No More Learning

October 30th, Daun, seeing Neisse Siege as good as gone
to water, decided with himself that he could still do a far
more important stroke: capture Dresden, get hold of Saxony
in Friedrich's absence. Daun turned round from Reichen-
bach, accordingly; and, at his slow-footed pace, addressed
himself to that new errand. Had he made better despatch,
or even been in better luck, it is very possible he might have
done something there. In Dresden, and in Governor
Schmettau with his small garrison, there is no strength for a
siege; in Saxony is nothing but some poor remnant under
Finck, much of it Free-corps and light people: capable of
being swallowed by the Reichs Army itself, -- were the
Reichs Army enterprising, or in good circumstances other-
wise. It is true the Russians have quitted Colberg as im-
possible; and are flowing homewards dragged by hunger:
the little Dohna Army will, therefore, march for Saxony;
the little Anti-Swedish Army, under Wedell, has likewise
been mostly ordered thither; both at their quickest. For
Daun, all turns on despatch; loiter a little, and Friedrich
himself will be here again!
Daun, I have no doubt, stirred his slow feet the fastest
he could. November 7th, Daun was in the neighbourhood of
Pirna Country again, had his Bridge at Pirna, for com-
munication; urged the Reichs Army to bestir itself, Now or
never. Reichs Army did push out a little against Finck;
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? 70 SEVEN-YEARS WAR RISES TO A HEIGHT, [book XVIII.
9th Nov. 1758.
made him leave that perpetual Camp of Gahmig, take new
camps, Kesselsdorf and elsewhere; and at length made him
shoot across Elbe, to the north-west, on a pontoon bridge
below Dresden, with retreating room to northward, and
shelter under the guns of that City. Reichs Army has like-
wise made powerful detachments for capture of Leipzig and
the north-western towns; capture of Torgau, the Magazine
town, first of all: summon them, with force evidently over-
powering, "Free-withdrawal, if you don't resist; and if you
do--! " -- At Torgau there was actual attempt made (No-
vember 12th), rather elaborate and dangerous-looking; under
Haddick, with near 10,000 of the "Austrian-auxiliary" sort:
to whom the old Commandant, --judging Wedell, the late
Anti-Swedish Wedell, to be now near, -- rushed out with
"300 men and one big gun;" and made such a firing and
festiculating as was quite extraordinary, as if Wedell were
ere already: till Wedell's self did come in sight; and the
overpowering Reichs Detachment made its best speed else-
whither. * The other Sieges remained things of theory; the
other Reichs Detachments hurried home, I think, without
summoning anybody.
Meanwhile, Daun, with the proper Artilleries at last
ready, comes flowing forward (November Sth-9th); and
takes post in the Great Garden, or south side of Dresden;
minatory to Schmettau and that City. The walls, or works,
are weak; outside there is nothing but Mayer and the Free-
corps to resist, -- who indeed has surpassed himself this
season, and been extraordinarily diligent upon that lazy
Reichs Army. Commandant Schmettau signifies to Daun,
the day Daun came in sight, "If your Excellenz advance
farther on me, the grim Rules of War in besieged places
will order That I burn the Suburbs, which are your defences
in attacking me,"-- and actually fills the fine houses on the
Southern Suburb with combustible matter, making due an-
nouncements, to Court and population, as well as toDauii.
"Burn the Suburbs? " answers Daun: "In the name of
civilised humanity, you will never think of such thing! "
"That will I, your Excellenz, of a surety, and do it! "
answers Schmettau. So that Dresden is full of pity, terror
* Tempelhof, &c. ; "Letter from a Prussian Officer," in Ueldea-Ge-
schichtc, v. 286.
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? CHAP. XIV. l BATTLE OP HOCHKIRCH. 71
9th Nov. 1758.
and speculation. ' The common rumour is, says Excellency
Mitchell, who is sojourning there for the present, "That
Briihl" (nefarious Briihl, born to be the death of us! ) "has
persuaded Polish Majesty to sanction this enterprise of
Daun's,"-- very careless, Briihl, what become of Dresden
or us, so the King of Prussia be well hurt or spited!
Certain enough, November 9th, Daun does come on,
regardless of Schmettau's assurances; so that, "about mid-
night," Mayer, who "can hear the enemy busily building
four big batteries" withal, has to report himself driven to
the edge of those high Houses (which are filled with com-
bustibles), and that some Croats are got into the upper
windows. "Burn them, then! " answers Schmettau (such
the dire necessity of sieged places): and, "at 3 A. m. " (three
hours notice to the poor inmates), Mayer does so; hideous
flames bursting out, punctually at the stroke of 3: "whole
"Suburb seemed on blaze" (about a sixth part of it actually
so), "nay you would have said the whole Town was en-
"vironed in flames. " Excellency Mitchell climbed a steeple:
"will not describe to your Lordship the horror, the terror
"and confusion of this night; wretched inhabitants running
"with their furniture" (what of it they had got flung out,
between 12 o'clock and 3) "towards the Great Garden; all
"Dresden, to appearance, girt in flames, ruins and smoke. "
Such anight in Dresden, especially in the Pima Suburb, as
was never seen before. * This was the sad beginning, or
attempt at beginning, of Dresden Siege; and this also was
the end of it, on Daun's part at present. For four days more,
he hung about the place, minatory, hesitative; but attempted
nothing feasible; and on the fifth day, -- "for a certain
weighty reason," as the Austrian Gazettes express it, -- he
saw good to vanish into the Pirna Rock-Country, and be out
of harm's way in the mean while!
The truth is, Daun's was an intricate case just now;
needing, above all things, swiftness of treatment; what,
of all things, it could not get from Daun. His denun * Mitchell, Memoirs and Papers, i. 4fi9. InHelden-Geschichte, v. 295-302,
minute account (corresponding well with Mitchell's); ib. 303-33, the certi-
fied details of the damage done: "280 houses lost;" "4 human lives. "
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? 72 SEVEN-YEARS WAR RISES TO A HEIGHT, [book XVHI.
20th Nov. 1758.
ciations on that burnt Suburb were again loud; but
Schmettau continues deaf to all that, -- means "to
defend himself by the known rules of war and of
honour;" declares, he "will dispute from street to street,
and only finish in the middle of Polish Majesty's Eoyal
Palace. " Denunciation will do nothing! Daun had
above 100,000 men in those parts. Rushing forward
with sharp shot and bayonet storm, instead of logical
denunciation, it is probable Daun might have settled
his Schmettau. But the hour of tide was rigorous,
withal; -- and such an ebb, if you missed it in hesi-
tating! Nnvemker l&th, Daun withdrew; the ebbing
coming. That same day, Friedrich was at Lauban in
the Lausitz, within a hundred miles again; speeding
hitherward; behind him a Silesia brushed clear, before
him a Saxony to be brushed. "Reason weighty" enough,
think Daun and the Austrian Gazettes! But such,
since you have missed the tide-hour, is the inexorable
fact of ebb, -- going at that frightful rate. Daun
never was the man to dispute facts.
November 20th, Friedrich arrived in Dresden; heard,
next day, that Daun had wheeled decisively homeward
from Pirna Country; that the Reichs Army and he are
diligently climbing the Metal Mountains; and that there
is not in Saxony, more than in Silesia, an enemy left.
What a Sequel to Hochkirch! "Neisse and Dresden
both! " we had hoped as sequel, if lucky: "Neisse or
Dresden" seemed infallible. And we are climbing the
Metal Mountains, under facts superior to us.
And Campaign Third has closed in this manner; --
leaving things much as it found them. Essentially a
drawn match; Contending Parties little altered in rela-
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? CHAP. XIV. ] BATTLE OF HOCHKIRCH. 73
20th Nov. 1758.
tive strength; -- both of them, it may be presumed,
considerably weaker. Friedrich is not triumphant, or
shining in the light of bonfires, as last Year; but, in
the mind of judges, stands higher than ever (if that
could help him much); -- and is not "annihilated" in
the least, which is the surprising circumstance.
Friedrich's marches, especially, have been wonder-
ful, this Year. In the spring time, old Marechal de
Belleisle, French Minister of War, consulting officially
about future operations, heard it objected once: "But
if the King of Prussia were to burst-in upon us there? "
"The King of Prussia is a great soldier," answered M.
de Belleisle; "but his Army is not a shuttle (navette)" -- to be shot about, in that way, from side to side of
the world! No surely; not altogether. But the King
of Prussia has, among other arts, an art of marching
Armies, which by degrees astonishes the old Marechal.
To "come upon us en navette," suddenly "like a shuttle"
from the other side of the web, became an established
phrase among the French concerned in these unfortunate
matters. *
"The Pitt-and-Ferdinand Campaign of 1758," says a
Note, which I would fain abridge, "is more palpably vic-
"torious than Friedrich's, much more an affair of bonfires
"than his; though it too has had its rubs. Loss of honour at
"Crefeld; loss ot Louisburg and Codfishery: these are serious
"blows our enemy has had. But then, to temper the joy
"over Louisburg, there was, at Ticonderoga, by Aber-
"cromby, on the small scale (all the extent of scale he had),
"a melancholy Platitude committed: that of walking into
"an enemy without the least reconnoitering of him, who
"proves to be chin-deep in abatis and fieldworks; and kills,
"much at his ease, about 2,000brave fellows, brought 5,000
* Archenholtz, i. 316; Montalembert, scepius, for the phrase "en
Miielle. "
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? 74 SEVEN-YEARS WAR RISES TO A HEIGHT, [book XVIII.
20ti Nov. 1758.
miles for that object. And obliges you to walk away on
the instant, and quit Ticonderoga, like a-- surely like a
very tragic Dignitary in Cocked-hat! To be cashiered, we
will hope; at least, to be laid on the shelf, and replaced
by some Wolfe or some Amherst, fitter for the business!
Nor were the Descents on the French Coast much to speak
of: 'Great Guns got at Cherbourg,' these truly, as ex-
hibited in Hyde-Park, were a comfortable sight, especially
to the simpler sort: but on the other hand, atMorlaix, on
the part of poor old General Bligh and Company, there had
been a Platitude equal or superior to that of Abercromby,
though not so tragical in loss of men. 'What of that? ' said
an enthusiastic Public, striking their balance, and joyfully
illuminating. -- Here is a Clipping from Ohio Country,
'Letter of an Officer' (distilled essence of Two Letters),
'dated, Fort-Duquesne, 28th November 1158:
"'Our small Corps under General Forbes, after much
'sore scrambling through the Wildernesses, and contending
'with enemies wild and tame, is, since the last four days,
'in possession of Fort Duquesne' (Pittsburg henceforth):
'Friday 24th, the French garrison, on our appearance,
'made off without fighting; took to boats down the Ohio,
'and vanished out of those Countries,' -- forever and a day,
we will hope. 'Their Louisiana-Canada communication is
'lost; and all that prodigious tract of rich country,' --
which Mr. Washington fixed upon long ago, is ours again,
if we can turn it to use. 'This day a detachment of us goes
'toBraddock's field of battle' (poor Braddock! ), 'to bury
'the bones of our slaughtered countrymen; many of whom
'the French butchered in cold blood, and, to their own
'eternal shame and infamy, have left lying above ground
'ever since. As indeed they have done with all those slain
'round the Fort in late weeks;' -- calling themselves a
civilised Nation too! "*
Lower Rhine, July -- November 1758. "Ferdinand's
manoeuvres, after Crefeld, on the France-ward side of
Khine, were very pretty: but, without Wesel, and versus
a Belleisle as War-Minister, and a Contades who was some-
thing of a General, it would not do. Belleisle made un-
common exertions, diligent to get his broken people drilled
* Old Newspapers (in Gentleman's Magazine for 1759, pp. 41, 39).
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? CHAP. X1V. 1 BATTLE OF HOCHKIRCH. 76
20th Nov. 1758.
"again; Contades was wary, and counter-manoeuvered
"rather well. Finally, Soubise" (readers recollect him and
his 24 or 30,000, who stood in Frankfurt Country, on the
hither or north side of Rhine), famed Bossbach Soubise,--
"pushing out, at Belleisle's bidding, towards Hanover, in a
"region vacant otherwise of troops, -- became dangerous to
"Ferdinand. 'Making for Hanover? ' thought Ferdinand:
"'Or perhaps meaning to attack my 12,000English that are
"just landed? Nay, perhaps my Rhine-Bridge itself, and
"the small Party left there? ' Ferdinand found he would
"have to return, and look after Soubise. Crossed, accord-
"ingly (August 8th), by his old Bridge at Rees, -- which he
"found safe, in spite of attempts there had been;* --and
"never recrossed during this War. Judges even say his first
"crossing had never much solidity of outlook in it; and
"though so delightful to the public, was his questionablest
"step.
"On the 12,000 English, Soubise had attempted nothing.
"Ferdinand joined his English at Soest (August 20th); to
"their great joy and his,** 10 or 12,000 as a first instalment:
"-- Grand-looking fellows, said the Germans. And did you
"ever see such horses, such splendour of equipment, regard-
"less of expense? Not to mention those Bergschotten (Scotch
"Highlanders), with their bagpipes, sporrans, kilts, and
"exotic costumes and ways; astonishing to the German
"mind. *** Out of all whom (Bergschotten included), Ferdi-
"nand, by management,-- and management was needed,
* "Fight ofMeer" (Chevert, with 10,000, beaten off, and the Bridge
BaVed, by Imhof, with 3,000; -- both clever soldiers; Imhof in better lack, and favoured by the ground: "5th August 1758"): Mauvillon, i. 315.
** Duke of Marlborough's heavy-laden Letter to Pitt, "Koesfeld, August
15th:'' "Nothing but rains and uncertainties;1' "marching, latterly, up to
our middles In water;" have come from Embden, straight south towards
WeselCountry, almost 150 miles (Soest still a good sixty miles to southeast
of us). Chatham Correspondence (London, 1838), i. 334, 337. The poor Duke
died in two months hence; and the command devolved on Lord George
Sackville, as is too well known.
*** Romantic view of the Bergschotten (2,000 of them, led by the Junior
of . the Sir Robert Keiths, above mentioned, who is a soldier as yet), in
Anhenholtz, l. 351-353: ib. and in Preuss, n. 136, of the "uniforms with
gold and silver lace," of the superb horses, "one regiment all roan horses,
another all black, another all" &c.
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? 76 SEVEN-TEARS WAR RISES TO A HEIGHT, [book XVm.
20th Nov. 1758.
'-- got a great deal of first-rate fighting, in the next Four
'Years.
"Nor, in regard to Hanover, could Soubise make any-
'thing of it; though he did (owing to a couple of stupid
'fellows, General Prince von Ysenburg and General Oberg,
'detached by Ferdinand on that service) escape the lively
'treatment Ferdinand had prepared for him; and even gave
'a kind of Beating to each of those stupid fellows, * -- one of
'which, Oberg's one, might have ruined Oberg and his
'Detachment altogether, had Soubise been alert, which he
'by no means was! 'Paris made such jeering aboutRoss-
'bach and the Prince de Soubise,' says Voltaire,** 'and
'nobody said a word about these two Victories of his, next
'Year! For which there might be two reasons: one, ac-
'cording to Tempelhof, that'the Victories were of the so-so
'kind (sie waren auch darnach);' and another, that they
'were ascribed to Broglio, on both occasions, -- how justly,
'nobody will now argue!
"Contades had not failed, in the mean while, to follow
'with the main Army; and was now elaborately manoeuver-
'ing about; intent to have Lippstadt, or some Fortress in
'those Rhine-Weser Countries. On the tail of that second
'so-so Victory by Soubise, Contades thought, Now would
'be the chance. And did try hard, but without effect.
Ferdinand was himself attending Contades; and mistakes
were not likely. Ferdinand, in the thick of the game
'October 21st-30th), 'made a masterly movement' -- that is
'to say, cut Contades and his Soubise irretrievably asunder:
'no junction now possible to them; the weaker of them
'liable to ruin, -- unless Contades, the stronger, would
'give battle; which, though greatly outnumbering Ferdi-
'nand, he was cautious not to do.
A melancholic cautious
'man, apt to be over-cautious, -- nicknamed 'L'Apothecaire'
* 1>>. "Fight of Sand ershausen" (Broglio, as Soubise's vanguard, 12,000;
versus Ysenburg, 7,000, who stupidly would not withdraw tilt beaten: "23d
July 1758," before Ferdinand had come across again. 2? . Fight of Luttern-
berg (Soubise, 30,000; versus Oberg, about 18,000, who stupidly hung back
till Soubise was all gathered, and then &c. , still more stupidly: "10th Oc-
tober 1758"). See Mauritian, I. 312 (or better, Archenholtz, I. 345); and
Mauvillon, i. 327. Both Lutternberg and Sandershausen are in the neigh-
bourhood of Cassel; -- as many of those Ferdinand fights were.
? * Hisloire de Louis XV.
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? CHAP. XIV. ] BATTLE OF HOCHKIRCH. 77;
20th Nov. 1758.
"by the Parisians, from his down looks, -- but had good
"soldier qualities withal. Soubise and he haggled about, a
"short while, -- not a long, in these dangerous circum-
"stances; and then had to go home again, without result,
"each the way he came; Contades himself repassing through
"Wesel, and wintering on his own side of the Rhine. "
How Pitt is succeeding, and aiming to succeed, on
the French Foreign Settlements: on the Guinea Coast,
on the High Seas everywhere; in the West Indies; still
more in the East, -- where General Lally (that fiery
0'Mul/a%, famous since Fontenoy), missioned with
"full-powers," as they call them, is raging up and
down, about Madras and neighbourhood, in a violent,
impetuous, more and more bankrupt manner: -- Of all
this, we can say nothing for the present, little at any
time. Here are two facts of the financial sort, suffi-
ciently illuminative. The much-expending, much-sub-
sidying Government of France cannot now borrow ex-
cept at 7 per cent Interest; and the rate of Marine
Insurance has risen to 70 per cent. * One way and
other, here is a Pitt clearly progressive; and a long-
pending Jenkins's-Ear Question in a fair way to be
settled! --
Friedrieh stays in Saxony about a month, inspect-
ing and adjusting; thence to Breslau, for Winter-
quarters. His Winter is like to be a sad and silent
one, this time; with none of the gaieties of last Year;
the royal heart heavy enough with many private sor-
rows, were there none of public at all I This is a
word from him, two days after finishing Daun for the
season:
* Retzow, ii. 5.
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? 78 SEVEN-YEARS WAR RISES TO A HEIGHT, [book XVm.
23d Nov. 1758.
Friedrich to Mylord Marischal (at Colombier in Neufchatel).
Dresden, 23d November 1758.
"There is nothing left for us, mon cher Mylord, but to
"mingle and blend our weeping for the losses we have had.
"If my head were a fountain of tears, it would not suffice for
"the grief I feel.
"Our Campaign is over; and there has nothing come of
"it, on one side or the other, but the loss of a great many
"worthy people, the misery of a great many poor soldiers
"crippled forever, the ruin of some Provinces, the ravage,
"pillage and conflagration of some flourishing Towns. Ex-
"ploits these which make humanity shudder: sad fruits of
"the wickedness and ambition of certain People in Power,
"who sacrifice everything to their unbridled passions! I
"wish you, mon cher Mylord, nothing that has the least
"resemblance to my destiny; and everything that is wanting
"to it. " "Your old friend, till death. " -- F. *
* (Entires de Frederic, xx. 273.
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? BOOK XIX.
FRIEDRICH LIKE TO BE OVERWHELMED IN THE
SEVEN-YEARS WAR.
1759-1760.
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? Jan. --April 1759.
CHAPTER I.
PRELIMINARIES TO A FOURTH CAMPAIGN.
The posting of the Five Armies this Winter, --
Five of them in Germany, not counting the Russians,
who have vanished to Cimmeria over the horizon, for
their months of rest, -- is something wonderful, and
strikes the picturesque imagination. Such a Chain of
Posts, for length, if for nothing else! From the centre
of Bohemia eastward, Daun's Austrians are spread all
round the western Silesian Border and the south-eastern
Saxon; waited on by Prussians, in more or less pro-
ximity. Next are the Reichsfolk; scattered over Thii-
ringen and the Franconian Countries; fronting partly
into Hessen and Duke Ferdinand's outskirts: -- the
main body of Duke Ferdinand is far to westward, in
Miinster Country, vigilant upon Contades, with the
Rhine between. Contades and Soubise, -- adjoining
on the Reichsfolk are these Two French Armies: Sou-
bise's, some 25,000, in Frankfurt-Ems Country, be-
tween the Mayn and the Lahn, with its back to the
Rhine; then Contades, onward to Maes River and the
Dutch Borders, with his face to the Rhine, -- and
Duke Ferdinand observant of him on the other side.
That is the "Cordon of Posts" or winter-quarters, this
Year. "From the Giant Mountains and the Metal
"Mountains, to the Ocean; -- to the mouth of Rhine,"
may we not say; "and back again to the Swiss Alps
"or springs of Rhine, that Upper-Rhine Country being
Carlyle, Frederick the Great. XI. t>
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? 82 FRIEDRICH LIKE TO BE OVERWHELMED. [book m.
Jan. --April 1759.
"all either French or Austrian, and a basis for Sou-
"bise? "* Not to speak of Ocean itself, and its winged
War-Fleets, lone-somely hovering and patrolling; or of
the Americas and Indies beyond!
"This is such a Chain of mutually vigilant Winter-
"quarters," says Archenholz, "as was never drawn in
"Germany, or in Europe, before. " Chain of about
300,000 fighting men, poured out in that lengthy
manner. Taking their winter siesta there, asleep with
one eye open, till reinforced for new business of death
and destruction against Spring. Pathetic surely, as
well as picturesque. "Three Campaigns there have
"already been," sighs the peaceable observer: "Three
"Campaigns, surely furious enough; Eleven Battles in
"them,** a Prag, a Kolin, Leuthen, Rossbach;-- must
"there still be others, then, to the misery of poor man-
"kind? " thus sigh many peaceful persons. Not con-
sidering what are, and have been, the rages, the in-
iquities, the loud and silent deliriums, the mad blind-
nesses and sins of mankind; and what amount of cal-
cining these may reasonably take. Not calcinable in
three Campaigns at all, it would appear! Four more
Campaigns are needed: then there will be innocuous
ashes in quantity; and a result unexpected, and worth
marking in World-History.
It is notably one of Friedrich's fond hopes, -- of
which he keeps up several, as bright cloud-hangings in
the haggard inner world he now has, -- that Peace is
just at hand; one right struggle more, and Peace must
? Archenholtz, i. 30B.
** Stcn/. cl, v. 185. This, I suppose, would be his enumeration: Lobositj
(1756); Prni/, Kolin, Hastenbeck, Gross-Jagersdorf, Itossbach, Breslau, Lett-
then (1757); Crefold, Zorndorf, Hofhkirch (1758): "eleven hitherto in all. "
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? CHAP, i. l PRELIMINARIES TO A FOURTH CAMPAIGN. 83
Jan. -April 1759.
come! And on the part of Britannic George and him,
repeated attempts were made,-- one in the end of this
Year 1759; -- but one and all of them proved futile,
and, unless for accidental reasons, need to be men-
tioned here. Many men, in all nations, long for Peace;
but there are Three Women at the top of the world
who do not; their wrath, various in quality, is great
in quantity, and disasters do the reverse of appeas-
ing it.
The French people, as is natural, are weary of a
War which yields them mere losses and disgraces;
"War carried on for Austrian whims, which likewise
seem to be impracticable! " think they. And their
Bernis himself, Minister of Foreign Affairs, who began
this sad French-Austrian Adventure, has already been
remonstrating with Kaunitz, and grumbling anxiously,
"Could not the Swedes, or somebody, be got to mediate?
Such a War is too ruinous! " Hearing which, the
Pompadour is shocked at the favourite creature of her
hands; hastens to dismiss him ("Be Cardinal, then, you
ingrate of a Bernis; disappear under that Red Hat! ")
-- and appoints, in his stead, one Choiseul (known
hitherto as Stainville, Comte de Stainville, French Ex-
cellency at Vienna, but now made Duke on this pro-
motion), Due de Choiseul;* who is a Lorrainer, or
Semi-Austrian, by very birth; and probably much fitter
for the place. A swift, impetuous kind of man, this
Choiseul, who is still rather young than otherwise; plenty
of proud spirit in him, of shifts, talent of the reckless
sort; who proved very notable in France for the next
twenty years.
French trade being ruined withal, money is running
* Minister of Foreign Affairs, "11th November 1758" (Barbier, iv. 294).
6*
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? 84 FRIEDRICH LIKE TO BE OVERWHELMED. [book XIX.
Jan. -- April 1759.
dreadfully low: but they appoint a new Controller-
General; a M. de Silhouette, who is thought to have
an extraordinary creative genius in Finance. Had he
but a Fortunatus-Purse, how lucky were it! With
Fortunatus Silhouette as purseholder, with a fiery young
Choiseul on this hand, and a fiery old Belleisle on
that, Pompadour meditates great things this Year, --
Invasions of England; stronger German Armies; better
German Plans, and slashings home upon Hanover it-
self, or the vital point; -- and flatters herself, and her
poor Louis, that there is on the anvil, for 1759, such
a French Campaign as will perhaps astonish Pitt and
another insolent King. Very fixed, fell, and feminine
is the Pompadour's humour in this matter. Nor is the
Czarina's less so; but more, if possible; unappeasable except by death. Imperial Maria Theresa has masculine
reasons withal; great hopes, too, of late. Of the War's
ending till flat impossibility stop it, there is no likeli-
hood.
To Pitt this Campaign 1759, in spite of bad omens
at the outset, proved altogether splendid: but greatly
the reverse on Friedrich's side; to whom it was the
most disastrous and unfortunate he had yet made, or
did ever make. Pitt at his zenith, in public reputation;
Friedrich never so low before, nothing seemingly but
extinction near ahead, when this Year ended. The
truth is, apart from his specific pieces of ill-luck, there
had now begun for Friedrich a new rule of procedure,
which much altered his appearance in the world.
Thrice over had he tried by the aggressive or invasive
method; thrice over made a plunge at the enemy's
heart, hoping so to disarm or lame him: but that, with
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? CHAP. I. ] PRELIMINARIES TO A FOURTH CAMPAIGN. 85
Jan. --April 1759.
resources spent to such a degree, is what he cannot do
a fourth time; he is too weak henceforth to think of
that.
Prussia has always its King, and his unrivalled
talent; but that is pretty much the only fixed item.
Prussia vmus France, Austria, Russia, Sweden and the
German Reich, what is it as a field of supplies for war!
Except its King, these are failing, year by year; and
at a rate fatally swift in comparison. Friedrich cannot
now do Leuthens, Rossbachs; far-shining feats of
victory, which astonish all the world. His fine
Prussian veterans have mostly perished; and have
been replaced by new levies and recruits; who are
inferior both in discipline and in native quality; --
though they have still, people say, a noteworthy taste
of the old Prussian sort in them; and do, in fact, fight
well to the last. But "it is observable," says Retzow
somewhere, and indeed it follows from the nature of
the case, "that while the Prussian Army presents
"always its best kind of soldiers at the beginning of a
"war, Austria, such are its resources in population,
"always improves in that particular, and its best troops
"appear in the last campaigns. " In a word, Friedrich
stands on the defensive henceforth; disputing his ground
inch by inch: and is reduced, more and more, to battle
obscurely with a hydra-coil of enemies and impediments;
and to do heroisms which make no noise in the Ga-
zettes. And, alas, which cannot figure in History
either, -- what is mora a sorrow to me here!
Friedrich, say all judges of soldiership and human
character who have studied Friedrich sufficiently, "is
greater than ever," in these four Years now coming. *
* Berenhorst, Kricjsknnsl. ; Retzow; &c.
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