is not anywhere a tract more purely of tumbled sand, than all this between Kunersdorf and Dam Vorstadt; and you judge, without aid of record or tradition, that it is greatly altered for the worse since Friedrich's time,—some rabbit-colony, or other the like insignificancy, eating out the roots, till all vegetation died, and the wind got hold and set it dancing;—and that, in 1759, when Russian human beings took it for a Camp, it must have been at least coherent, more or less; covered, held together by some film of scrubby vegetation; not blowing about in every wind as now! Kunersdorf stands with its northern end pushed into that KUHGRUND (Cow-Hollow); which must then have been a grassy place. Eastward of Kunersdorf the ground has still some skin of peat, and sticks together: but westward, all that three miles, it is a mere tumult of sand-hills, tumbled about in every direction (so diligent have the conies been, and then the winds); no gullet, or definite cut or hollow, now traceable anywhere, but only an endless imbroglio of twisted sand-heaps and sand-hollows, which continually alter in the wind-storms. Sand wholly, and—except the strong paved Highway that now runs through it (to Reppen, Meseritz and the Polish Frontier, and is strongly paved till it get through Kunersdorf)—chaotic wholly; a scene of heaped barrenness and horror, not to be matched but in Sahara; the features of the Battle quite blown away, and indecipherable in our time. "A hundred years ago, it would have some tattered skin,—of peat, of heather and dwarf whins, with the sand cropping out only here and there. So one has to figure it in Soltikof's day,—before the conies ruined it. Which was not till within the last sixty years, as appears. Kriele's Book (in 1801) still gives no hint of change: the KUHGRUND, which now has nothing but dry sand for the most industrious ruminant, is still a place of succulence and herbage in Kriele's time; 'Deep Way,' where 'at one point two carts could not pass,' was not yet blown out of existence, but has still 'a Well in it' for Kriele; HOHLE GRUND (since called Loudon's Hollow), with the Jew Hill and Jew Churchyard beyond, seem tolerable enough places to Kriele. Probably not unlike what the surrounding Country still is. A Country of poor villages, and of wild ground, flat generally, and but tolerably green; with lakelets, bushes, scrubs, and intricate meandering little runlets and oozelets; and in general with more of Forest so called than now is:—this is Kunersdorf Chain of Knolls; Soltikof's Intrenched Camp at present; destined to become very famous in the world, after lying so long obscure under Oder and its rages." [TOURIST'S NOTE (Autumnn, 1852).] From the Knolls of Trettin, that Saturday afternoon, Friedrich takes view of the Russian Camp. All lying bright enough there; from Muhlberg to Judenberg, convenient to our glass; between us and the evening Sun. Batteries most abundant, difficulties great: Soltikof just ahead here, 72,000: Loudon at the Red Grange yonder, on their extreme left, with 18,000 more. An uncommonly strong position for 90,000 against 50,000. One thing strikes Friedrich: On front in this northern side, close by the base of the Russian Camp, runs—for the present away FROM Oder, but intending to join it elsewhere—a paltry little Brook, "Hen-Floss" so called, with at least two successive Mills on it (KLEINE MUHLE, GROSSE MUHLE); and on the northern shore of it, spilling itself out into a wet waste called ELSBRUCH (Alder Waste), which is especially notable to Friedrich. ALDER Waste? Watery, scrubby; no passage there, thinks Friedrich; which his Peasant with the water-jug confirms. "Tell me, however," inquires Friedrich, with strictness, "From the Red Grange yonder, where General Loudon is, if you wished to get over to the HOHLE GRUND, or to the Judenberg, would you cross that Hen-Floss?" "It is not crossable, your Majesty; one has to go round quite westward by the Dam." "What, from Rothe Vorwerk to Big Hollow, no passage, say you; no crossing?" "None, your Majesty," insists the Peasant;—who is not aware that the Russians have made one of firm trestles and logs, and use it daily for highway there; an error of some interest to Friedrich within the next twenty-four hours! Friedrich himself does not know this bit of ground: but there is with him, besides the Peasant, a Major Linden, whose Regiment used to lie in Frankfurt, of whom Friedrich makes minute questioning. Linden answers confidently; has been over all this tract a hundred times; "but knows it only as a hunter," says Tempelhof, [Tempelhof, iii. 186.] "not as a soldier," which he ought to have done. His answers are supposed to have misled Friedrich on various points, and done him essential damage. Friedrich's view of the case, that evening, is by no means so despondent as might be imagined: he regards the thing as difficult, not as impossible,—and one of his anxieties is, that he be not balked of trying it straightway. Retiring to his hut in Bischofsee, he makes two Dispositions, of admirable clearness, brevity, and calculated for two contingencies: [Given in Tempelhof, iii. 182, 183.] That of the enemy retaining his now posture; and That of the enemy making off for Reppen;—which latter does not at all concern us, as matters turned! Of the former the course will unfold itself to us, in practice, shortly. At 2 A.M. Friedrich will be on foot again, at 3 on march again.—The last phenomenon, at Bischofsee this night, is some sudden glare of disastrous light rising over the woods:—"Russians burning Kunersdorf!" as neighbors are sorry to hear. That is the finale of much Russian rearranging and tumbling, this day; that barbarous burning of Kunersdorf, before going to bed. To-morrow various other poor Villages got burnt by them, which they had better have left standing. The Russians, on hearing that Friedrich was across at Goritz, and coming on them from the north side, not from Frankfurt by the Reppen Highway, were in great agitation. Not thrown into terror, but into manifold haste, knowing what hasty adversary there was. Endless readjustments they have to make; a day of tumultuous business with the Russians, this Saturday, 11th, when the news reached them. "They inverted their front [say all the Books but Friedrich's own]: Not coming by the Reppen Highway, then!" think they. And thereupon changed rear to front, as at Zorndorf, but more elaborately;—which I should not mention, were it not that hereby their late "right wing on the Muhlberg" has, in strict speech, become their "left," and there is ambiguity and discrepancy in some of the Books, should any poor reader take to studying them on this matter. Changed their front; which involves much interior changing; readjusting of batteries and the like. That of burning Kunersdorf was the barbaric winding up of all this: barbaric, and, in the military sense, absurd; poor Kunersdorf could have been burnt at any moment, if needful; and to the Russians the keeping of it standing was the profitable thing, as an impediment to Friedrich in his advance there. They have laid it flat and permeable; ashes all of it,—except the Church only, which is of stone; not so combustible, and may have uses withal. Has perhaps served as temporary lock-up, prison for the night, to some of those Frankfurt Deputations and their troublesome wailings; and may serve as temporary hospital to-morrow, who knows? Readjustments in the Russian Camp were manifold: but these are as nothing, in the tumultuous business of the day. Carting of their baggage, every article of value, to that safe Wagenburg in the River; driving of cattle,—the very driving of cattle through Frankfurt, endless herds of them, gathered by the Cossacks from far and wide, "lasted for four-and-twenty hours." Oxen in Frankfurt that day were at the rate of ten shillings per head. Often enough you were offered a full-grown young steer for a loaf of bread; nay the Cossacks, when there was absolutely no bidder, would slaughter down the animal, leave its carcass in the streets, and sell the hide for a TYMPF,—fivepence (very bad silver at present). Never before or since was seen in Frankfurt such a Saturday, for bellowing and braying, and raging and tumulting, all through the day and through the night; ushering in such a Sunday too! Sunday about 3 in the morning, Friedrich is on march again,—Russians still in their place; and Disposition FIRST, not SECOND at all, to be our rule of action! Friedrich, in Two Columns, marches off, eastward through the woods, as if for Reppen quite away from the Russians and their Muhlberg; but intending to circle round at the due point, and come down upon their right flank there (left flank, as he persists to call it), out of the woods, and clasp it in his arms in an impressive, unexpected way. In Two Columns; which are meant, as usual, to be the Two Lines of Battle: Seidlitz, with chosen Cavalry, is at the head of Column First, and will be Left Wing, were we on the ground; Eugen of Wurtemberg, closing the rear of Column First, will, he, or Finck and he together, be Right Wing. That is the order of march;—order of BATTLE, we shall find, had to alter itself somewhat, for reasons extremely valid! Finck with his 12,000 is to keep his present ground; to have two good batteries got ready, each on its knoll ahead, which shall wait silent in the interim: Finck to ride out reconnoitring, with many General Officers, and to make motions and ostentations; in a word, to persuade the Russians that here is the Main Army coming on from the north. All which Finck does; avoiding, as his orders were, any firing, or serious commencement of business, till the King reappear out of the woods. The Russians give Finck and his General Officers a cannon salvo, here and there, without effect, and get no answer. "The King does not see his way, then, after all?" think the Russians. Their Cossacks go scouring about; on the southern side, "burn Schwetig and Reipzig," without the least advantage to themselves: most of the Cavalry, and a regiment or two of excellent Austrian Grenadiers, are with Loudon, near the Red Grange, in front of the Russian extreme left;—but will have stept over into Big Hollow at a moment of crisis! The King's march, through the Forest of Reppen, was nothing like so expeditious as had been expected. There are thickets, intricacies, runlets, boggy oozes; indifferent to one man well mounted, but vitally important to 30,000 with heavy cannon to bring on. Boggy oozings especially,—there is one dirty stream or floss (HUNERFLIESS, Hen-Floss) which wanders dismally through those recesses, issuing from the far south, with dirty daughters dismally wandering into it, and others that cannot get into it (being of the lake kind): these, in their weary, circling, recircling course towards Oder,—FAULE LAACKE (Foul Lake, LITHER-MERE, as it were), Foul Bridge, Swine's Nook (SCHWEINEBUCKT), and many others,—occasion endless difficulty. Whether Major Linden was shot that day, or what became of him after, I do not know: but it was pity he had not studied the ground with a soldier's eye instead of a hunter's! Plumping suddenly, at last, upon Hen-Floss itself, Friedrich has to turn angularly; angularly, which occasions great delay: the heavy cannon (wall-guns brought from Custrin) have twelve horses each, and cannot turn among the trees, but have to be unyoked, reyoked, turned round by hand:—in short, it was eight in the morning before Friedrich arrived at the edge of the wood, on the Klosterberg, Walckberg, and other woody BERGS or knolls, within reach of Muhlberg, and behind the preliminary abatis there (abatis which was rather of service to him than otherwise);—and began privately building his batteries. At eight o'clock he, with Column First, which is now becoming Line First (CENTRE of Line First, if we reckon Finck as RIGHT-WING), is there; busy in that manner: Column Second, which was to have been Rear Line, is still a pretty way behind; and has many difficulties before it gets into Kunersdorf neighborhood, or can (having wriggled itself into a kind of LEFT-WING) co-operate on the Russian Position from the south side. On the north side, Finck has been ready these five hours.—Friedrich speeds the building of his batteries: "Silent, too; the Russians have not yet noticed us!" By degrees the Russians do notice something; shoot out Cossacks to reconnoitre. Cossacks in quantity; who are so insolent, and venture so very near, our gunners on the north battery give them a blast of satisfactory grape-shot; one and then another, four blasts in all, satisfactory to the gunner mind,—till the King's self, with a look, with a voice, came galloping: "Silence, will you!" The Russians took no offence; still considering Finck to be the main thing and Friedrich some scout party,—till at last, Half-past eleven, everything being ready on the Walck Hill, Friedrich's batteries opened there, in a sudden and volcanic way. Volcanically answered by the Russians, as soon as possible; who have 72 guns on this Muhlberg, and are nothing loath. Upon whom Finck's battery is opening from the north, withal: Friedrich has 60 cannon hereabouts; on the Walckberg, on the LITTLE Spitzberg (called SEIDLITZ HILL ever since); all playing diligently on the head and south shoulder of this Muhlberg: while Finck's battery opens on the north shoulder (could he but get near enough). Volcanic to a degree all these; nor are the Russians wanting, though they get more and more astonished: Tempelhof, who was in it, says he never, except at Torgau next Year, heard a louder cannonade. Loud exceedingly; and more or less appalling to the Russian imagination: but not destructive in proportion; the distance being too considerable,—"1,950 paces at the nearest," as Tempelhof has since ascertained by measuring. Friedrich's two batteries, however, as they took the Russians in the flank or by enfilade, did good execution. "The Russian guns were ill-pointed; the Russian batteries wrong-built; batteries so built as did not allow them sight of the Hollow they were meant to defend." [Tempelhof, iii. 186, 187.] After above half an hour of this, Friedrich orders storm of the Muhlberg: Forward on it, with what of enfilading it has had! Eight grenadier Battalions, a chosen vanguard appointed for the work (names of Battalions all given, and deathless in the Prussian War-Annals), tramp forth on this service: cross the abatis, which the Russian grenadoes have mostly burnt; down into the Hollow. Steady as planets; "with a precision and coherency," says Tempelhof, "which even on the parade-ground would have deserved praises. Once well in the Hollow, they suffer nothing; though the blind Russian fire, going all over their heads, rages threefold:" suffered nothing in the Hollow; nor till they reached almost the brow of the Muhlberg, and were within a hundred steps of the Russian guns. These were the critical steps, these final ones; such torrents of grape-shot and musket-shot and sheer death bursting out, here at last, upon the Eight Battalions, as they come above ground. Who advanced, unwavering, all the faster,—speed one's only safety. They poured into the Russian gunners and musketry battalions one volley of choicest quality, which had a shaking effect; then, with level bayonets, plunge on the batteries: which are all empty before we can leap into them; artillery-men, musketeer battalions, all on wing; general whirlpool spreading. And so, in ten minutes, the Muhlberg and its guns are ours. Ever since Zorndorf, an idea had got abroad, says Tempelhof, that the Russians would die instead of yielding; but it proved far otherwise here. Down as far as Kunersdorf, which may be about a mile westward, the Russians are all in a whirl; at best hanging in tatters and clumps, their Officers struggling against the flight; "mixed groups you would see huddled together a hundred men deep." The Russian Left Wing is beaten: had we our cannon up here, our cavalry up here, the Russian Army were in a bad way! This is a glorious beginning; completed, I think, as far almost as Kunersdorf by one o'clock: and could the iron continue to be struck while it is at white-heat as now, the result were as good as certain. That was Friedrich's calculation: but circumstances which he had not counted on, some which he could not count on, sadly retarded the matter. His Left Wing (Rear Line, which should now have been Left Wing) from southward, his Right Wing from northward, and Finck farther west, were now on the instant to have simultaneously closed upon the beaten Russians, and crushed them altogether. The Right Wing, conquerors of the Muhlberg, are here: but neither Finck nor the Left can be simultaneous with them. Finck and his artillery are much retarded with the Flosses and poor single Bridges; and of the Left Wing there are only some Vanguard Regiments capable of helping ("who drove out the Russians from Kunersdorf Churchyard," as their first feat),—no Main Body yet for a long while. Such impediments, such intricacies of bog and bush! The entire Wing does at last get to the southeast of Kunersdorf, free of the wood; but finds (contrary to Linden with his hunter eye) an intricate meshwork of meres and straggling lakes, two of them in the burnt Village itself; no passing of these except on narrow isthmuses, which necessitate change of rank and re-change; and our Left Wing cannot, with all its industry, "march up," that is, arrive at the enemy in fighting line, without the painfulest delays. And then the getting forward of our cannon! On the Muhlberg itself the seventy-two Russian guns, "owing to difference of calibre," or artillery-men know what, cannot be used by us: a few light guns, Tempelhof to one of them, a poor four in all, with perhaps 100 shot to each, did, by the King's order, hasten to the top of the Muhlberg; and never did Tempelhof see a finer chance for artillery than there. Soft sloping ground, with Russians simmering ahead of you, all the way down to Kunersdorf, a mile long: by horizontal pointing, you had such reboundings (RICOCHETS); and carried beautiful execution! Tempelhof soon spent his hundred shots: but it was not at once that any of our sixty heavy guns could be got up thither. Twelve horses to each: fancy it, and what baffling delays here and elsewhere;—and how the Russian whirlpool was settling more and more, in the interim! And had, in part, settled; in part, got through to the rear, and been replaced by fresh troops! Friedrich's activities, and suppressed and insuppressible impatiences in this interval, are also conceivable, though not on record for us. The swiftest of men; tied down, in this manner, with the blaze of perfect victory ahead, were the moments NOT running out! Slower or faster, he thinks (I suppose), the victory is his; and that he must possess his soul till things do arrive. It was in one and more of those embargoed intervals that he wrote to Berlin [Preuss, ii. 212 n.] (which is waiting, as if for life or death, the issue of this scene, sixty miles distant): "Russians beaten; rejoice with me!" Four successive couriers, I believe, with messages to that effect; and at last a Fifth with dolefully contrary news!— In proportion as the cannon and other necessaries gradually got in, the Fight flamed up from its embers more and more: and there ensued,—the Russians being now ranked again (fronting eastward now) "in many lines," and very fierce,—a second still deadlier bout; Friedrich furiously diligent on their front and right flank; Finck, from the Alder Waste, battering and charging (uphill, and under difficulties from those Flosses and single Bridges) on their left flank. This too, after long deadly efforts on the Prussian part, ended again clearly in their favor; their enemies broken a second time, and driven not only out of Kunersdorf and the Kuhgrund, but some say almost to the foot of the Judenberg,—what can only be very partially true. Broken portions of the Russian left flank,—some of Finck's people, in their victorious wrath, may have chased these very far: but it is certain the general Russian mass rallied again a long way short of the Judenberg;—though, the ground being all obliterated by the rabbits and the winds, nobody can now know with exactitude where. And indeed the Battle, from this point onwards, becomes blurred and confused to us, only its grosser features visible henceforth. Where the "Big Spitzberg" was (so terribly important soon), nobody can now tell me, except from maps. London's motions too are obscure, though important. I believe his grenadiers had not yet been in the fire; but am certain they are now come out of Big Hollow; fresh for the rescue; and have taken front rank in this Second Rally that is made. Loudon's Cavalry Loudon himself has in hand, and waits with them in a fit place. He has 18,000 fresh men; and an eye like few others on a field of war. Loudon's 18,000 are fresh: of the Prussians that can by no means be said. I should judge it must be 3 of the afternoon. The day is windless, blazing; one of the hottest August days; and "nobody, for twelve hours past, could command a drink of water:" very fresh the poor Prussians cannot be! They have done two bouts of excellent fighting; tumbled the Russians well back, stormed many batteries; and taken in all 180 cannon. At this stage, it appears, Finck and many Generals, Seidlitz among the others, were of opinion that, in present circumstances, with troops so tired, and the enemy nearly certain to draw off, if permitted, here had been enough for one day, and that there ought to be pause till to-morrow. Friedrich knew well the need of rest; but Friedrich, impatient of things half-done, especially of Russians half-beaten, would not listen to this proposal; which was reckoned upon him as a grave and tragic fault, all the rest of his life; though favorable judges, who were on the ground, Tempelhof for one, [Tempelhof, iii. 194.] are willing to prove that pausing here—at the point we had really got to, a little beyond the Kuhgrund, namely; and not a couple of miles westward, at the foot of the Jew Hill, where vague rumor puts us—was not feasible or reasonable. Friedrich considers with himself, "Our left wing has hardly yet been in fire!" calls out the entire left wing, foot and horse: these are to emerge from their meshwork of Lakes about Kunersdorf, and bear a hand along with us on the Russian front here,—especially to sweep away that raging Battery they have on the Big Spitzberg, and make us clear of it. The Big Spitzberg lies to south and ahead of the Russian right as now ranked; fatally covers their right flank, and half ruins the attack in front. Big Spitzberg is blown irrecognizable in our time; but it was then an all-important thing. The left-wing Infantry thread their lake-labyrinth, the soonest possible; have to rank again on the hither side, under a tearing fire from that Spitzberg; can then at last, and do, storm onwards, upwards; but cannot, with their best efforts, take the Spitzberg: and have to fall back under its floods of tearing case-shot, and retire out of range. To Friedrich's blank disappointment: "Try it you, then, Seidlitz; you saved us at Zorndorf!" Seidlitz, though it is an impossible problem to storm batteries with horse, does charge in for the Russian flank, in spite of its covering battery: but the torrents of grape-shot are insufferable; the Seidlitz people, torn in gaps, recoil, whirl round, and do not rank again till beyond the Lakes of Kunersdorf. Seidlitz himself has got wounded, and has had to be carried away. And, in brief, from this point onwards all goes aback with the Prussians more and more. Repeated attempts on that Spitzberg battery prove vain; to advance without it is impossible. Friedrich's exertions are passionate, almost desperate; rallying, animating, new-ordering; everywhere in the hottest of the fire. "Thrice he personally led on the main attack." He has had two horses shot down under him; mounting a third, this too gets a bullet in an artery of the neck, and is about falling, when two Adjutants save the King. In his waistcoat-pocket some small gold case (ETUI) has got smitten flat by a bullet, which would otherwise have ended matters. The people about him remonstrate on such exposure of a life beyond value; he answers curtly, "We must all of us try every method here, to win the Battle: I, like every other, must stand to my duty here!" These, and a second brief word or two farther on, are all of articulate that we hear from him this day. Friedrich's wearied battalions here on the Heights, while the Spitzberg to left goes so ill, fight desperately; but cannot prevail farther; and in spite of Friedrich's vehement rallyings and urgings, gradually lose ground,—back at last to Kunersdorf and the Kuhgrund again. The Loudon grenadiers, and exclaimed masses of fresh Russians, are not to be broken, but advance and advance. Fancy the panting death-labors, and spasmodic toilings and bafflings, of those poor Prussians and their King! Nothing now succeeding; the death-agony now come; all hearts growing hopeless; only one heart still seeing hope. The Spitzberg is impossible; tried how often I know not. Finck, from the Alder Waste, with his Infantry, attacks, and again attacks; without success: "Let the Cavalry go round, then, and try there. Seidlitz we have not; you Eugen of Wurtemberg lead them!" Eugen leads them (cuirassiers, or we will forget what); round by the eastern end of the Muhlberg; then westward, along the Alder Waste; finally southward, against the Russian flank, himself foremost, and at the gallop for charging:—Eugen, "looking round, finds his men all gone," and has to gallop the other way, gets wounded to boot. Puttkammer, with Hussars, then tried it; Puttkammer was shot dead, and his Hussars too could do nothing. Back, slowly back, go the Prussians generally, nothing now succeeds with them. Back to the Kuhgrund again; fairly over the steep brow there; the Russians serrying their ranks atop, rearranging their many guns. There, once more, rose frightful struggle; desperate attempt by the fordone Prussians to retake that Height. "Lasted fifteen minutes, line to line not fifty yards asunder;" such musketry,—our last cartridges withal. Ardent Prussian parties trying to storm up; few ever getting to the top, none ever standing there alive one minute. This was the death-agony of the Battle. Loudon, waiting behind the Spitzberg, dashes forward now, towards the Kuhgrund and our Left Flank. At sight of which a universal feeling shivers through the Prussian heart, "Hope ended, then!"—and their solid ranks rustle everywhere; and melt into one wild deluge, ebbing from the place as fast as it can. It is towards six o'clock; the sweltering Sun is now fallen low and veiled; gray evening sinking over those wastes. "N'Y A-T-IL DONC PAS UN BOUGRE DE BOULET QUI PUISSE M'ATTEINDREE (Is there no one b—— of a ball that can reach me, then)?" exclaimed Friedrich in despair. Such a day he had never thought to see. The pillar of the State, the Prussian Army itself, gone to chaos in this manner. Friedrich still passionately struggles, exhorts, commands, entreats even with tears, "Children, don't forsake me, in this pinch (KINDER, VERLASSET HEUTE MICH, EUREN KONIG, EUREN VATER, NICHT)!" [Kriele, p. 169.]—but all ears are deaf. On the Muhlberg one regiment still stood by their guns, covering the retreat. But the retreat is more and more a flight; "no Prussian Army was ever seen in such a state." At the Bridges of that Hen-Floss, there was such a crowding, all our guns got jammed; and had to be left, 165 of them of various calibre, and the whole of the Russian 180 that were once in our hands. Had the chase been vigorous, this Prussian Army had been heard of no more. But beyond the Muhlberg, there was little or no pursuit; through the wood the Army, all in chaos, but without molestation otherwise, made for its Oder Bridges by the way it had come. [Tempelhof, iii. 179-200; Retzow, ii. 80-115: in Seyfarth, Beylagen, ii. 589-598, Bericht von der am 12 August, 1759 bey Kunersdorf vorgefallenen Schlacht (Official); and IB. 598-603, Beschreibung der &c. (by a Private Hand): lucidly accurate both.] Friedrich was among the last to quit the ground. He seemed stupefied by the excess of his emotions; in no haste to go; uncertain whether he would go at all. His adjutants were about him, and a small party of Ziethen Hussars under Captain Prittwitz. Wild swarms of Cossacks approached the place. "PRITTWITZ, ICH BIN VERLOREN (Prittwitz, I am lost)!" remarked he. "NEIN, IHRO MAJESTAT!" answered Prittwitz with enthusiasm; charged fiercely, he and his few, into the swarms of Cossacks; cut them about, held them at bay, or sent them else-whither, while the Adjutants seized Friedrich's bridle, and galloped off with him. At OEtscher and the Bridges, Friedrich found of his late Army not quite 3,000 men. Even Wunsch is not there till next morning. Wunsch with his Party had, early in the afternoon, laid hold of Frankfurt, as ordered; made the garrison prisoners, blocked the Oder Bridge; poor Frankfurt tremulously thanking Heaven for him, and for such an omen. In spite of their Wagenburg and these Pontoon-Bridges, it appears, there would have been no retreat for the Russians except into Wunsch's cannon: Wagenburg way, latish in the afternoon, there was such a scramble of runaways and retreating baggage, all was jammed into impassability; scarcely could a single man get through. In case of defeat, the Russian Army would have had no chance but surrender or extermination. [Tempelhof, iii. 194: in Retzow (ii. 110) is some dubious traditionary stuff on the matter.] At dark, however, Wunsch had summons, so truculent in style, he knew what it meant; and answering in words peremptorily, "No" with a like emphasis, privately got ready again, and at midnight disappeared. Got to Reitwein without accident. Friedrich found at OEtscher nothing but huts full of poor wounded men, and their miseries and surgeries;—he took shelter, himself, in a hut "which had been plundered by Cossacks" (in the past days), but which had fewer wounded than others, and could be furnished with some bundles of dry straw. Kriele has a pretty Anecdote, with names and particulars, of two poor Lieutenants, who were lying on the floor, as he entered this hut. They had lain there for many hours; the Surgeons thinking them desperate; which Friedrich did not. "ACH KINDER, Alas, children, you are badly wounded, then?" "JA, your Majesty: but how goes the Battle?" (Answer, evasive on this point): "Are you bandaged, though? Have you been let blood?" "NEIN, EUER MAJESTAT, KEIN TEUFEL WILL UNS VERBINDEN (Not a devil of them would bandage us)!" Upon which there is a Surgeon instantly brought; reprimanded for neglect: "Desperate, say you? These are young fellows; feel that hand, and that; no fever there: Nature in such cases does wonders!" Upon which the leech had to perform his function; and the poor young fellows were saved,—and did new fighting, and got new wounds, and had Pensions when the War ended. [Kriele, pp. 169, 170; and in all the Anecdote-Books.] This appears to have been Friedrich's first work in that hut at OEtscher. Here next is a Third Autograph to Finkenstein, written in that hut, probably the first of several Official things there:— THE KING TO GRAF VAN FINKENSTEIN (at Berlin): Third Note. OETSCHER, "12th August," 1759. "I attacked the Enemy this morning about eleven; we beat him back to the JUDENKIRCHHOF (Jew Churchyard,"—a mistake, but now of no moment), "near Frankfurt. All my troops came into action, and have done wonders. I reassembled them three times; at length, I was myself nearly taken prisoner; and we had to quit the Field. My coat is riddled with bullets, two horses were killed under me;—my misfortune is, that I am still alive. Our loss is very considerable. Of an Army of 48,000 men, I have, at this moment while I write, not more than 3,000 together; and am no longer master of my forces. In Berlin you will do well to think of your safety. It is a great calamity; and I will not survive it: the consequences of this Battle will be worse than the Battle itself. I have no resources more; and, to confess the truth, I hold all for lost. I will not survive the destruction of my Country. Farewell forever (ADIEU POUR JAMAIS).—F." [In orig. "CE 12," no other date (OEuvres de Frederic, xxv. 306).] Another thing, of the same tragic character, is that of handing over this Army to Finck's charge. Order there is to Finck of that tenor: and along with it the following notable Autograph,—a Friedrich taking leave both of Kingship and of life. The Autograph exists; but has no date,—date of the Order would probably be still OETSCHER, 12th AUGUST; date of the Autograph, REITWEIN (across the River), next day. FRIEDRICH TO LIEUT.-GENERAL FINCK (at OEtscher or Reitwein). "General Finck gets a difficult commission; the unlucky Army which I give up to him is no longer in condition to make head against the Russians. Haddick will now start for Berlin, perhaps Loudon too; if General Finck go after these, the Russians will fall on his rear; if he continue on the Oder, he gets Haddick on his flank (SO KRIGT ER DEN HADEK DISS SEIT):—however, I believe, should Loudon go for Berlin, he might attack Loudon, and try to beat him: this, if it succeeded, would be a stand against misfortune, and hold matters up. Time gained is much, in these desperate circumstances. The news from Torgau and Dresden, Coper my Secretary (COPER MEIN SEGRETER," kind of lieutenant to Eichel [See Preuss, i. 349, iii. 442.]) "will send him. You (ER) must inform my Brother [Prince Henri] of everything; whom I have declared Generalissimo of the Army. To repair this bad luck altogether is not possible: but what my Brother shall command, must be done:—the Army swears to my Nephew [King henceforth]. "This is all the advice, in these unhappy circumstances, I am in a condition to give. Had I still had resources, I would have stayed by them (SO WEHRE ICH DARBEI GEBLIEBEN). "FRIEDRICH" [Exact Copy, two exact copies, in PREUSS (i. 450, and again, ii. 215).] All this done, the wearied Friedrich flung himself into his truss of dry straw; and was seen sound asleep there, a single sentry at the door, by some high Generals that ventured to look in. On the morrow he crossed to Reitwein; by to-morrow night, there had 23,000 of his fugitives come in to him;—but this is now to be Finck's affair, not his! That day, too (for the Paper seems to be misdated), he signed, and despatched to Schmettau, Commandant in Dresden, a Missive, which proved more fatal than either of the others; and brought, or helped to bring, very bitter fruits for him, before long:— TO LIEUTENANT-GENERAL VON SCHMETTAU (at Dresden). "REITWEIN, 14th [probably 13th] August, 1759. "You will perhaps have heard of the Check [L'ECHEC, Kunersdorf to wit!] I have met with from the Russian Army on the 13th [12th, if you have the Almanac at hand] of this month. Though at bottom our affairs in regard to the Enemy here are not desperate, I find I shall not now be able to make any detachment for your assistance. Should the Austrians attempt anything against Dresden, therefore, you will see if there are means of maintaining yourself; failing which, it will behoove you to try and obtain a favorable Capitulation,—to wit, Liberty to withdraw, with the whole Garrison, Moneys, Magazines, Hospital and all that we have at Dresden, either to Berlin or else-whither, so as to join some Corps of my Troops. "As a fit of illness [MALADIE, alas!] has come on me,—which I do not think will have dangerous results,—I have for the present left the command of my Troops to Lieutenant-General von Finck; whose Orders you are to execute as if coming to you directly from myself. On this I pray God to have you in his holy and worthy keeping.—F." [Preuss, ii. Urkundenbuch, p. 43.] At Berlin, on this 13th,—with the Five Couriers coming in successively (and not in the order of their despatch, but the fatal Fifth arriving some time AHEAD of the Fourth, who still spoke of progress and victory),—there was such a day as Sulzer (ACH MEIN LIEBER SULZER!) had never seen in the world. "'Above 50,000 human beings on the Palace Esplanade and streets about;' swaying hither and thither, in agony of expectation, in alternate paroxysm of joy and of terror and woe; often enough the opposite paroxysms simultaneous in the different groups, and men crushed down in despair met by men leaping into the air for very gladness:" Sulzer (whose sympathy is of very aesthetic type) "would not, for any consideration, have missed such a scene." [Briefe der Schweitzer Bodmer, Sulzer, Gessner; aus Gleim's literarischen Nachlasse: herausgegeben von Wilhelm Korte (Zurich, 1804), pp. 316-319.] The "scene" is much obliged to you, MEIN LIEBER!— Practically we find, in Rodenbeck, or straggling elsewhere, this Note: "On the day after Kunersdorf, Queen and Court fly to Magdeburg: this is their second flight. Their first was on Haddick's Visit, October, 1757; but after Rossbach they soon returned, and Berlin and the Court were then extremely gay: different gentlemen, French and others of every Nation, fallen prisoners, made the Queen's soirees the finest in the world for splendor and variety, at that time." [Rodenbeck, i. 390; &c. &c.] One other Note we save, for the sake of poor Major Kleist, "Poet of the Spring," as he was then called. A valiant, punctual Soldier, and with a turn for Literature as well; who wrote really pleasant fine things, new at that time and rapturously welcome, though too much in the sentimental vein for the times which have followed. Major Kleist,—there is a General Kleist, a Colonel Kleist of the Green Hussars (called GRUNE Kleist, a terrible cutting fellow):—this is not Grune Kleist; this is the Poet of THE SPRING; whose fate at Kunersdorf made a tragic impression in all intelligent circles of Teutschland. Here is Kriele's Note (abridged):—Chapter II.—GENERAL DOHNA; DICTATOR WEDELL: BATTLE OF ZULLICHAU.
DICTATOR WEDELL FIGHTS HIS BATTLE (Monday, 23d July, 1759), WITHOUT SUCCESS.
Chapter III.—FRIEDRICH IN PERSON ATTEMPTS THE RUSSIAN PROBLEM; NOT WITH SUCCESS.
Chapter IV.—BATTLE OF KUNERSDORF.