Chapter VIII.--BATTLE OF ROSSBACH.
Friedrich left Leipzig Sunday, October 30th; encamped, that night, on
the famous Field of Lutzen, with the vanguard, he (as usual, and Mayer
with him, who did some brisk smiting home of what French there were);
Keith and Duke Ferdinand following, with main body and rear.
Movements on the Soubise-Hildburghausen part are all retrograde
again;--can Dauphiness Bellona do nothing, then, except shuttle forwards
and then backwards according to Friedrich's absence or presence? The
Soubise-Hildburghausen Army does immediately withdraw on this occasion,
as on the former; and makes for the safe side of the Saale again,
rapidly retreating before Friedrich, who is not above one to two of
them,--more like one to three, now that Broglio's Detachment is come
to hand. Broglio got to Merseburg October 26th,--guess 15,000
strong;--considerably out of repair, and glad to have done with such a
march, and be within reach of Soubise. This is the Second Son of our old
Blusterous Friend; a man who came to some mark, and to a great deal of
trouble, in this War; and ended, readers know how, at the Siege of the
Bastille thirty-two years afterwards!
So soon as rested, Broglio, by order, moves leftwards to Halle, to guard
Saale Bridge there; Soubise himself edging after him to Merseburg, on a
similar errand; and leaving Hildburghausen to take charge of Weissenfels
and the Third Saale Bridge. That is Dauphiness's posture while Friedrich
encamps at Lutzen:--let impatient human nature fix these three places
for itself, and hasten to the catastrophe of wretched Dauphiness.
Soubise, it ought to be remembered, is not in the highest spirits; but
his Officers in over-high, "Doing this PETIT MARQUIS DE BRANDEBOURG
the honor to have a kind of War with him (DE LUI FAIRE UNE ESPECE DE
GUERRE)," as they term it. Being puffed up with general vanity, and the
newspaper rumor about Haddick's feat,--which, like the gloves it got,
is going all to left-hand in this way. Hildburghausen and the others
overrule Soubise; and indeed there is no remedy; "Provision almost
out;--how retreat to our magazines and our fastnesses, with Friedrich
once across Saale, and sticking to the skirts of us?" Here, from
eye-witnesses where possible, are the successive steps of Dauphiness
towards her doom, which is famous in the world ever since.
"Monday, 31st October, 1757," as the Town-Syndic of Weissenfels
records, "about eight in the morning, [Muller, SCHLACHT BEI ROSSBACH ("a
Centenary Piece," Berlin, 1857,--containing several curious Extracts),
p. 44, _Helden-Geschichte,_ iv. 643, 651-668.] the King of Prussia, with
his whole Army" (or what seemed to us the whole, though it was but
a half; Keith with the other half being within reach to northward,
marching Merseburg way), "came before this Town." Has been here before;
as Keith has, as Soubise and others have: a town much agitated lately by
transit of troops. It was from the eastern, or high landward side, where
the so-called Castle is, that Friedrich came: Castle built originally on
some "White Crag (WEISSE FELS" not now conspicuous), from which the town
and whilom Duchy take their name.
"We have often heard of Weissenfels, while the poor old drunken Duke
lived, who used to be a Suitor of Wilhelmina's, liable to hard usage;
and have marched through it, with the Salzburgers, in peaceable times.
A solid pleasant-enough little place (6,000 souls or so); lies leant
against high ground (White Crags, or whatever it once was) on the
eastern or right bank of the Saale; a Town in part flat, in part very
steep; the streets of it, or main street and secondaries, running off
level enough from the River and Bridge; rising by slow degrees, but at
last rapidly against the high ground or cliffs, just mentioned; a
stiff acclivity of streets, till crowned by the so-called Castle, the
'Augustus Burg' in those days, the 'Friedrich-Wilhelm Barrack' in ours.
It was on this crown of the cliffs that his Prussian Majesty appeared.
"Saale is of good breadth here; has done perhaps two hundred miles,
since he started, in the Fichtelgebirge (PINE MOUNTAINS), on his long
course Elbe-ward; received, only ten miles ago, his last big branch, the
wide-wandering Unstrut, coming in with much drainage from the northern
parts:--in breadth, Saale may be compared to Thames, to Tay or Beauley;
his depth not fordable, though nothing like so deep as Thames's; main
cargo visible is rafts of timber: banks green, definite, scant of
wood; river of rather dark complexion, mainly noiseless, but of useful
pleasant qualities otherwise."
From this Castle or landward side come Friedrich and his Prussians, on
Monday morning about eight. "The garrison, some 4,000 Reichs folk and
a French Battalion or two, shut the Gates, and assembled in the
Market-place,"--a big square, close at the foot of the Heights; "on the
other hand, from the top of the Heights [KLAMMERK the particular spot],
the Prussians cannonaded Town and Gates; to speedy bursting open of the
same; and rushed in over the walls of the Castle-court, and by other
openings into the Town: so that the garrison above said had to quit, and
roll with all speed across the Saale Bridge, and set the same on fire
behind them." This was their remedy for all the Three Bridges, when
attacked; but it succeeded nowhere so well as here.
"The fire was of extreme rapidity; prepared beforehand:" Bridge all
of dry wood coated with pitch;--"fire reinforced too, in view of such
event, by all the suet, lard and oleaginous matter the Garrison could
find in Weissenfels; some hundredweights of tallow-dips, for one
item, going up on this occasion." Bridge, "worth 100,000 thalers,"
is instantly ablaze: some 400 finding the bridge so flamy, and the
Prussians at their skirts, were obliged to surrender;--Feldmarschall
Hildburghausen, sleeping about two miles off, gets himself awakened in
this unpleasant manner. Flying garrison halt on the other side of the
River, where the rest of their Army is; plant cannon there against
quenching of the Bridge; and so keep firing, answered by the Prussians,
with much noise and no great mischief, till 3 P.M., when the Bridge is
quite gone (Toll-keeper's Lodge and all), and the enterprise of crossing
there had plainly become impossible.
Friedrich quickly, about a mile farther down the River, has picked out
another crossing-place, in the interim, and founded some new adequate
plank or raft bridge there; which, by diligence all night, will
be crossable to-morrow. So that, except for amusing the enemy, the
cannonading may cease at Weissenfels. A certain Duc de Crillon,
in command at this Weissenfels Bridge-burning and cannonade, has a
chivalrous Anecdote (amounting nearly to zero when well examined) about
saving or sparing Friedrich's life on this interesting occasion: How,
being now on the safe side of the River, he Crillon with his staff
taking some refection of breakfast after the furious flurry there had
been; there came to him one of his Artillery Captains, stationed in
an Island in the River, asking, "Shall I shoot the King of Prussia,
Monseigneur? He is down reconnoitring his end of the Bridge: sha'n't I,
then?" To whom Crillon gives a glass of wine and smilingly magnanimous
answer to a negative effect. [_"Memoires militaires de Louis &c. Duc
de Crillon _ (Paris, 1791), p. 166;"--as cited by Preuss, ii. 88.]
Concerning which, one has to remark, Not only, FIRST, that the Artillery
Captain's power of seeing Friedrich (which is itself uncertain) would
indeed mean the power of aiming at him, but differs immensely from that
of hitting him with shot; so that this "Shall I kill the King?" was
mainly thrasonic wind from Captain Bertin. But SECONDLY, that there is
no "Island" in the River thereabouts, for Captain Bertin to fire from!
So that probably the whole story is wind or little more: dreamlike, or
at best some idle thrasonic-theoretic question, on the part of Bertin;
proper answer thereto (consisting mainly in a glass of wine) from
Monseigneur:--all which, on retrospection, Monseigneur feels, or would
fain feel, to have been not theoretic-thrasonic but practical, and of a
rather godlike nature. Zero mainly, as we said; Friedrich thanks you for
zero, Monseigneur.
"The Prussians were billeted in the Town that night," says our Syndic;
"and in many a house there came to be twenty men, and even thirty and
above it, lodged. All was quiet through the night; the French and the
Reichs folk were drawn back upon the higher grounds, about Burgwerben
and on to Tagwerben; and we saw their watch-fires burning." Friedrich's
Bridge meanwhile, unmolested by the enemy, is getting ready.
Keith, looking across to Merseburg on the morrow morning (Tuesday, Nov.
1st), whither he had marched direct with the other Half of the Army,
finds Merseburg Bridge destroyed, or broken; and Soubise with batteries
on the farther side, intending to dispute the passage. Keith despatches
Duke Ferdinand to Halle, another twelve miles down, who finds Halle
Bridge destroyed in like manner, and Broglio intending to dispute;
which, however, on second thoughts, neither of them I did. Friedrich's
new Bridge at Herren-Muhle (LORDSHIPS' MILL) is of course an important
point to them; Friedrich's passage now past dispute! "Let us fall back,"
say they, "and rank ourselves a little; we are 50 or 60,000 strong; ill
off for provisions; but well able to retreat; and have permission to
fight on this side of the River."
The combined Army, "Dauphiness," or whatever we are to call it, does on
Wednesday morning (November 2d) gather in its cannon and outskirts, and
give up the Saale question; retire landwards to the higher grounds some
miles; and diligently get itself united, and into order of battle better
or worse, near the Village of Mucheln (which means Kirk MICHAEL, and is
still written "SANCT MICHEL" by some on this occasion). There Dauphiness
takes post, leaning on the heights, not in a very scientific way;
leaving Keith and Ferdinand to rebuild their Bridges unmolested, and all
Prussians to come across at discretion. Which they have diligently done
(2d-3d November), by their respective Bridges; and on Thursday afternoon
are all across, encamped at Bedra, in close neighborhood to Mucheln;
which Friedrich has been out reconnoitring and finds that he can attack
next morning very early.
Next morning, accordingly, "by 2 o'clock, with a bright moon shining,"
Friedrich is on horseback, his Army following. But on examining by
moonlight, the enemy have shifted their position; turned on their axis,
more or less, into new wood-patches, new batteries and bogs; which
has greatly mended their affair. No good attacking them so, thinks
Friedrich; and returns to his Camp; slightly cannonaded, one wing of
him, from some battery of the enemy; and immoderately crowed over by
them: "Dare not, you see! Tried, and was defeated!" cry their newspapers
and they,--for one day. Friedrich lodges again in Bedra this night,
others say in Rossbach; shifts his own Camp a little; left wing of it
now at Rossbach (HOME-BROOK, or BECK, soon to be a world-famous Hamlet):
the effects of hunger on the Dauphiness, so far from her supplies, will,
he calculates, be stronger than on him, and will bring her to better
terms shortly. Dauphiness needs bread; one may have fine clipping at the
skirts of her, if she try retreat. That Dauphiness would play the prank
she did next morning, Friedrich had not ventured to calculate.
CATASTROPHE OF DAUPHINESS (Saturday, 5th November, 1757).
Meandering Saale is on one of his big turns, as he passes Weissenfels;
turning, pretty rapidly here, from southeastward, which he was a dozen
miles ago, round to northeastward again or northward altogether, which
he gets to be at Merseburg, a dozen farther down. Right across from
Weissenfels, lapped in this crook of the Saale, or washed by it on south
side and on east, rises, with extreme laziness, a dull circular lump of
country, six or eight miles in diameter; with Rossbach and half a dozen
other scraggy sleepy Hamlets scattered on it;--which, till the morning
of Saturday, 5th November, 1757, had not been notable to any visitor.
The topmost point or points, for there are two (not discoverable except
by tradition and guess), the country people do call Hills, JANUS-HUGEL,
POLZEN-HUGEL--Hill sensible to wagon-horses in those bad loose tracks of
sandy mud, but unimpressive on the Tourist, who has to admit that there
seldom was so flat a Hill. Rising, let us guess, forty yards in
the three or four miles it has had. Might be called a perceptibly
pot-bellied plain, with more propriety; flat country, slightly puffed
up;--in shape not steeper than the mould of an immense tea-saucer would
be. Tea-saucer 6 miles in diameter, 100 feet in depth, and of irregular
contour, which indeed will sufficiently represent it to the reader's
mind.
Saale, at four or five miles distance, bounds this scraggy lump on the
east and on the south. Westward and northward, springing about Mucheln
on each hand, and setting off to right and to left Saale-ward, are what
we take to be two brooks; at least are two hollows: and behind these,
the country rises higher; undulating still on lazy terms, but now
painted azure by the distance, not unpleasant to behold, with its litter
all lapped out of sight, and its poor brooks tinkling forward (as we
judge) into the Saale, Merseburg way, or reverse-wise into the Unstrut,
the last big branch of Saale. Southward from our Janus Height, eight or
nine miles off, may be seen some vestige of Freiburg; steeple or gilt
weathercock faintly visible, on the Unstrut yonder;--which I take to
be Soubise's bread-basket at present. And farther off, and opposite the
MOUTH of the Unstrut, well across the Saale, lies another namable Town
(visible in clear weather, as a smoke-cloud at certain hours, about
meal-time, when the kettles are on boil), the Town of Naumburg,--one of
several German Naumburgs,--the Naumburg of Gustaf Adolf; where his slain
body lay, on the night of Lutzen Battle, with his poor Queen and
others weeping over it. Naumburg is on the other side of Saale, not of
importance to Soubise in such posture.
This is the circular block or lump of country, on the north or northwest
side of which Friedrich now lies, and which will become, he little
thinks how memorable on the morrow. Over the heights, immediately
eastward of Friedrich, there is a kind of hollow, or scooped-out place;
shallow valley of some extent, which deserves notice against to-morrow:
but in general the ground is lazily spherical, and without noticeable
hollows or valleys when fairly away from the River. A dull blunt lump of
country; made of sand and mud,--may have been grassy once, with broom on
it, in the pastoral times; is now under poor plough-husbandry, arable or
scratchable in all parts, and looks rather miserable in winter-time. No
vestige of hedge on it, of shrub or bush; one tree, ugly but big, which
may have been alive in Friedrich's time, stands not far from Rossbach
Hamlet; one, and no more, discoverable in these areas.
Various Hamlets lie sprinkled about: very sleepy, rusty, irregular
little places; huts and cattle-stalls huddled down, as if shaken from
a bag; much straw, thick thatch and crumbly mud-brick; but looking warm
and peaceable, for the Four-footed and the Two-footed; which latter, if
you speak to them, are solid reasonable people, with energetic German
eyes and hearts, though so ill-lodged. These Hamlets, needing shelter
and spring-water, stand generally in some slight hollow, if well up the
Height, as Rorschach is; sometimes, if near the bottom, they are nestled
in a sudden dell or gash,--work of the primeval rains, accumulating from
above, and ploughing out their way. The rains, we can see, have been
busy; but there is seldom the least stream visible, bottom being too
sandy and porous. On the western slope, there is in our time a kind of
coal, or coal-dust, dug up; in the way of quarrying, not of mining; and
one or two big chasms of this sort are confusedly busy: the natives mix
this valuable coal-dust with water, mould it into bricks, and so use as
fuel: one of the features of these hamlets is the strange black bricks,
standing on edge about the cottage-doors, to drip, and dry in the sun.
For this or for other reasons, the westward slope appears to be the
best; and has a major share of hamlets on it: Rossbach is high up, and
looks over upon Mucheln, and its dim belfry and appurtenances, which lie
safe across the hollow, perhaps two miles off,--safe from Friedrich, if
there were eatables and lodging to be had in such a place. Friedrich's
left wing is in Rossbach. Bedra where Friedrich's right wing is;
Branderode where the Soubise right is; then Grost; Schevenroda,
Zeuchfeld, Pettstadt, Lunstadt,--especially Reichartswerben, where
Soubise's right will come to be: these the reader may take note of in
his Map. Several of them lie in ashes just then; plundered, replundered,
and at last set fire to; so busy have Soubise's hungry people been,
of late, in the Country they came to "deliver." The Freiburg road, the
Naumburg road, both towards Merseburg, cross this Height; straight like
the string, Saale by Weissenfels being the bow.
The HERRENHAUS (Squire's Mansion) still stands in Rossbach, with
the littery Hamlet at its flank: a high, pavilion-roofed, and though
dilapidated, pretentious kind of House; some kind of court round it,
some kind of hedge or screen of brushwood and brick-wall: terribly in
need of the besom, it and its environment throughout. King, I suppose,
did lodge there overnight: certain it is the Squire was absent; and
the Squire's Man, three days afterwards, reported to him as follows:...
"Saturday, the 5th, about 8 A.M., his Majesty mounted to the roof of
the Herrenhaus here, some tiles having been removed [for that end, or
by accident, is not said], and saw how the French and Reichs Army were
getting in movement"--wriggling out of their Camp leftwards, evidently
aiming towards Grost. "In about an hour, near half their Army was
through Grost, and had turned southward, rather southeastward, from
Grost, out in the Rossbach and Almsdorf region, and proceeding still
towards Pettstadt,"--towards Schevenroda more precisely, not towards
Pettstadt yet. "His Majesty looked always through the perspective: and
to me was the grace done to be ever at his side, and to name for him
the roads the French and Reichs Army was marching." [Muller, p. 50;
Rodenbeck, p. 326.]
The King had heard of this phenomenon hours before, and had sent out
Hussars and scouts upon it; but now sees it with his eyes:--"Going for
Freiburg, and their bread-cupboard," thinks the King; who does not as
yet make much of the movement; but will watch it well, and calculates to
have a stroke at the rear end of it, in due season. With which view, the
cavalry, Seidlitz and Mayer, are ordered to saddle; foot regiments, and
all else, to be in readiness. This French-Reichs Dauphiness is not rapid
in her field-exercise; and has a great deal of wriggling and unwinding
before she can fairly pick herself out, and get forward towards
Schevenroda on the Freiburg road. In three or in two parallel columns,
artillery between them, horse ahead, horse arear; haggling along
there;--making for their bread-baskets, thinks the King. A body
of French, horse chiefly, under St. Germain, come out, in the
Schortau-Almsdorf part, with some salvoing and prancing, as if intending
to attack about Rossbach, where our left wing is: but his Majesty sees
it to be a pretence merely; and St. Germain, motionless, and doing
nothing but cannonade a little, seems to agree that it is so. Dauphiness
continues her slow movements; King, in this Squire's Mansion of
Rossbach, sits down to dinner, dinner with Officers at the usual hour of
noon,--little dreaming what the Dauphiness has in her head.
Truth is, the Dauphiness is in exultant spirits, this morning; intending
great things against a certain "little Marquis of Brandenburg," to whom
one does so much honor. Generals looking down yesterday on the King of
Prussia's Camp, able to count every man in it (and half the men being
invisible, owing to bends of the ground), counted him to 10,000 or so;
and had said, "Pshaw, are not we above 50,000; let us end it! Take him
on his left. Round yonder, till we get upon his left, and even upon his
rear withal, St. Germain co-operating on the other side of him: on left,
on rear, on front, at the same moment, is not that a sure game?" A very
ticklish game, answers surly sagacious Lloyd: "No general will permit
himself to be taken in flank with his eyes open; and the King of Prussia
is the unlikeliest you could try it with!"
Trying it meanwhile they are; marching along by the low grounds here,
intending to sweep gradually leftwards towards Janus-Hill quarter; there
to sweep home upon him, coil him up, left and rear and front, in their
boa-constrictor folds, and end his trifle of an Army and him. "Why not,
if we do our duty at all, annihilate his trifle of an Army; take himself
prisoner, and so end it?" Report says, Soubise had really, in some
moment of enthusiasm lately, warned the Versailles populations to expect
such a thing; and that the Duchess of Orleans, forgetful of poor King
Louis's presence, had in HER enthusiasm, exclaimed: "TANT MIEUX, I shall
at last see a King, then!" But perhaps it is a mere French epigram, such
as the winds often generate there, and put down for fact.--Friedrich's
retreat to Weissenfels is cut off for Friedrich: an Austrian party has
been at the Herren-Muhle Bridge this morning, has torn it up and pitched
it into the river; planks far on to Merseburg by this time. And, in
fact, unless Friedrich be nimble--But that he usually is.
Friedrich's dinner had gone on with deliberation for about two hours,
Friedrich's intentions not yet known to any, but everybody, great and
small, waiting eagerly for them, like greyhounds on the slip,--when
Adjutant Gaudi, who had been on the House-top the while, rushes into the
Dining-room faster than he ought, and, with some tremor in his voice and
eyes, reports hastily: "At Schevenroda, at Pettstadt yonder! Enemy has
turned to left. Clearly for the left."--"Well, and if he do? No flurry
needed, Captain!" answered Friedrich,--(NOT in these precise words; but
rebuking Gaudi, with a look not of laughter wholly, and with a certain
question, as to the state of Gaudi's stomachic part, which is still
known in traditionary circles, but is not mentionable here);--and went,
with due gravity, himself to the roof, with his Officers. "To the
left, sure enough; meaning to attack us there:" the thing Friedrich had
despaired of is voluntarily coming, then;--and it is a thing of stern
qualities withal; a wager of life, with glorious possibilities behind.
Friedrich earnestly surveys the phenomenon for some minutes; in some
minutes, Friedrich sees his way through it, at least into it, and how
he will do it. Off, eastward; march! Swift are his orders; almost still
swifter the fulfillment of them. Prussian Army is a nimble article in
comparison with Dauphiness! In half an hour's time, all is packed and
to the road; and, except Mayer and certain Free-Corps or Light-Horse,
to amuse St. Germain and his Almsdorf people, there is not a Prussian
visible in these localities to French eyes. "At half-past two," says the
Squire's Man,--or let us take him a sentence earlier, to lose nothing
of such a Document: "At noon his Majesty took dinner; sat till about
two o'clock; then again went to the roof; and perceived that the
Enemy's Army at Pettstadt were turning about the little Wood there
northeastward, as if for Lunstadt [into the Lunstadt road];--such
cannonading too," from those Almsdorf people, "that the balls flew over
our heads,"--or I tremulously thought so. "At half-past two, the word
was given, March! And good speed they made about it, in this Herrenhaus,
and out of doors too, striking their tents, and cording up and trimly
shouldering everything with incredible brevity," as if machinery were
doing it; "and at three, on the Prussian part, all was packed and out
into the court for being carried off; and, in fact, the Prussian Army
was on march at three." Seidlitz, with all his Horse, vanishing round
the corner of the Height; speeding along, invisible on his northern
slope there, straight for the Janus-Polzen Hill part; the Infantry
following, double-quick;--well knowing, each, what he has got to do.
But at this interesting point, the Editors--small thanks to them,
authentic but thrice-stupid mortals--cut short our Eye-witness, not
so much as telling us his name, some of them not even his date or
whereabouts; and so the curtain tumbles down (as if its string had
been cut, or suddenly eaten by unwise animals), and we are left to gray
hubbub, and our own resources at second-hand. Except only that a French
Officer--one of those cannonading from Almsdorf, no doubt--declares
that "it was like a change of scene in the Opera (DECORATION D'OPERA),"
[Letter in MULLER: p. 60. In WESTPHALEN (ii. 128-133) is a much superior
French Letter, intercepted somewhere, and fallen to Duke Ferdinand; well
worth reading, on Rossbach and the previous Affairs.] so very rapid; and
that "they all rolled off eastward at quick time." At extremely quick
time;--and soon, in the slight hollow behind Janus Hugel, vanished from
sight of these Almsdorf French, and of the Soubise-Hildburghausen Army
in general. Which latter is agreeably surprised at the phenomenon;
and draws a highly flattering conclusion from it. "Gone, then; off
at double-quick for Merseburg; aha!" think the Soubise-Hildburghausen
people: "Double-quick you too, my pretty men, lest they do whisk away,
and we never get a stroke at them,!"--
Seidlitz meanwhile, with his cavalry (thirty-eight squadrons, about
4,000 horse), is rapidly doing the order he has had. Seidlitz at a sharp
military trot, and the infantry at doublequick to keep up near him,
which they cannot quite do, are, as we have said, making right across
for the Polzen-Hill and Janus-Hill quarter; their route the string,
French route the bow; and are invisible to the French, owing to the
heights between. Seidlitz, when he gets to the proper point eastward,
will wheel about, front to southward, and be our left wing; infantry, as
centre and right, will appear in like manner; and--we shall see!
The exultant Dauphiness, or Soubise-Hildburghausen Army (let us call it,
for brevity's sake, Dauphiness or French, which it mainly was), on that
rapid disappearance of the Prussians, never doubted but the Prussians
were off on flight for Merseburg, to get across by the Bridge there.
Whereat Dauphiness, doubly exultant, mended her own pace, cavalry at
a sharp trot, infantry double-quick, but unable to keep up,--for the
purpose of capturing or intercepting the runaway Prussians. Speed,
my friends,--if you would do a stroke upon Friedrich, and show the
Versailles people a King at last! Thus they, hurrying on, in two
parallel columns,--infantry, long floods of it, coming double-quick but
somewhat fallen behind; cavalry 7,000 or so, as vanguard,--faster and
faster; sweeping forward on their southern side of the Janus-and-Polzen
slope, and now rather climbing the same.
Seidlitz has his hussar pickets on the top, to keep him informed as
to their motions, and how far they are got. Seidlitz, invisible on the
south slope of the Polzen Hugel, finds about half-past three P.M. that
he is now fairly ahead of Dauphiness; Seidlitz halts, wheels, comes
to the top, "Got the flank of them, sure enough!"--and without waiting
signal or farther orders, every instant being precious, rapidly forms
himself; and plunges down on these poor people. "Compact as a wall, and
with an incredible velocity (D'UNE VITESSE INCROYABLE)," says one
of them. Figure the astonishment of Dauphiness; of poor Broglio, who
commands the horse here. Taken in flank, instead of taking other people;
intercepted, not in the least needing to intercept! Has no time to
form, though he tried what he could. Only the two Austrian regiments
got completely formed; the rest very incompletely; and Seidlitz, in the
blaze of rapid steel, is in upon them. The two Austrian regiments,
and two French that are named, made what debate was feasible;--courage
nowise wanting, in such sad want of captaincy; nay Soubise in person
galloped into it, if that could have helped. But from the first, the
matter was hopeless; Seidlitz slashing it at such a rate, and plunging
through it and again through it, thrice, some say four times: so that,
in the space of half an hour, this luckless cavalry was all tumbling off
the ground; plunging down-hill, in full flight, across its own infantry
or whatever obstacle, Seidlitz on the hips of it; and galloping madly
over the horizon, towards Freiburg as it proved; and was not again heard
of that day.
In about half an hour that bit of work was over; and Seidlitz, with
his ranks trimmed again, had drawn himself southward a little, into the
Hollow of Tageswerben, there to wait impending phenomena. For Friedrich
with the Infantry is now emerging over Janus Hill, in a highly
thunderous manner,--eighteen pieces of artillery going, and "four big
guns taken from the walls of Leipzig;" and there will be events anon.
It is said, Hildburghausen, at the first glimpse of Friedrich over
the hill-top, whispered to Soubise, "We are lost, Royal
Highness!"--"Courage!" Soubise would answer; and both, let us hope, did
their utmost in this extremely bad predicament they had got into.
Friedrich's artillery goes at a murderous rate; had come in view, over
the hill-top, before Seidlitz ended,--"nothing but, the muzzles of
it visible" (and the fire-torrents from it) to us poor French below.
Friedrich's lines; or rather his one line, mere tip of his left
wing,--only seven battalions in it, five of them under Keith from the
second or reserve line; whole centre and right wing standing "refused"
in oblique rank, invisible, BEHIND the Hill,--Friedrich's line, we say,
the artillery to its right, shoots out in mysterious Prussian rhythm,
in echelons, in potences, obliquely down the Janus-Hill side; straight,
rigid, regular as iron clock-work; and strides towards us, silent,
with the lightning sleeping in it:--Friedrich has got the flank of
Dauphiness, and means to keep it. Once and again and a third time, poor
Soubise, with his poor regiments much in an imbroglio, here heaped on
one another, there with wide gaps, halt being so sudden,--attempts
to recover the flank, and pushes out this regiment and the other,
rightward, to be even with Friedrich. But sees with despair that it
cannot be; that Friedrich with his echelons, potences and mysterious
Prussian resources, pulls himself out like the pieces of a
prospect-glass, piece after piece, hopelessly fast and seemingly no
end to them; and that the flank is lost, and that--Unhappy Generals of
Dauphiness, what a phenomenon for them! A terrible Friedrich, not fled
to Merseburg at all; but mounted there on the Janus Hill, as on his
saddle-horse, with face quite the other way;--and for holster-pistol,
has plucked out twenty-two cannon. Clad verily in fire; Chimera-like,
RIDING the Janus Hill, in that manner; left leg (or wing) of him
spurning us into the abysses, right one ready to help at discretion!
Hildburghausen, I will hope, does his utmost; Soubise, Broglio, for
certain do. The French line is in front, next the Prussians: poor
Generals of Dauphiness are panting to retrieve themselves. But with
regiments jammed in this astonishing way, and got collectively into the
lion's throat, what can be done? Steady, rigid as iron clock-work, the
Prussian line strides forward; at forty paces' distance delivers its
first shock of lightning, bursts into platoon fire; and so continues,
steady at the rate of five shots a minute,--hard to endure by poor
masses all in a coil. "The artillery tore down whole ranks of us," says
the Wutenberg Dragoon; [His Letter in MULLER, p. 83.] "the Prussian
musketry did terrible execution."
Things began %o waver very soon, French reeling back from the Prussian
fire, Reichs troops rocking very uneasy, torn by such artillery; when,
to crown the matter, Seidlitz, seeing all things rock to the due extent,
bursts out of Tageswerben Hollow, terribly compact and furious, upon the
rear of them. Which sets all things into inextricable tumble; and the
Battle is become a rout and a riding into ruin, no Battle ever more.
Lasted twenty-five minutes, this second act of it, or till half-past
four: after which, the curtains rapidly descending (Night's curtain,
were there no other) cover the remainder; the only stage-direction,
EXEUNT OMNES. Which for a 50 or 60,000, ridden over by Seidlitz Horse,
was not quite an easy matter! They left, of killed and wounded, near
3,000; of prisoners, 5,000 (Generals among them 8, Officers 300): in
sum, about 8,000; not to mention cannon, 67 or 72; with standards,
flags, kettle-drums and meaner baggages AD LIBITUM in a manner. The
Prussian loss was, 165 killed, 376 wounded;--between a sixteenth and a
fifteenth part of theirs: in number the Prussians had been little more
than one to three; 22,000 of all arms,--not above half of whom ever came
into the fire; Seidlitz and seven battalions doing all the fighting that
was needed, St. Germain tried to cover the retreat; but "got broken,"
he says,--Mayer bursting in on him,--and soon went to slush like the
others.
Seldom, almost never, not even at Crecy or Poictiers, was any Army
better beaten. And truly, we must say, seldom did any better deserve
it, so far as the Chief Parties went. Yes, Messieurs, this is the PETIT
MARQUIS DE BRANDEBOURG; you will know this one, when you meet him again!
The flight, the French part of it, was towards Freiburg Bridge; in full
gallop, long after the chase had ceased; crossing of the Unstrut there,
hoarse, many-voiced, all night; burning of the Bridge; found burnt, when
Friedrich arrived next morning. He had encamped at Obschutz, short way
from the field itself. French Army, Reichs Army, all was gone to staves,
to utter chaotic wreck. Hildburghausen went by Naumburg; crossed the
Saale there; bent homewards through the Weimar Country; one wild flood
of ruin, swift as it could go; at Erfurt "only one regiment was in
rank, and marched through with drums beating." His Army, which had been
disgustingly unhappy from the first, and was now fallen fluid on these
mad terms, flowed all away in different rills, each by the course
straightest home; and Hildburghausen arriving at Bamberg, with
hardly the ghost or mutilated skeleton of an Army, flung down
his truncheon,--"A murrain on your Reichs Armies and regimental
chaoses!"--and went indignantly home. Reichs Army had to begin at the
beginning again; and did not reappear on the scene till late next Year,
under a new Commander, and with slightly improved conditions.
Dauphiness Proper was in no better case; and would have flowed home
in like manner, had not home been so far, and the way unknown. Twelve
thousand of them rushed straggling through the Eichsfeld; plundering and
harrying, like Cossacks or Calmucks: "Army blown asunder, over a circle
of forty miles' radius," writes St. Germain: "had the Enemy pursued us,
after I got broken [burst in upon by Mayer and his Free-Corps people]
we had been annihilated. Never did Army behave worse; the first
cannon-salvo decided our rout and our shame." [St. Germain to Verney:
different Excerpts of Letters in the two weeks after Rossbach and before
(given in Preuss, ii. 97).]
In two days' time (November 7th), the French had got to Langensalza,
fifty-five miles from the Battle-field of Rossbach; plundering, running,
SACRE-DIEU-ing; a wild deluge of molten wreck, filling the Eichsfeld
with its waste noises, making night hideous and day too;--in the
villages Placards were stuck up, appointing Nordhausen and Heiligenstadt
for rallying place. [Muller, p. 73.]
Soubise rode, with few attendants, all night towards Nordhausen,--eighty
miles off, foot of the Bracken Country, where the Richelieu resources
are;--Soubise with few attendants, face set towards the Brocken;
himself, it is like, in a somewhat hag-ridden condition.
"The joy of poor Teutschland at large," says one of my Notes, "and how
all Germans, Prussian and Anti-Prussian alike, flung up their caps, with
unanimous LEBE-HOCH, at the news of Rossbach, has often been remarked;
and indeed is still almost touching to see. The perhaps bravest Nation
in the world, though the least braggart, very certainly EIN TAPFERES
VOLK (as their Goethe calls them); so long insulted, snubbed and
trampled on, by a luckier, not a braver:--has not your exultant
Dauphiness got a beautiful little dose administered her; and is gone off
in foul shrieks, and pangs of the interior,--let no man ask whitherward!
'SI UN ALLEMAND PEUT AVOIR DE L'ESPRIT (Can a German possibly have
sharpness of wits)?' Well, yes, it would seem: here is one German
graduate who understands his medicine-chest, and the quality of
patients!--Dauphiness got no pity anywhere; plenty of epigrams, and
mostly nothing but laughter even in Paris itself. Napoleon long after,
who much admires Friedrich, finds that this Victory of Rossbach was
inevitable; 'but what fills me with astonishment and shame,' adds he,
'is that it was gained by six battalions and thirty squadrons [seven
properly, and thirty-eight] over such a multitude!' [Montholon, MEMOIRES
&C. DE NAPOLEON (Napoleon's _Precis des Guerres de Frederic II.,_ vii.
210).]--It is well known, Napoleon, after Jena, as if Jena had not been
enough for him, tore down the first Monument of Rossbach, some poor
ashlar Pyramid or Pillar, raised by the neighborhood, with nothing more
afflictive inscribed on it than a date; and sent it off in carts for
Paris (where no stone of it ever arrived, the Thuringen carmen slinking
off, and leaving it scattered in different places over the face of
Thuringen in general); so that they had the trouble of a new one
lately." [Rodenbeck, _Beitrage,_ i. 299; ib. p. 385, Lithograph of the
poor extinct Monument itself.]
From Friedrich the "Army of the Circles," that is, Dauphiness and
Company,--called HOOPERS or "Coopers" (TONNELIERS), with a desperate
attempt at wit by pun,--get their Adieu in words withal. This is the
famed CONGE DE L'ARMEE DES CERCLES ET DES TONNELIERS; a short metrical
Piece; called by Editors the most profane, most indecent, most &c.; and
printed with asterisk veils thrown over the worst passages. Who
shall dare, searching and rummaging for insight into Friedrich, and
complaining that there is none, to lift any portion of the veil; and
say, "See--Faugh!" The cynicism, truly, but also the irrepressible
honest exultation, has a kind of epic completeness, and fulness of
sincerity; and, at bottom, the thing is nothing like so wicked as
careless commentators have given out. Dare to look a little:--
"ADIEU, GRANDS ERASEURS DE ROIS," so it starts: "Adieu, grand crushers
of Kings; arrogant wind-bags, Turpin, Broglio, Soubise,--Hildburghausen
with the gray beard, foolish still as when your beard was black in the
Turk-War time:--brisk journey to you all!" That is the first stanza;
unexceptionable, had we room. The second stanza is,--with the veils
partially lifted; with probably "MOISE" put into the first blank, and
into the third something of or belonging to "CESAR,"--
"Je vows ai vu comme...
Dans des ronces en certain lieu
Eut l'honneur de voir...
Ou comme au gre de sa luxure
Le bon Nicomede a l'ecart
Aiguillonnait sa flamme impure
Des..."
Enough to say, the Author, with a wild burst of spiritual enthusiasm,
sings the charms of the rearward part of certain men; and what a royal
ecstatic felicity there sometimes is in indisputable survey of the same.
He rises to the heights of Anti-Biblical profanity, quoting Moses on
the Hill of Vision; sinks to the bottomless of human or ultra-human
depravity, quoting King Nicomedes's experiences on Caesar (happily
known only to the learned); and, in brief, recognizes that there is, on
occasion, considerable beauty in that quarter of the human figure, when
it turns on you opportunely. A most cynical profane affair: yet, we must
say by way of parenthesis, one which gives no countenance to Voltaire's
atrocities of rumor about Friedrich himself in this matter; the reverse
rather, if well read; being altogether theoretic, scientific; sings with
gusto the glow of beauty you find in that unexpected quarter,--while
KICKING it deservedly and with enthusiasm. "To see the"--what shall
we call it: seat of honor, in fact, "of your enemy:" has it not an
undeniable charm? "I own to you in confidence, O Soubise and Company,
this fine laurel I have got, and was so in need of, is nothing more
or other than the sight of your"--FOUR ASTERISKS. "Oblige me, whenever
clandestine Fate brings us together, by showing me that"--always that,
if you would give me pleasure when we meet. "And oh," next stanza says,
"to think what our glory is founded on,"--on view of that unmentionable
object, I declare to you!--And through other stanzas, getting smutty
enough (though in theory only), which we need not prosecute farther.
[_OEuvres de Frederic,_ xii. 70-73 (WRITTEN at Freiburg, 6th November,
when his Majesty got thither, and found the Bridge burnt).] A certain
heartiness and epic greatness of cynicism, life's nakedness grown almost
as if innocent again; an immense suppressed insuppressible Haha, on the
part of this King. Strange TE-DEUM indeed. Coming from the very heart,
truly, as few of them do; but not, in other points, recommendable at
all!--Here, of the night before, is something better:--
TO WILHELMINA.
"NEAR WEISSENFELS [OBSCHUTZ, in fact; does not know yet what the Battle
will be CALLED], 5th November, 1757.
"At last, my dear Sister, I can announce you a bit of good news. You
were doubtless aware that the Coopers with their circles had a mind to
take Leipzig. I ran up, and hove them beyond Saale. The Duc de Richelieu
sent them a reinforcement of twenty battalions and fourteen squadrons
[say 15,000 horse and foot]; they then called themselves 63,000 strong.
Yesterday I went to reconnoitre them; could not attack them in the post
they held. This had rendered them rash. Today they came out with
the intention of attacking me; but I took the start of them (LES AI
PREVENU). It was a Battle EN DOUCEUR (soft to one's wish). Thanks to
God I have not a hundred men killed; the only General ill wounded
is Meinecke. My Brother Henri and General Seidlitz have slight hurts
[gun-shots, not so slight, that of Seidlitz] in the arm. We have all
the Enemy's cannon, all the... I am in full march to drive them over the
Unstrut [already driven, your Majesty; bridge burning].
"You, my dear Sister, my good, my divine and affectionate Sister
[faithful to the bone, in good truth, poor Wilhelmina], who deign to
interest yourself in the fate of a Brother who adores you, deign also
to share in my joy. The instant I have time, I will tell you more. I
embrace you with my whole heart; Adieu. F." [_OEuvres de Frederic,_
xxvii. i. 310.]
ULTERIOR FATE OF DAUPHINESS; FLIES OVER THE RHINE IN BAD FASHION:
DAUPHINESS'S WAYS WITH THE SAXON POPULATION IN HER DELIVERANCE-WORK.
Friedrich had no more fighting with the French. November 9th,
at Merseburg, in all stillness, Duke Ferdinand got his Britannic
Commission, his full Powers, from Friedrich and the parties interested;
in all stillness made his arrangements, as if for Magdeburg and his
Governorship there,--Friedrich hastening off for Silesia the while. Duke
Ferdinand did stay six days in Magdeburg, inspecting or pretending to
inspect; very pleasant with his Sister and the Royalties that, are now
there; but, at midnight of day sixth shot off silently on wider errand.
And, in sum, on Thursday, 24th November, 1757, appeared in Stade, on
horseback at morning parade there; intimating, to what joy of the poor
Brunswick Grenadiers and others, That he was come to take command;
that Kloster-Zeven is abolished; that we are not an "Observation Army,"
rotting here in the parish pound, any longer, but an "Allied Army" (such
now our title), intending to strike for ourselves, and get out of pound
straightway!--
"THURSDAY, 24th NOVEMBER-TUESDAY, 29th. Duke Ferdinand did accordingly
pick up the reins of this distracted Affair; and, in a way wonderful
to see, shot sanity into every fibre of it; and kept it sane and
road-worthy for the Five Years coming. With a silent velocity, an
energy, an imperturbable steadfastness and clear insight into cause and
effect; which were creditable to the school he came from; and were
a very joyful sight to Pitt and others concerned. So that from next
Tuesday, 'November 29th, before daylight,' when Ferdinand's batteries
began playing upon Harburg (French Fortress nearest to Stade), the reign
of the French ceased in those Countries; and an astonished Richelieu and
his French, lying scattered over all the West of Germany, in readiness
for nothing but plunder, had to fall more or less distracted in their
turn; and do a number of astonishing things. To try this and that, of
futile, more or less frantic nature; be driven from post after post; be
driven across the Aller first of all;--Richelieu to go home thereupon,
and be succeeded by one still more incompetent.
"DECEMBER 13th, a fortnight after Ferdinand's appearance, Richelieu had
got to the safe side of the Aller (burning of Zelle Bridge and Zelle
Town there, his last act in Germany); Ferdinand's quarters now wide
enough; and vigorous speed of preparation going on for farther chase,
were the weather mended. FEBRUARY 17th, 1758, Ferdinand was on foot
again; Prince de Clermont, the still more incompetent successor of
Richelieu, gazing wide-eyed upon him, but doing nothing else: and for
the next six weeks there was seen a once triumphant Richelieu-D'Estrees
French Army, much in rags, much in disorder, in terror, and here and
there almost in despair,--winging their way; like clouds of draggled
poultry caught by a mastiff in the corn. Across Weser, across Ems,
finally across the Rhine itself, every feather of them,--their
long-drawn cackle, of a shrieky type, filling all Nature in those
months; the mastiff steadily following. [Mauvillon, i. 252-284 ("9th
November, 1757-1st April, 1758"); Westphalen, i. 316-503 (abundantly
explicit, authentic and even entertaining,--with the ample
Correspondences, ib. ii. 147-350); Schaper, _Vie militaire du Marechal
Prince Ferdinand_ (2 tomes, 8vo, Magdebourg, 1796, 1799), i. 7-100 (a
careful Book; of an official exactitude, like Westphalen's,--and appears
to be left incomplete like his).] To the astonishment of Pitt and
mankind. Can this be the same Army that Royal Highness led to the Sea
and the Parish Pound? The same identically, wasted to about two-thirds
by Royal Highness; not a drum in it changed otherwise, only One Man
different,--and he is the important one!
"Pitt, when the news of Rossbach came, awakening the bonfires and
steeple-bells of England to such a pitch, had resolved on an emphatic
measure: that of sending English Troops to reinforce our Allied Army,
and its new General;--such an Ally as that Rossbach one being rare in
the eyes of Pitt. 'Postpone the meeting of Parliament, yet a few days,
your Majesty,' said Pitt, 'till I get the estimates ready!' [Thackeray,
i. 310.] To which Majesty assented, and all England with him: 'England's
own Cause,' thinks Pitt, with confidence: 'our way of Conquering
America,--and, in the circumstances, our one way!' English did land,
accordingly; first instalment of them, a 12,000 (in August next),
increased gradually to 20,000; with no end of furnishings to them and
everybody; with results again satisfactory to Pitt; and very famous in
the England that then was, dim as they are now grown."
The effect of all which was, that Pitt, with his Ferdinands and
reinforcements, found work for the French ever onwards from Rossbach;
French also turning as if exclusively upon perfidious Albion: and the
thing became, in Teutschland, as elsewhere, a duel of life and
death between these natural enemies,--Teutschland the centre of
it,--Teutschland and the accessible French Sea-Towns,--but the
circumference of it going round from Manilla and Madras to Havana and
Quebec again. Wide-spread furious duel; prize, America and life. By land
and sea; handsomely done by Pitt on both elements. Land part, we say,
was always mainly in Germany, under Ferdinand,--in Hessen and
the Westphalian Countries, as far west as Minden, as far east as
Frankfurt-on-Mayn, generally well north of Rhine, well south of Elbe:
that was, for five years coming, the cockpit or place of deadly fence
between France and England. Friedrich's arena lies eastward of that,
occasionally playing into it a little, and played into by it, and always
in lively sympathy and consultation with it: but, except the French
subsidizings, diplomatizings. and great diligenae against him in foreign
Courts, Friedrich is, in practical respects, free of the French;
and ever after Rossbach, Ferdinand and the English keep them in full
work,--growing yearly too full. A heavy Business for England and
Ferdinand; which is happily kept extraneous to Friedrich thenceforth; to
him and us; which is not on the stage of his affairs and ours, but is
to be conceived always as vigorously proceeding alongside of it, close
beyond the scenes, and liable at any time to make tragic entry on him
again:--of which we shall have to notice the louder occurrences and
cardinal phases, but, for the future, nothing more.
Soubise, who had crept into the skirts of the Richelieu Army in Hanover
or Hessen Country, had of course to take wing in that general fright
before the mastiff. Soubise did not cross the Rhine with it; Soubise
made off eastward; [Westphalen, i. 501 ("end of March, 1758").]--found
new roost in Hanau-Frankfurt Country; and had thoughts of joining the
Austrians in Bohemia next Campaign; but got new order,--such the pinches
of a winged Clermont with a mastiff Ferdinand at his poor draggled
tail;--and came back to the Ferdinand scene, to help there; and never
saw Friedrich again. Both Broglio and he had a good deal of fighting
(mostly beating) from Ferdinand; and a great deal of trouble and sorrow
in the course of this War; but after Rossbach it is not Friedrich or
we, it is Ferdinand and the Destinies that have to do with them. Poor
Soubise, except that he was the creature of Generalissima Pompadour,
which had something radically absurd in it, did not deserve all the
laughter he got: a man of some chivalry, some qualities. As for Broglio,
I remember always, not without human emotion, the two extreme points of
his career as a soldier: Rossbach and the Fall of the Bastille. He was
towards forty, when Friedrich bestrode the Janus Hill in that fiery
manner; he was turned of seventy when, from the pavements of Paris,
the Chimera of Democracy rose on him, in fire of a still more horrible
description.
Dauphiness-Bellona, in her special and in her widest sense, has made
exit, then. Gone, like clouds of draggled poultry home across the Rhine.
She was the most marauding Army lately seen, also the most gasconading,
and had the least capacity for fighting: three worse qualities no army
could have. How she fought, we have seen sufficiently. Before taking
leave of her forever, readers, as she is a paragon in her kind, would
perhaps take a glance or two at her marauding qualities,--by a good
opportunity that offers. Plotho at Regensburg, that a supreme Reichs
Diet may know what a "deliverance of Saxony" this has been, submits one
day the following irrefragable Documents, "which have happened," not
without good industry of my own, "to fall into my [Plotho's] hands."
They are Documents partly of epistolary, partly of a Petitionary form,
presented to Polish Majesty, out of that Saxon Country; and have an
AFFIDAVIT quality about them, one and all.
1. BIG DAUPHINESS (that is, D'Estrees) IN THE WESEL COUNTRIES, AT AN
EARLY STAGE,--WHILE STILL ENDEAVORING WHAT SHE COULD TO BEHAVE WELL,
HANGING 1,000 MARAUDERS AND THE LIKE (A private Letter):--
"COUNTY MARK, 20th JUNE, 1757. The French troops are going on here in a
way to utterly ruin us. Schmidt, their President of Justice, whom they
set up in Cleve, has got orders to change all the Magistracies of the
Country [Protestant by nature], so as that half the members shall be
Catholic. Bielefeld was openly plundered by the French for three hours
long. You cannot by possibility represent to yourself what the actual
state of misery in these Countries is. A SCHEFFEL of rye costs three
thalers sixteen groschen [who knows how many times its natural price!].
And now we are to be forced to eat the spoiled meal those French troops
brought with them; which is gone to such a state no animal would have
it. This poisoned meal we are to buy from them, ready money, at the
price they fix; and that famine may induce us, they are about to stop
the mills, and forcibly take away what little bread-corn we have left.
God have pity on us, and deliver us soon! Next week we are to have
a transit of 6,000 Pfalzers [Kur-Pfalz, foolish idle fellow, and
Kur-Baiern too, are both in subsidy of France, as usual; 6,000
Pfalzers just due here]; these, I suppose, will sweep us clean bare."
[_Helden-Geschichte,_ iv. 399.]:
Wesel Fortress, Gate of the Rhine, could not be defended by Friedrich:
and the Hanover Incapables, and England still all in St. Vitus, would
not hear of undertaking it; left it wide open for the French; never
could recover it, or get the Rhine-Gate barred again, during the whole
War. One hopes they repented;--but perhaps it was only Pitt and Duke
Ferdinand that did so, instead! The Wesel Countries were at once
occupied by the French; "a conquest of her Imperial Majesty's;"
continued to be administered in Imperial Majesty's name,--and are
thriving as above.
2. DAUPHINESS PROPER (that is, Soubise) IN THURINGEN, AT A LATE STAGE:--
"LETTER FROM FREIBURG, SHORTLY AFTER ROSSBACH.--It was on the 23d
October, a Sunday, that we of Freiburg had our first billeting of
French; a body of Cavalry from different regiments [going to take
Leipzig, take Torgau, what not]: and from that day Freiburg never
emptied of French, who kept marching through it in extraordinary
quantities. The marching lasted fourteen days, namely, till the 6th
November [day AFTER Rossbach; when they burnt our poor Bridge, and
marched for the last time]; and often the billeting was so heavy, that
in a single house there were forty or fifty men. Who at all times had to
be lodged and dieted gratis; nay many householders, over and above
the ordinary meal, were obliged to give them money too; and many poor
people, who can scarcely get their own bit of bread, had to run and
bring at once their sixteen or eighteen groschen [pence] worth of wine,
not to speak of coffee and sugar. And a great increase of the mischief
it was always, that the soldiers and common people did not understand
one another's language."--Heavy billeting; but what was that?... "Vast,
nearly impossible, quantities of forage and provision," were wrung from
us, as from all the other Towns and Villages about, "under continual
threatening to burn and raze us from the earth. Often did our French
Colonel threaten, 'He would have the cannon opened on Freiburg
straightway.' Nay, had it stood by foraging, we might have reckoned
ourselves lucky. But our straits increased day by day; and sheer
plundering became more and more excessive.
"The robbing and torturing of travellers, the plundering and burning of
Saxon Villages... Almost all the Towns and Villages hereabouts are so
plundered out, that many a one now has nothing but what he carries on
his body. Plundering was universal: and no sooner was one party away,
than another came, and still another; and often the same house was three
or four times plundered. Branderode, a Village two leagues from this
[stands on the Field of Rossbach, if we look], is so ruined out, that
nobody almost has anything left: Chief Inspector Baron von Bose's
Schloss there, with its splendid appointments, they ruined utterly; took
all money, victuals, valuables, furniture, clothes, linen and beds, all
they could carry; what could not be carried away, they cut, hewed and
smashed to pieces; broke the wine-casks; and even tore up the documents
and letters they found lying in the place. Branderode Dorf was twice
set fire to by them; and was, at last, with Zeuchfeld, which is an
Amtsdorf,--after both had been plundered,--reduced to ashes. The
Churches of Branderode and Zeuchfeld, with several other Churches, were
plundered; the altars broken, the altar-cloths and other vestures cut
to pieces, and the sacred vessels and cups carried away,--except [for we
have a notarial exactness, and will exaggerate nothing] that in the case
of Branderode they sent the cup back. Of the pollution of the altars,
and of the blasphemous songs these people sang in the churches, one
cannot think without horror.
"And it was merely our pretended Allies and Protectors that have
desecrated our divine service, utterly wasted our Country, reduced the
inhabitants to want and desperation, and, in short, have so behaved that
you would not know this region again. Truly these troops have realized
for us most of the infamies we heard reported of the Cossacks, and their
ravagings in Preussen lately.
"It is one of their smallest doings that they robbed a Saxon Clergyman
(name and circumstances can be given if required), three times over, on
the public Highway; shot at him, tied him to a horse's tail and dragged
him along with them; so that he is now lying ill, in danger of his life.
On the whole, it is our beloved Pastors, Clergymen most of all, that
have been plundered of everything they had.
"Balgart and Zschieplitz, both Villages half a league from this, have
likewise been heavily plundered; they have even left the Parson nothing
but what he wore on his back. Grost," another Rossbach place, "which
belongs to the Kammerjunker Heldorf, has likewise"... OHE, SATIS!--"All
this happened between the 23d and 31st October; consequently before the
Battle.... In many Villages you see the trees and fields sprinkled with
feathers from the beds that have been slit up.
"In several Villages belonging to the Royal Electoral privy Councillor
von Bruhl [who is properly the fountain of all this and of much other
misery to us, if we knew it!] the plundering likewise had begun; and a
quantity of about a hundred swine [so ho!] had been cut in pieces:
but in the midst of their work, the Allies heard that these were Bruhl
estates, and ceased their havoc of them. These accordingly are the only
lands in all this region whose fate has been tolerable.
"The appellation, every moment renewed, of 'Heretic!' was the courteous
address from these people to our fellow-Christians; 'heretic dogs
(KETZERISCHE HUNDE)' was a PRADICAT always in their mouth.
"In Weischutz," a mile or two from us, up the Unstrut, "a French Colonel
who wanted to ride out upon the works, made the there Pastor, Magister
Schren, stoop down by way of horse-block, and mounted into the saddle
from his back. [Messieurs, you will kindle the wrath of mankind some
day, and get a terrible plucking, with those high ways of yours!]
"Churches are all smashed; obscene songs were sung, in form of litany,
from the pulpits and altars; what was done with the communion-vessels,
when they were not worth stealing,"--is hideous to the religious sense,
and shall not be mentioned in human speech.
3. THE BROGLIO REINFORCEMENT COMING ACROSS TO JOIN SOUBISE, AND PERFORM
AT ROSSBACH (Humble Petition from the Magistrates of Sangerhausen, To
the King of Poland's Majesty):--
SANGERHAUSEN, 23d OCTOBER, 1757.--"Scarcely had we, with profound
submission (ALLERUNTERTHANIGST), under date of the 13th current,
represented to your Royal Majesty and Electoral Translucency how heavily
we were pressed down by the forage requisitions and transits of troops,
and the consequent, expenditure in food, drinking, in oats and hay,
which no one pays,--when directly thereafter, on the 14th of October,
a new French party, of the Fischer Corps,"--Fischer is a mighty Hussar,
scarcely inferior to Turpin; and stands in astonishing authority
with Richelieu, and an Army whose object is plunder, [Ferdinand's
Correspondente, SOEPIUS (_Westphalen,_ i. 40-127); &c. &c.]--"new party
of the Fischer Corps, of some sixty men and horse, arrived in the Town;
demanded meat, drink, oats and hay, and all things necessary; which they
received from us;--and not only paid not one farthing for all this, but
furthermore some of them, instead of thanks to their Landlord, Rossold,
forcibly broke up his press, drank his brandy, and carried off a TOUTE
(gather-all) with money in it. From a Tanner, Lindauer by name, they
bargained for a buckskin; and having taken, would not pay it. In the
RATHSKELLER (Town Public-house) they drank much wine, and gave nothing
for it: nay on marching off,--because no mounted guide (REITENDER BOTE)
was at hand, and though they had before expressly said none such would
be needed,--they rushed about like distracted persons (WIE RASENDE
LEUTE) in the market-place and in the streets; beat the people, tumbled
them about, and lugged them along, in a violent manner; using abusive
language to a frightful extent, and threatening every misfortune.
"Hardly were we rid of this confusion and astonishment when, on October
21st, a whole swarm of horses, men, women, children and wagons, which
likewise all belonged to the Fischer Corps, and were commanded by
First-Lieutenant Schmidt, came into our Town. This troop consisted of
80 men, part infantry, part cavalry; with some 80 work-horses, 10
baggage-wagons, and about 100 persons, women, sick people and the
like. They stayed the whole night here; made meat, drink, corn, hay
and whatever they needed be brought them; and went off next day without
paying anything.
"Our Inns were now almost quite exhausted of forage in corn or hay; and
we knew not how we were to pay what had been spent,--when the thirty
French Light Cavalry, of whom we, with profound submission, on the
13th HUJUS gave your Royal Majesty and Electoral Translucency account,
renewed their visit upon us; came, under the command of Rittmeister
de Mocu, on the 22d of October [while the baggage-wagons, work-horses,
women, sick, and so forth, were hardly gone], towards evening, into the
Town; consumed in meat and drink, oats and hay, and the like, what they
could lay hold of; and next morning early marched away, paying, as their
custom is, nothing.
"Not enough that,--besides the great forage-contribution (LIEFERUNG),
which we already, with profound submission, notified to your Royal
Majesty and Electoral Translucency as having been laid upon us; and
that, by order of the Duc de Broglio, a new requisition is now laid on
us, and we have had to engage for sixty-four more sacks of wheat,
and thirty-two of rye (as is noted under head A, in the enclosed
copy),--there has farther come on us, on the part of the Reichs Army,
from Kreis-Commissarius Heldorf [whose Schloss of Grost, we perceive,
they have since burnt, by way of thanks to him [Supra, No. 2.]], the
simultaneous Order for instant delivery of Forage (as under head B, here
enclosed)! Thus are we, at the appointed places, all at once to furnish
such quantities, more than we can raise; and know not when or where we
shall, either for what has been already furnished, or for what is
still to be, receive one penny of money: nay, over and above, we are to
sustain the many marchings of troops, and provide to the same what meat,
drink, oats, hay and so on, they require, without the least return of
payment!
"So unendurable, and, taken all together, so hard (SIC) begins the
conduct of these troops, that profess being come as friends and helpers,
to appear to us. And Heaven alone knows how long, under a continuance of
such things, the subjects (whom the Hail-storm of last year had at any
rate impoverished) shall be able to support the same. We would, were a
reasonable delivery of forage laid upon us even at a low price, and the
board and billet of the marching troops paid to us even in part, lay out
our whole strength in helping to bear the burdens of the Fatherland; but
if such things go on, which will soon leave us only bare life and empty
huts, we can look forward to nothing but our ruin and destruction. But,
as it is not your Royal Majesty's and Electoral Translucency's most
gracious will that we, your Most Supreme Self's most faithful subjects,
should entirely perish, therefore we repeat our former most submissive
prayer once again with hot (SIC) sorrow of mind to Highest-the-Same;
and sob most submissively for that help which your Most Supreme Self,
through most gracious mediation with the Duc de Richelieu, with the
Reichs Army or wherever else, might perhaps most graciously procure
for us. Who, in deepest longing thitherwards, with the most deepest
devotion, remain--" [_ Helden-Geschichte,_ iv. 688-691.] (NAMES,
unfortunately, not given).
How many Saxons and Germans generally--alas, how many men
universally--cry towards celestial luminaries of the governing kind
with the most deepest devotion, in their extreme need, under their
unsufferable injuries; and are truly like dogs in the backyard barking
at the Moon. The Moon won't come down to them, and be eaten as green
cheese; the Moon can't!
4. DAUPHINESS AFTER ROSSBACH. "Excise-Inspector Neitsche, at Bebra, near
Weissenfels [Bebra is well ahead from Freiburg and the burnt Bridge,
and a good twenty-five miles west of Weissenfels], writes To the King of
Poland's Majesty, 9th NOVEMBER, 1757:--
"May it please your Royal Majesty and Electoral Translucency, out of
your highest grace, to take knowledge, from the accompanying Registers
SUB SIGNO MARTIS [sign unknown to readers here], of the things which, in
the name of this Township of Bebra, the Burgermeister Johann Adam, with
the Raths and others concerned, have laid before the Excise-Inspection
here. As follows:--
"It will be already well known to the Excise-Inspection that on the
7th of November (A. C.) of the current year [day before yesterday, in
fact!], the French Army so handled this place as to have not only taken
from the inhabitants, by open force, all bread and articles of food, but
likewise all clothes, beds, linens (WASCHE), and other portable goods;
that it has broken, split to pieces, and emptied out, all chests,
boxes, presses, drawers; has shot dead, in the backyards and on the
thatch-roofs, all manner of feathered-stock, as hens, geese, pigeons;
also carried forth with it all swine, cow, sheep and horse cattle; laid
violent hands on the inhabitants, clapped guns, swords, pistols to their
breast, and threatened to kill them unless they showed and brought out
whatever goods they had; or else has hunted them wholly out of their
houses, shooting at them, cutting, sticking and at last driving them
away, thereby to have the freer room to rob and plunder: flung out hay
and other harvest-stock from the barns into the mud and dung, and had
it trampled to ruin under the horses, feet; nay, in fact, has dealt with
this place in so unpermitted a way as even to the most hard-hearted man
must seem compassionable."--Poor fellows: CETERA DESUNT; but that is
enough! What can a Polish Majesty and Electoral Translucency do? Here
too is a sorrowful howling to the Moon. [_Helden-Geschichte,_ iv. 692.]
... "For a hundred miles round," writes St. Germain, "the Country is
plundered and harried as if fire from Heaven had fallen on it; scarcely
have our plunderers and marauders left the houses standing.... I lead a
band of robbers, of assassins, fit for breaking on the wheel; they would
turn tail at the first gunshot, and are always ready to mutiny. If the
Government (LA COUR," with its Pompadour presiding, very unlikely for
such an enterprise!) "cannot lay the knife to the root of all this, we
may give up the notion of War." [St. Germain, after Rossbach and before
(in Preuss, UBI SUPRA).]...
Such a pitch have French Armies sunk to. When was there seen such
a Bellona as Dauphiness before? Nay, in fact, she is the same
devil-serving Army that Marechal de Saxe commanded with such
triumph,--Marechal de Saxe in better luck for opponents; Army then in
a younger stage of its development. Foaming then as sweet must, as new
wine, in the hands of a skilful vintner, poisonous but brisk; not run,
as now, to the vinegar state, intolerable to all mortals. She can now
announce from her camp-theatres the reverse of the Roucoux
program, "To-morrow, Messieurs, you are going to fight; our Manager
foresees"--you will be beaten; and we cannot say what or where the next
Piece will be! Impious, licentious, high-flaring efflorescence of all
the Vices is not to be redeemed by the one Quasi-Virtue of readiness to
be shot;--sweet of that kind, and sour of this, are the same substance,
if you only wait. How kind was the Devil to his Saxe; and flew away with
him in rose-pink, while it was still time!
Chapter IX.--FRIEDRICH MARCHES FOR SILESIA.
The fame of Friedrich is high enough again in the Gazetteer world;
all people, and the French themselves, laughing at their grandiloquent
Dauphiness-Bellona, and writing epigrams on Soubise. But Friedrich's
difficulties are still enormous. One enemy coming with open mouth, you
plunge in upon, and ruin, on this hand; and it only gives you room
to attempt upon another bigger one on that. Soubise he has finished
handsomely, for this season; but now he must try conclusions with Prince
Karl. Quick, towards Silesia, after this glorious Victory which the
Gazetteers are celebrating.
The news out of Silesia are ominously doubtful, bad at the best. Duke
Bevern, once Winterfeld was gone, had, as we observed, felt himself free
to act; unchecked, but also unsupported, by counsel of the due heroism;
and had acted unwisely. Made direct for Silesia, namely, where are
meal-magazines and strong places. Prince Karl, they say, was also
unwise; took no thought beforehand, or he might have gained marches,
disputed rivers, Bober, Queiss, with Bevern, and as good as hindered him
from ever getting to Silesia. So say critics, Retzow and others; perhaps
looking too fixedly on one side of the question. Certain it is, Bevern
marched in peace to Silesia; found it by no means the better place it
had promised to be.
Prince Karl--Daun there as second, but Karl now the dominant hand--was
on the heels of Bevern, march after march. Prince Karl cut athwart him
by one cunning march, in Liegnitz Country; barring him from Schweidnitz,
the chief stronghold of Silesia, and to appearance from Breslau, the
chief city, too. Bevern, who did not want for soldiership, when reduced
to his shifts, now made a beautiful manoeuvre, say the critics; struck
out leftwards, namely, and crossed the Oder, as if making for Glogau,
quite beyond Prince Karl's sphere of possibility,--but turned to right,
not to left, when across, and got in upon Breslau from the other or
east side of the River. Cunning manoeuvre, if you will, and followed by
cunning manoeuvres: but the result is, Prince Karl has got Schweidnitz
to rear, stands between Breslau and it; can besiege Schweidnitz when
he likes, and no relief to it possible that will not cost a battle. A
battle, thinks Friedrich, is what Bevern ought to have tried at first; a
well-fought battle might have settled everything, and there was no
other good likelihood in such an expedition: but now, by detaching
reinforcements to this garrison and that, he has weakened himself
beyond right power of fighting. [_OEuvres de Frederic,_ iv. 141,
159.] Schweidnitz is liable to siege; Breslau, with its poor walls
and multitudinous population, can stand no siege worth mentioning; the
Silesian strong places, not to speak of meal-magazines, are like to go
a bad road. Quite dominant, this Prince Karl; placarding and
proclaiming in all places, according to the new "Imperial Patent," [In _
Helden-Geschichte,_ (iv. 832, 833), Copy of it: "Absolved from all prior
Treaties by Prussian Majesty's attack on us, We" &c. &c. ("21st Sept.
1757").] That Silesia is her Imperial Majesty's again! Which seems to be
fast becoming the fact;--unless contradicted better. Quick!
Bevern has now, October 1st, no manoeuvre left but to draw out of
Breslau; post himself on the southern side of it, in a safe angle there,
marshy Lohe in front, broad Oder to rear, Breslau at his right-hand with
bread; and there intrenching himself by the best methods, wait slowly,
in a sitting posture, events which are extensively on the gallop at
present. One fancies, Had Winterfeld been still there! It is as brave an
Army, 30,000, or more, as ever wore steel. Surely something could have
been done with it;--something better than sit watching the events on
full gallop all round! Bevern was a loyal, considerably skilful and
valiant man; in the Battle of Lobositz, and elsewhere, we have seen him
brave as a lion: but perhaps in the other kind of bravery wanted here,
he--Well, his case was horribly difficult; full of intricacy. And he
sat, no doubt in a very wretched state, consulting the oracles, with
events (which are themselves oracular) going at such a pace.
Schweidnitz was besieged October 26th. Nadasti, with 20,000, was set
to do it; Prince Karl, with 60,000, ready to protect him; Prince Bevern
asking the oracles:--what a bit of news for Friedrich; breaking suddenly
the effulgency of Rossbach with a bar of ominous black! Friedrich,
still in the thick of pure Saxon business, makes instant arrangement for
Silesia as well: Prince Henri, with such and such corps, to maintain the
Saale, and guard Saxony; Marshal Keith, with such and such, to step over
into Bohemia, and raise contributions at least, and tread on the tail of
the big Silesian snake: all this Friedrich settles within a week; takes
certain corps of his own, effective about 13,000; and on November 13th
marches from Leipzig. Round by Torgau, by Muhlberg, Grossenhayn; by
Bautzen, Weissenberg, across the Queiss, across the Bober; and so, with
long marches, strides continually forward, all hearts willing, and all
limbs, though in this sad winter weather, towards relief of Schweidnitz.
At Grossenhayn, fifth day of the march, Friedrich learns that
Schweidnitz is gone. November 12th-14th, Schweidnitz went by
capitulation; contrary to everybody's hope or fear; certainly a
very short defence for such a fortress. Fault of the Commandant, was
everybody's first thought. Not probably the best of Commandants, said
others gradually; but his garrison had Saxons in it;--one day "180 of
them in a lump threw down their arms, in the trenches, and went over to
the Enemy." Owing to whatsoever, the place is gone. Such towers, such
curtains, star-ramparts; such an opulence of cannons, stores, munitions,
a 30,000 pounds of hard cash, one item. All is gone, after a fortnight's
siege. What a piece of news, as heard by Friedrich, coming at his utmost
towards the scene itself! As seen by Bevern, too, in his questioning
mood, it was an event of very oracular nature.
On Monday, 14th, Schweidnitz fell; Karl, with Nadasti reunited to him,
was now 80,000 odd; and lost no time. On Tuesday next, NOVEMBER 22d,
1757, "at three in the morning," long hours before daybreak, Karl, with
his 60,000, all learnedly arranged, comes rolling over upon hapless
Bevern: with no end of cannonading and storm of war: BATTLE OF
BRESLAU, they call it; ruinous to Bevern. Of which we shall attempt no
description: except to say, that Karl had five bridges on the Lohe,
came across the Lohe by five Bridges; and that Bevern stood to his arms,
steady as the rocks, to prevent his getting over, and to entertain
him when over; that there were five principal attacks, renewed and
re-renewed as long as needful, with torrents of shot, of death and
tumult; over six or eight miles of country, for the space of fifteen
hours. Battle comparable only to Malplaquet, said the Austrians; such a
hurricane of artillery, strongly intrenched enemy and loud doomsday of
war. Did not end till nine at night; Austrians victorious, more or
less, in four of their attacks or separate enterprises: that is to say,
masters of the Lohe, and of the outmost Prussian villages and posts in
front of the Prussian centre and right wing; victorious in that northern
part;--but plainly unvictorious in the southeast or Prussian left
wing,--farthest off from Breslau, and under Ziethen's command,--where
they were driven across the Lohe again, and lost prisoners and cannons,
or a cannon. [In Seyfarth, Three Accounts; _ Beylagan,_ ii. 198, 221,
234 et seq.]
Some of Bevern's people, grounding on this latter circumstance, and that
they still held the Battle-field, or most part of it, wrote themselves
victorious;--though in a dim brief manner, as if conscious of the
contrary. Which indeed was the fact. At the council of war, which he
summoned that evening, there were proposals of night-attack, and other
fierce measures; but Bevern, rejecting the plan for a night attack on
the Austrian camp as too dubious, did, in the dark hours, through the
silent streets of Breslau, withdraw himself across the Oder, instead;
leaving 80 cannon, and 5,000 killed and wounded; an evidently beaten man
and Army. And indeed did straightway disappear personally altogether, as
no longer equal to events. Rode out, namely, to reconnoitre in the gray
of his second sad morning, on this new Bank of the Oder; saw little
except gray mist; but rode into a Croat outpost, only one poor groom
attending him; and was there made prisoner:--intentionally, thought
mankind; intentionally, thinks Friedrich, who was very angry with the
poor man. [Preuss, ii. 102. More exact in Kutzen, DER TAG VON LEUTHEN
(Breslau, 1857,--an excellent exact little Compilation, from manifold
sources well studied), pp. 166-169, date "24th November."]
The poor man was carried to Vienna, if readers care to know; but being a
near Cousin there (second-cousin, no less, to the late Empress-Mother),
was by the high now-reigning Empress-Queen received in a charmingly
gracious manner, and sent home again without ransom. "To Stettin!"
beckoned Friedrich sternly from the distance, and would not see him at
all: "To Stettin, I say, your official post in time of peace! Command me
the invalid Garrison there; you are fit for nothing better!"--I will
add one other thing, which unhappily will seem strange to readers: that
there came no whisper of complaint from Bevern; mere silence, and loyal
industry with his poor means, from Bevern; and that he proved heroically
useful in Stettin two years hence, against the Swedes, against the
Russians in the Siege-of-Colberg time; and gained Friedrich's favor
again, with other good results. Which I observe was a common method with
Prussian Generals and soldiers, when, unjustly or justly, they fell into
trouble of this kind; and a much better one than that of complaining in
the Newspapers, and demanding Commissions of Inquiry, presided over by
Chaos and the Fourth-Estate, now is.
Bevern being with the Croats, the Prussian Army falls to General Kyau,
as next in rank; who (directly in the teeth of fierce orders that are
speeding hither for Bevern and him) marches away, leaving Breslau to its
fate; and making towards Glogau, as the one sure point in this wreck of
things. And Prince Karl, that same day, goes upon Breslau; which is in
no case to resist and be bombarded: so that poor old General Lestwitz,
the Prussian Commandant,--always thought to be a valiant old gentleman,
but who had been wounded in the late Action, and was blamably
discouraged,--took the terms offered, and surrendered without firing a
gun. Garrison and he to march out, in "Free Withdrawal;" these are the
terms: Garrison was 4,000 and odd, mostly Silesian recruits; but
there marched hardly 500 out with poor Lestwitz; the Silesian
recruits--persuaded by conceivable methods, that they were to be
prisoners of war, and that, in short, Austria was now come to be King
again, and might make inquiry into men's conduct--found it safer to
take service with Austria, to vanish into holes in Breslau or where they
could; and, for instance, one regiment (or battalion, let us hide the
name of it), on marching through the Gate, consisted only of nine
chief officers and four men. [Muller, SCHLACHT BEI LEUTHEN (Berlin,
1857,--professedly a mere abridgment and shadow of Kutzen: unindexed
like it), p. 12 (with name and particulars).]
There were lost 98 pieces of cannon; endless magazines and stores of
war. A Breslau scandalously gone;--a Breslau preaching day after
next (27th, which was Sunday), in certain of its churches, especially
Cardinal Schaffgotsch in the Dom Insel doing it, Thanksgiving Sermons,
as per order, with unction real or official, "That our ancient
sovereigns are restored to us:" which Sermons--except in the
Schaffgotsch case, Prince Karl and the high Catholic world all there in
gala--were "sparsely attended," say my authors. The Austrians are at
the top of their pride; and consider full surely that Silesia is theirs,
though Friedrich were here twice over. "What is Friedrich? We beat
him at Kolin. His Prussians at Zittau, at Moys, at Breslau in the new
Malplaquet, were we beaten by them? Hnh!"--and snort (in the Austrian
mess-rooms), and snap their fingers at Friedrich and his coming.
It was at Gorlitz (scene of poor Winterfeld's death) that Friedrich,
"on November 23d, the tenth day of his march," first got rumor of
the Breslau Malplaquet: "endless cannonading heard thereabouts all
yesterday!" said rumor from the east,--more and more steadily, as
Friedrich hastened forward;--and that it was "a victory for Bevern."
Till, at Naumburg on the Queiss, he gets the actual tidings: Bevern
gone to the Croats, Breslau going, Kyau marching vague; and what kind of
victory it was.
Ever from Grossenhayn onwards there had been message on message, more
and more rigorous, precise and indignant, "Do this, do that; your
Dilection shall answer it with your head!"--not one message of which
reached his Dilection, till Dilection and Fate (such the gallop of
events) had done the contrary: and now Dilection and his head have made
a finish of it. "No," answers Friedrich to himself; "not till we are all
finished!"--and pushes on, he too, like a kind of Fate. "What does or
can he mean, then?" say the Austrians, with scornful astonishment, and
think his head must be turning: "Will he beat us out of Silesia with
his Potsdam Guard-Parade then?" "POTSDAMSCHE WACHT-PARADE:"--so they
denominate his small Army; and are very mirthful in their mess-rooms. "I
will attack them, if they stood on the Zobtenberg, if they stood on the
steeples of Breslau!" said Friedrich; and tramped diligently forward.
Day after day, as the real tidings arrive, his outlook in Silesia is
becoming darker and darker: a sternly dark march this altogether. Prince
Karl has thrown a garrison into Liegnitz on Friedrich's road; Prince
Karl lies encamped with Breslau at his back; has above 80,000 when fully
gathered; and reigns supreme in those parts. Darker march there seldom
was: all black save a light that burns in one heart, refusing to be
quenched till death.
Friedrich sends orders that Kyau shall be put in arrest; that Ziethen
shall be general of the Bevern wreck, shall bring it round by Glogau,
and rendezvous with Friedrich at a place and day,--Parchwitz, 2d of
December coming;--and be steady, my old Ziethen. Friedrich brushes past
the Liegnitz Garrison, leaves Liegnitz and it a trifle to the right;
arrives at Parchwitz November 28th; and there rests, or at least his
weary troops do, till Ziethen come up; the King not very restful, with
so many things to prearrange; a life or death crisis now nigh. Well, it
is but death; and death has been fronted before now! We who are after
the event, on the safe sunny side of it, can form small image of the
horrors and the inward dubieties to him who is passing through it;--and
how Hope is needed to shine heroically eternal in some hearts. Fire of
Hope, that does not issue in mere blazings, mad audacities and chaotic
despair, but advances with its eyes open, measuredly, counting its
steps, to the wrestling-place,--this is a godlike thing; much available
to mankind in all the battles they have; battles with steel, or of
whatever sort.
Friedrich, at Parchwitz, assembled his Captains, and spoke to them; it
was the night after Ziethen came in, night of December 3d, 1757; and
Ziethen, no doubt, was there: for it is an authentic meeting, this at
Parchwitz, and the words were taken down.
FRIEDRICH'S SPEECH TO HIS GENERALS (Parchwitz, 3d December, 1757). [From
RETZOW, i. 240-242 (slightly abridged).]
"It is not unknown to you, MEINE HERREN, what disasters have befallen
here, while we were busy with the French and Reichs Army. Schweidnitz is
gone; Duke of Bevern beaten; Breslau gone, and all our war-stores there;
good part of Silesia gone: and, in fact, my embarrassments would be
at the insuperable pitch, had not I boundless trust in you, and your
qualities, which have been so often manifested, as soldiers and sons of
your Country. Hardly one among you but has distinguished himself by some
nobly memorable action: all these services to the State and me I know
well, and will never forget.
"I flatter myself, therefore, that in this case too nothing will be
wanting which the State has a right to expect of your valor. The hour is
at hand. I should think I had done nothing, if I left the Austrians in
possession of Silesia. Let me apprise you, then: I intend, in spite of
the Rules of Art, to attack Prince Karl's Army, which is nearly thrice
our strength, wherever I find it. The question is not of his numbers, or
the strength of his position: all this, by courage, by the skill of our
methods, we will try to make good. This step I must risk, or everything
is lost. We must beat the enemy, or perish all of us before his
batteries. So I read the case; so I will act in it.
"Make this my determination known to all Officers of the Army; prepare
the men for what work is now to ensue, and say that I hold myself
entitled to demand exact fulfilment of orders. For you, when I reflect
that you are Prussians, can I think that you will act unworthily? But if
there should be one or another who dreads to share all dangers with
me, he,"--continued his Majesty, with an interrogative look, and then
pausing for answer,--"can have his Discharge this evening, and shall not
suffer the least reproach from me."--Modest strong bass murmur; meaning
"No, by the Eternal!" if you looked into the eyes and faces of the
group. Never will Retzow Junior forget that scene, and how effulgently
eloquent the veteran physiognomies were.
"Hah, I knew it," said the King, with his most radiant smile, "none
of you would desert me! I depend on your help, then; and on victory
as sure."--The speech winds up with a specific passage: "The Cavalry
regiment that does not on the instant, on order given, dash full plunge
into the enemy, I will, directly after the Battle, unhorse, and make
it a Garrison regiment. The Infantry battalion which, meet with what
it may, shows the least sign of hesitating, loses its colors and its
sabres, and I cut the trimmings from its uniform! Now good-night,
Gentlemen: shortly we have either beaten the Enemy, or we never see one
another again."
An excellent temper in this Army; a rough vein of heroism in it, steady
to the death;--and plenty of hope in it too, hope in Vater Fritz. "Never
mind," the soldiers used to say, in John Duke of Marlborough's time,
"Corporal John will get us through it!"--That same evening Friedrich
rode into the Camp, where the regiments he had were now all gathered,
out of their cantonments, to march on the morrow. First regiment he came
upon was the Life-Guard Cuirassiers: the men, in their accustomed way,
gave him good-evening, which he cheerily returned. Some of the more
veteran sort asked, ruggedly confidential, as well as loyal: "What is
thy news, then, so late?" "Good news, children (KINDER): to-morrow
you will beat the Austrians tightly!" "That we will, by--!" answered
they.--"But think only where they stand yonder, and how they have
intrenched themselves?" said Friedrich. "And if they had the Devil in
front and all round them, we will knock them out; only thou lead us
on!"--"Well, I will see what you can do: now lay you down, and sleep
sound; and good sleep to you!" "Good-night, Fritz!" answer all; [Muller,
p. 21 (from Kaltenhorn, of whom INFRA); Preuss, &c. &c.] as Fritz ambles
on to the next regiment, to which, as to every one, he will have some
word.
Was it the famous Pommern regiment, this that he next spoke to,--who
answered Loudon's summons to them once (as shall be noticed by and by)
in a way ineffable, though unforgettable? Manteuffel of Foot; yes, no
other! [Archenholtz, ii. 61; and Kutzen, p. 35.] They have their own
opinion of their capacities against an enemy, and do not want for a
good conceit of themselves. "Well, children, how think you it will be
to-morrow? They are twice as strong as we." "Never thou mind that;
there are no Pommerners among them; thou knowest what the Pommerners can
do!"--FRIEDRICH: "Yea, truly, that do I; otherwise I durst not risk the
battle. Now good sleep to you! to-morrow, then, we shall either have
beaten the Enemy or else be all dead." "Yea," answered the whole
regiment; "dead, or else the Enemy beaten:" and so went to deep sleep,
preface to a deeper for many of them,--as beseems brave men. In this
world it much beseems the brave man, uncertain about so many things, to
be certain of himself for one thing.
These snatches of Camp Dialogue, much more the Speech preserved to us
by Retzow Junior, appear to be true; though as to the dates, the
circumstances, there has been debating. [Kutzen, pp. 175-181.] Other
Anecdotes, dubious or more, still float about in quantity;--of which
let us give only one; that of the Deserter (which has merit as a myth).
"What made thee desert, then?" "Hm, alas, your Majesty, we were got so
down in the world, and had such a time of it!"--"Well, try it one day
more; and if we cannot mend matters, thou and I will both desert."
A learned Doctor, one of the most recent on these matters, is astonished
why the Histories of Friedrich should be such dreary reading, and
Friedrich himself so prosaic, barren an object; and lays the blame
upon the Age, insensible to real greatness; led away by clap-trap
Napoleonisms, regardless of expense. Upon which Smelfungus takes him up,
with a twitch:--
"To my sad mind, Herr Doctor, it seems ascribable rather to the
Dryasdust of these Ages, especially to the Prussian Dryasdust, sitting
comfortable in his Academies, waving sublimely his long ears as he
tramples human Heroisms into unintelligible pipe-clay and dreary
continents of sand and cinders, with the Doctors all applauding.
"Had the sacred Poet, or man of real Human Genius, been at his work, for
the thousand years last past, instead of idly fiddling far away from
his work,--which surely is definable as being very mainly, That of
INTERPRETING human Heroisms; of painfully extricating, and extorting
from the circumambient chaos of muddy babble, rumor and mendacity, some
not inconceivable human and divine Image of them, more and more clear,
complete and credible for mankind (poor mankind dumbly looking up to him
for guidance, as to what it shall think of God and of Men in this Scene
of Things),--I calculate, we should by this time have had a different
Friedrich of it; O Heavens, a different world of it, in so many
respects!
"My esteemed Herr Doctor, it is too painful a subject. Godlike fabulous
Achilles, and the old Greek Kings of men, one perceives, after study,
to be dim enough Grazier Sovereigns, 'living among infinite dung,' till
their sacred Poet extricated them. And our UNsacred all-desecrating
Dryasdust,--Herr Doctor, I must say, it fills me with despair! Authentic
human Heroisms, not fabulous a whit, but true to the bone, and by all
appearance very much nobler than those of godlike Achilles and pious
AEneas ever could have been,--left in this manner, trodden under foot of
man and beast; man and beast alike insensible that there is anything
but common mud under foot, and grateful to anybody that will assure them
there is nothing. Oh, Doctor, oh, Doctor! And the results of it--You
need not go exclusively 'to France' to look at them. They are too
visible in the so-called 'Social Hierarchies,' and sublime gilt
Doggeries, sltcred and secular, of all Modern Countries! Let us be
silent, my friend."--
"Prussian Dryasdust," he says elsewhere, "does make a terrible job of
it; especially when he attempts to weep through his pipe-clay, or rise
with his long ears into the moral sublime. As to the German People,
I find that they dimly have not wanted sensibility to Friedrich; that
their multitudes of Anecdotes, still circulating among them in print and
VIVA VOCE, are proof of this. Thereby they have at least made a MYTH of
Friedrich's History, and given some rhythmus, life and cheerful human
substantiality to his work and him. Accept these Anecdotes as the Epic
THEY could not write of him, but were longing to hear from somebody who
could. Who has not yet appeared among mankind, nor will for some time.
Alas, my friend, on piercing through the bewildering nimbus of babble,
malignity, mendacity, which veils seven-fold the Face of Friedrich
from us, and getting to see some glimpses of the Face itself, one is
sorrowfully struck dumb once more. What a suicidal set of creatures;
commanding as with one voice, That there shall be no Heroism more among
them; that all shall be Doggery and Common-place henceforth. 'ACH,
MEIN LIEBER SULZER, you don't know that damned brood!'--Well, well.
'Solomon's Temple,' the Moslems say, 'had to be built under the chirping
of ten thousand Sparrows.' Ten thousand of them; committee of the whole
house, unanimously of the opposite view;--and could not quite hinder it.
That too is something!"--