Chapter 12. Another Step

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_ The Russian infantry being involved in the turmoil and confusion caused by the charge of Seidlitz, and the defeat of their cavalry, the Prussian infantry again pressed forward, pouring in a heavy fire and charging with the bayonet. Three battalions had been drawn from this very country and, maddened by the tales they had heard of Cossack cruelty, were not to be denied. The Russians, however, keeping their ranks, filling up the gaps as they were formed, and returning as best they could the fire of the Prussians, held together with sullen obstinacy. By this time the ammunition on both sides was exhausted, and now the struggle became hand to hand, bayonet against bayonet, butt end of musket to butt end.

Seldom has so terrible a struggle ever been witnessed. Nightfall was approaching. Foot by foot the inert Russian mass was pushed backwards. One of their generals, Demikof, collected some two thousand foot and a thousand horse, and took possession of a knoll; and Frederick ordered them to be dispersed again. Forcade was ordered to attack them with two battalions, and General Rutter to bring up the Dohna men again and take them in flank; but the latter had not recovered from their state of demoralization, and at the first cannon shot turned and ran, continuing their flight even further than before, and taking refuge in the woods. Frederick instantly dismissed Rutter from the service.

Then, as night had completely fallen, the terrible conflict ceased. Fermor by this time, finding that there was no crossing the rivers, had returned. No regiment or battalion of his army remained in order. There was but a confused crowd, which the officers did their best to form into some sort of order, regardless of regiment or battalion. The Cossacks scoured the fields under the cover of night, plundering the dead and murdering the wounded, flames marking their path. Four hundred of them were caught at their work by the Prussian hussars, and every one killed.

Frederick sent for his tents, and the army pitched its camp, facing the Russians; but during the night the latter, having got into a sort of order, moved away to the westward and bivouacked on Drewitz Heath, facing the battle ground.

Fermor had some twenty-eight thousand men still with him, while Frederick had eighteen thousand. The former's loss had been twenty-one thousand, five hundred and twenty-nine killed, wounded, or missing; of whom eight thousand were killed. That of the Prussians was eleven thousand, three hundred and ninety, of whom three thousand six hundred and eighty were killed. Thus each side lost a third of its number in this terrible struggle.

The next morning the Russians got into better order, and drew up in order of battle. A cannonade was for some time kept up on both sides, but the armies were beyond range of artillery.

Neither party had any real thoughts of fighting. Fermor, beaten on his own ground the day before, could not dream of attacking the Prussians. The latter were worn out by the fatigues of the previous day. Moreover, on each side the musketry ammunition was used up. The hussars, pursuing the Cossacks, had in the night come upon the Russian waggon train at Kleim, and carried off a good deal of portable plunder.

The next morning, under cover of a fog, the Russians retreated, reached their baggage, and then moved slowly away; and, harassed by Dohna, sullenly continued their retreat to the Russian frontier. If Frederick could have pressed them, he would probably have won another victory; but he had news which called him to hasten away west to join Prince Henry, as his presence there was urgently required for the defence of Saxony.

Fergus had been with the king, when the Dohna regiments gave way before the impetuous charge of the Russians; the rest of the staff having been sent away, one after the other, either to bring up Seidlitz or to order a fresh movement among the infantry; and as the king rode down to endeavour to restore order, he followed closely behind him. The confusion was terrible. The Russian horse, mixed up with the infantry, were sabring and trampling them down.

Suddenly three of them dashed at the king. Fergus, setting spurs to his horse, interposed between them and Frederick. One of the Russians was ridden over, horse and man, by the impetus of his rush. The other two attacked him furiously, and for a moment he was very hard pressed. He kept his horse prancing and curvetting, and managed to keep both his assailants on his right; until at last he cut one down and, half a minute later, ran the other through the body.

"Gallantly done, Major Drummond," the king said quietly as, wheeling his horse, Fergus returned back to take his post behind him. "I shall not forget that you have saved my life."

Then, without further comment, Frederick continued his work trying to rally the infantry; ordering, entreating, and even laying the cane he always carried across their shoulders.

A minute later there was a thunder of hoofs, and Seidlitz burst down upon the Russian mass, changing in a moment the fate of the battle. Excited by the late encounter, Fergus's horse took its bit between its teeth, joined Seidlitz's cavalry as they swept past and, in spite of the efforts of its rider, plunged with him into the midst of the fight. For the next few minutes Fergus had but slight knowledge of what was going on, he being engaged in a series of hand-to-hand fights with both cavalry and infantry. Three times he was wounded, and then the pressure ceased, and he was again galloping across the moors in pursuit of the Russian horse.

It was not until Seidlitz's force drew rein that he recovered the control of his horse. Its flank was bleeding from a bayonet gash, and a bullet had gone through its neck. The first wound was of comparatively small consequence, but he feared that the other was serious; but though the horse panted from its exertion and excitement, its breath came regularly; and it was evident that the ball had not hit the spine, for had it done so it would have fallen at once.

He turned and rode back with the cavalry, who dismounted a short distance from the scene of action, in readiness to take their part again, should they be required; while he pursued his way to the spot where the king had stationed himself, surrounded by several of his staff. The king glanced at him, and then said:

"You are relieved from duty, Major Drummond. Let one of the surgeons see to you, at once."

Fergus rode but a short distance and then, turning suddenly faint, he slid from his horse to the ground. One of the staff, happening to look round, at once rode back to him.

"You had best let me bandage up your wounds roughly," he said. "It will be difficult to find a surgeon, now that they are all up to their eyes in work, somewhere in the rear."

Fergus had received two severe wounds in the face, and a bayonet thrust through his leg. The officer did his best to stanch the bleeding, and was still occupied in doing so when Karl rode up, jumped from his horse, and ran to his master's side.

"Where have you been, Karl?" Fergus asked, for the soldier had also received a severe wound in the head.

"I followed you, master, as in duty bound; but I was some distance behind you, and in that melee I could not get near you; and being mixed up with one of the squadrons, I did not see you as you came back, and was in a great state about you until, on riding up to the staff, one of the officers pointed you out to me."

"I think that you are in good hands now," the officer said. "I will join the king again."

Fergus thanked him warmly, but in a weak voice.

"The first thing, master, is for you to get a drink," Karl said; and he took, from the holster of Fergus's saddle, a flask that he had placed there that morning. "Take a good drink of this," he said, "then I will see to your wounds. It is plain enough to see that that officer knew nothing about them."

Fergus drank half of the contents of the flask, and then handed it to Karl.

"You finish it up," he said. "You want it as much as I do."

"Not so much, master; but I want it badly enough, I own."

Having drank, he proceeded to rebandage his master's wounds, first laying on them rolls of lint he took from his own saddlebag.

"I never go on a campaign without lint and a bandage or two," he said. "Many a life has been lost that might easily enough have been saved, had they been at hand."

He laid the lint on the wounds, and then bound them firmly and evenly. He had a bandage left, when he had finished this. With the aid of a man who was limping to the rear, he used it for stanching his own wounds.

"Well, master," he said, "you cannot do better than lie here, for the present. I will look after the horses, and fasten them up to that bush. The battle is going on as fiercely as ever, and looks as if it would go on until dark. If so, there will be no collecting the wounded tonight; but as soon as I see where the king bivouacs, I will get you there somehow."

"I shall do very well here--at any rate, for the present, Karl. In the meantime, it would be a good thing if you would take the two horses down to the brook, and give them a good drink. You mayn't get a chance later on. As my horse Turk is wounded in two places, I have no doubt the poor beast is as thirsty as I am."

"The bayonet wound is of no consequence," Karl said, after examining the horse's flanks; "except that it has taken a good bit off its value. I don't think this bullet wound through the neck is serious, either."

In an hour Karl returned, leading the horses.

"I feel all the better for a wash, captain. I wish you could have one, too. I have filled my water bottle, but you will want that before morning."

By means of the valises and cloaks, Fergus was propped up into a half-sitting position; and he remained where he was until, after nightfall, the din of battle ceased. He had eaten a few mouthfuls of bread, and felt stronger; and by the time the tents were pitched, and the bivouac fires lighted, he was able to stand. With Karl's assistance he mounted in side-saddle fashion and, Karl leading the horses, made for the tents of the king's staff, five hundred yards away. Captain Diedrich, the officer who shared the tent with Fergus, helped Karl to lift him down and carry him in.

"Do you want a surgeon to see you?"

"No, they must have thousands of serious cases on hand. I merely fainted from loss of blood. The two wounds in my head cannot be very serious, and Karl has bandaged them up as well as a surgeon could do. The worst wound is in my leg. The bayonet went right through it, and for a moment pinned it to the saddle. However, it is but a flesh wound, behind the bone about six inches below the knee. It bled very freely at first, but Karl stanched it, and it has not burst out since; so it is evident that no great harm is done."

"I will bring you in some wine and water now," Diedrich said. "They are getting supper, and I will send you a bowl of soup, as soon as it is ready."

After Karl had tethered the horses--that of Fergus with the others belonging to the staff, and his own with those of the escort and staff orderlies--he sat down at one of the fires, ate his supper--for each man carried three days' provisions in his haversack--and, chatting with his comrades, heard that several of the orderlies had been killed in the fight; and that four of the officers of the royal staff had also fallen under the enemy's fire, as they carried messages through the storm of case shot and bullets. All agreed that never had they seen so terrible a fight, and that well-nigh a third, if not more, of the army had been killed or wounded.

"We made a mistake about these Russians," one of the troopers said. "They are dirty, and they don't even look like soldiers, but I never saw such obstinate beggars to fight. From the moment the cavalry made their first charge they were beaten, and ought to have given in; but they seemed to know nothing about it, and that second line of theirs charged as if it was but the beginning of a battle. I was never so surprised in my life as when they poured down on us, horse and foot; but all that was nothing to the way they stood, afterwards. If they had been bags of sawdust they could not have been more indifferent to our fire.

"That was a bad business of Dohna's men. I thought, when we joined them, they looked too spick and span to be any good; but that they should run, almost as fast and far as the men of the Federal army at Rossbach, is shameful. Neither in the last war nor in this has a Prussian soldier so disgraced himself.

"I don't envy them. I don't suppose a man in the army will speak to them, and we may be sure that it will be a long time, indeed, before our Fritz gets over it. It will need some hard fighting, and something desperate in the way of bravery, before he forgives them.

"How is your master, Karl?"

"He will do. He has got three wounds, and lost a lot of blood; but in a fortnight he will be in the saddle again. Perhaps less, for he is as hard as steel."

"He saved the king's life, Karl. I was twenty yards away, and was wedged in so that there was no moving, except backwards; for Dohna's men were half mad with fright, and the Russians were cutting and slashing in the middle of us."

"I saw it," Karl said. "I was close to you at the time. I put spurs to my horse and rode over three or four of our own men, and cut down one who grasped my reins; but I got there too late. I had no great fear of the result, though. Why, you know, he killed six Pomeranians who were looting Count Eulenfurst's place, close to Dresden; and he made short work of those three Russians. It was done beautifully, too. They tried to get one on each side of him, but he kept them on his right, and that made a safe thing of it.

"He is a quiet, good-tempered officer. There is as much fun about him as a boy, but when his spirit is up, there are not many swordsmen in the army that could match him. Why, when he first joined, nearly three years ago, he was in the 3rd Royal Dragoons, my own regiment; and I heard the sergeant who was in the fencing room say that there was not an officer in the regiment who was a match for him with the sword.

"Now I have finished my pipe, and must be going to look after him again."

The king's surgeon examined Fergus's wounds the next morning, and said that, although he would not be able to sit a horse until his leg had healed, he would otherwise soon be convalescent.

Soon after he had left him, Sir John Mitchell came in to see him. As the English ambassador had very often, during the last two winters, met Fergus in the king's apartments, at which he himself was a regular visitor, they were by this time well known to each other. Mitchell, indeed, regarded Fergus as a valuable assistant in his work of interesting Frederick, and turning his mind from his many troubles and anxieties.

"The surgeon has just given a good account of you to the king, Drummond," he said; "and his majesty expressed much satisfaction at hearing that your wounds are not serious.

"'That youth is not like most of your compatriots, Mitchell,' he said to me with a smile; 'ever ready to fight, but equally ready to join in a drinking bout, should opportunity offer. He is always on horseback, and as hardy and as healthy as can be. With one of the hard-drinking sort, fever might set in; but there is no risk of it with him.

"'As I told you, he saved my life yesterday. I was nearly compelled to take to my sword, but that would have been of little avail against the three Russians. Save for the sake of Prussia, my life is of no great value to me, for 'tis one full of care and trouble; but for my country's sake I would fain hold on to it, as long as there is hope for her deliverance from her enemies.

"'You can congratulate him on his promotion, Mitchell, for I made him a major on the spot. It was a brilliant feat, as brilliant as that which he performed at Lobositz, or that at Count Eulenfurst's house at Dresden, each of which got him a step. 'Tis not often that an officer gets thrice promoted for distinguished bravery. Each time the feat was the talk of the whole army; and it will not be less so at the present time, methinks, nor will any feel jealous at his rapid rise.'"

"The king is too kind, your excellency."

"I do not think so, Drummond. I have marked you a good deal during the last two years, and you have borne yourself well; and as a Scotchman I am proud of you. You have the knack of your kinsman Keith of entering into the king's humours; of being a bright companion when he is in a good temper, and of holding your tongue when he is put out; of expressing your opinion frankly, and yet never familiarly; and your freshness and hopefulness often, I see, cheer the king, whose Prussians cannot, for their lives, help being stiff and formal, or get to talk with him as if he were a human being like themselves.

"Next to Keith and myself, I think that there is no one with whom the king can distract his mind so completely as with you. To him it is like getting a whiff of the fresh air from our Scottish hills. He told the surgeon to see that you were sent down with the first batch of wounded officers."

The next day, accordingly, while the two armies were watching each other and the cannon were growling, Fergus was taken down to Frankfort.

Zorndorf was fought on the 25th of August; and on the 2nd of September Frederick started with the army for Saxony, where Prince Maurice had been sorely pressed by Daun and the newly-raised army of the Confederates, and had had to take post on some heights a short distance from Dresden.

"A bad job, major," Karl grumbled as he brought the news to Fergus, who was quartered in a private house. "The king has gone to have a slap at Daun; and here are we, left behind. If he would have waited another fortnight, we might have been with him."

"Perhaps we shall get there in time yet, Karl. You may be sure that as soon as Daun hears that the king is coming he will, as usual, begin to fortify himself; and it will need no small amount of marching and counter-marching to get him to come out and give battle. He was slow and cautious before, but after Leuthen he is likely to be doubly so.

"However, I will get a tailor here today to measure me for a new uniform. What with blood, and your cutting my breeches to get at my leg, I must certainly get a new outfit before I rejoin.

"I hope I shall be with the marshal again. It is a good deal more lively with him than it is with the king's staff; who, although no doubt excellent soldiers, are certainly not lively companions. I do hope there will be no great battle until we get there. I should think I might start in a week."

The surgeon, however, would not hear of this; and it was the end of the third week in September before Fergus rode from Frankfort. The news from the south was so far satisfactory that he had fidgeted less than he would otherwise have done. Daun had, in fact, retired hastily from Meissen, and had taken post in an almost impregnable position at Stolpen. Neisse was being besieged and must be relieved, but Daun now blocked Frederick's way at Stolpen, both to that town and to Bautzen--cut him off, indeed, from Silesia, and for the moment the royal army and that of Prince Maurice were lying at Dresden. Fergus, therefore, was content to follow the doctor's orders, and to spend four days on the journey down to Dresden.

Keith was there, and received him joyfully. Lindsay greeted him vociferously.

"So you have gone up another step above me," he laughed. "Never was a fellow with such luck as you have. Saved the king's life, I hear. Tumbled over scores of Russians. Won the victory with your own sword."

"Not quite as much as that, Lindsay," Fergus laughed. "The scores of Cossacks come down to three, of whom one my horse tumbled over, and I managed the other two. Still, although the battle was only half finished when I was put out of all further part in it, I may be said in one way to have won it; for had the king fallen, there is no saying how matters might have gone. It is true that we could not have lost it, for the Russians were past taking the offensive, but it might have been a drawn battle."

"It was a terrible business," Lindsay said seriously. "As bad in its way as Prague, that is to say in proportion to the numbers engaged. Everyone says they would rather fight three Austrians than one Russian. The marshal has rather scored off the king; for he warned him that, though slow, the Russians were formidable foes, but the king scoffed at the idea. He has found out now that he greatly undervalued them, and has owned as much to Keith.

"I am sorry to say the marshal is not well. He suffers a good deal, and I fancy that, after this campaign is over, he will ask to be relieved from active duty in the field, and will take the command of the army covering Dresden. He has led a hard life, you see, and has done as much as three ordinary men.

"Still, we shall see how he is next spring. It would almost break his heart to have to give up before this war is over."

"It is difficult to say when that will be, Lindsay. Here we are, getting towards the third year, and the war is not one whit nearer to the end than it was when we left Berlin. It is true that we have no longer to count France as formidable, but Russia has turned out far more so than we expected; and having once taken the matter up, the empress, if she is half as obstinate as her soldiers, is likely to go on at it for a long time. And we are using up our army very fast, and cannot replace our losses as Austria and Russia can do."

"I hope they are not going to make another twenty years' war of it," Lindsay said. "If you go on in the way that you are doing, Drummond, you will be a field marshal in a third of that time; but you must remember about the proverb of the pitcher and the well."

"Yes, Lindsay, but you must remember that I am having a share of hard knocks. I have been wounded twice now, to say nothing of being stunned and taken prisoner; so you see I am having my share of bad luck, as well as good. Now at present you have never had as much as a scratch, and when your bad luck comes, it may come all in a lump."

"There is something in that, Fergus, though I own that I had not thought of it. Well, perhaps it is better to take it in small doses than have it come all at once.

"So you have brought your man back safe, I see, though he has had an ugly slash across the cheek.

"By the way, I hope that those two sword cuts are not going to leave bad scars, Drummond. It would be hard to have your beauty spoilt for life, and you only nineteen; though, fortunately, everyone thinks you two or three years older. However, they will be honourable scars, and women don't mind any disfigurement in a man, if it is got in battle. It is a pity, though, that you did not get them when defending the king's life, instead of in the cavalry charge afterwards.

"You brought your horse safe out of the battle, I hope?"

"He has, like myself, honourable scars, Lindsay. He got an ugly gash on the flank with a bayonet; and I am afraid, when it heals, white hair will grow on it. He had also a bullet through the neck. Fortunately it missed both spine and windpipe, and is quite healed up now."

"It is really a pity to take such a horse as that under fire," Lindsay said regretfully.

"Well, when one risks one's own life, one ought not to mind risking that of a horse, however valuable."

"No, I suppose not. Still, it is a pity to ride so valuable an animal. You are paid so much for risking your own life, you see, Drummond; but it is no part of the bargain that you should risk that of a horse worth any amount of money."

Fergus, on his arrival, called at once on Count Eulenfurst; who, with his wife and daughter, were delighted to see him, for he had now been absent from Dresden since Frederick had marched against Soubise, thirteen months before.

"We heard from Captain Lindsay," the count said, "when the army arrived here, some three weeks since, that you were wounded, but not gravely; also, that for valour shown in defending the king, when he was attacked by three Russians, you had been promoted to the rank of major, upon which we congratulate you heartily. And now that you have come, I suppose your king will soon be dashing away with you again.

"What a man he is, and what soldiers! I can assure you that sometimes, when I read the bulletins, I am inclined to regret that I was not born two days' journey farther north. And yet, in spite of his fierce blows at all these enemies, there is no sign of peace being any nearer than when you dropped down to our rescue, some twenty-seven months ago. 'Tis a terrible war."

"It is, indeed, count. Certainly, when I crossed the seas to take service here, I little thought how terrible was the struggle that was approaching. If we had known it, I am sure that my mother would never have let me leave home."

"She must be terribly uneasy about you," the countess said. "Do you hear from her often?"

"She writes once a month, and so do I. I get her letters in batches. I know that she must be very anxious, but she says nothing about it in her letters. She declares that she is proud that I am fighting for a Protestant prince, so hemmed in by his enemies; and that the thoughts and hopes of all England are with him, and the bells ring as loudly at our victories, through England and Scotland, as they do at Berlin."

"If we of Saxony had understood the matter sooner," the count said, "we should be surely fighting now on your side; and indeed, had not Frederick compelled his Saxon prisoners to serve with him, had he sent them all to their homes, there would have been no animosity and, as Protestants, the people would soon have come to see that your cause was their own. Most of them do see it, now; for whenever the enemy have entered Saxony, they have plundered and ill treated the people, especially the Protestants.

"Are your horses still alive?"

"Yes, count, and well, save that one was wounded at Zorndorf; but for that he cannot blame me, for it was his own doing. When Seidlitz charged into the midst of the Russians, he passed close to us; and Turk, maddened by excitement, seized the bit in his teeth and joined him in the melee. I got three wounds and he had two, but happily he has been cured as rapidly as I have, though with no advantage to the appearance of either of us."

"Will the scars on your face always show as they do now?" Thirza asked.

"I am sure I hope not," he said. "At present they are barely healed; but in time, no doubt, the redness will fade out, and they will not show greatly, though I daresay the scars will be always visible."

"I should be proud of them, Major Drummond," said Thirza, "considering that you got them in so great a battle, and one in which you rendered such service to the king."

"You see, I shall not be always able to explain when and how I got them," Fergus laughed. "People who do not know me will say:

"'There goes a young student, who has got his face slashed at the university.'"

"They could not say that," she said indignantly. "Even if you were not in uniform, anyone can see that you are a soldier."

"Whether or not, Countess Thirza, it is a matter that will certainly trouble me very little. However, I begin to think that I shall not always be a soldier. Certainly, I should not leave the army as long as this war goes on; but I have seen such terrible fighting, such tremendous carnage, that I think that at the end of it, if I come out at the end, I shall be glad to take to a peaceful life. My cousin, Marshal Keith, has been fighting all his life. He is a great soldier, and has the honour of being regarded by the king as his friend; but he has no home, no peace and quiet, no children growing up to take his place. I should not like to look forward to such a life, and would rather go back and pass my days in the Scottish glens where I was brought up."

"I think that you are right," the count said seriously. "In ordinary times a soldier's life would be a pleasant one, and he could reckon upon the occasional excitement of war; but such a war as this is beyond all calculation. In these three campaigns, and the present one is not ended, nigh half of the army which marched through here has been killed or wounded. It is terrible to think of. One talks of the chances of war, but this is making death almost a certainty; for if the war continues another two or three years, how few will be left of those who began it!

"Even now a great battle will probably be fought, in a few days. Two great armies are within as many marches of Dresden. The smallest of them outnumbers Frederick. The other is fully twice his strength, and so intrenched, as I hear, that the position is well-nigh impregnable."

"I expect the king will find means to force him out of it, without fighting," Fergus said with a smile. "Daun is altogether over cautious, and Leuthen is not likely to have rendered him more confident."

Fergus spent the greater part of his time at the count's, for Marshal Keith insisted upon his abstaining from all duty, until the march began.

"We are off tomorrow morning," he said, when he went up on the evening of the 30th of September. "Where, I know not. Except the king, Marshal Keith, and Prince Maurice, I do not suppose that anyone knows; but wherever it is, we start at daybreak."

"May you return, ere long, safe and sound!" the count said. "Is there nothing that we can do for you? You know we regard you as one of the family, and there is nothing that would give us greater pleasure than to be able, in some way, to make you comfortable."

"I thank you heartily, count, but I need nothing; and if I did I could purchase it, for it is but seldom that one has to put one's hand in one's pocket; and as a captain I have saved the greater part of my pay for the last two years, and shall pile up my hoard still faster, now that I am a major.

"I have never had an opportunity, before, of thanking you for that purse which you handed to Karl, to be laid out for my benefit in case of need. He holds it still, and I have never had occasion to draw upon it, and hope that I never may have to do so."

The next morning the army, furnished with nine days' provisions, and leaving a force to face the army of the Confederates, strode along the road at its usual pace. They took the road for Bautzen, drove off Loudon (who commanded Daun's northern outposts) without difficulty, and so passed his flank. The advance guard pushed on to Bautzen, drove away the small force there and, leaving there the magazines of the army, occupied Hochkirch, a few miles away. The king with the main body arrived at Bautzen on the following day, and halted there, to see what Daun was going to do.

The latter was, in fact, obliged to abandon his stronghold; for the Prussians, at Hochkirch, menaced the road by which he drew his provisions from his magazines at Zittau. Marching at night, he reached and occupied a line of hills between Hochkirch and Zittau, and within a couple of miles of the former place.

Frederick had been forced to wait, at Bautzen, till another convoy of provisions arrived. When he joined the division at Hochkirch, and saw Daun's army on the opposite hills, busy as usual in intrenching itself, he ordered the army to encamp when they were within a mile of Daun's position.

Marwitz, the staff officer to whom he gave the order, argued and remonstrated, and at length refused to be concerned in the marking out of such an encampment. He was at once put under arrest, and another officer did the work. Frederick, in fact, entertained a sovereign contempt for Daun, with his slow marches, his perpetual intrenchings, and his obstinate caution; and had no belief, whatever, that the Austrian marshal would attempt to attack him. He was in a very bad humour, too, having discovered that Retzow had failed to take possession of the Stromberg, a detached hill which would have rendered the position a safe one. He put him under arrest, and ordered the Stromberg to be occupied.

The next morning the force proceeding to do so found, however, that the post was already occupied by Austrians; who resisted stoutly and, being largely reinforced, maintained their position on the hill, on which several batteries were placed. It was now Tuesday, and Frederick determined to march away on the Saturday.

His obstinacy had placed the army in an altogether untenable and dangerous position. All his officers were extremely uneasy, and Keith declared to the king that the Austrians deserved to be hanged if they did not attack; to which Frederick replied:

"We must hope that they are more afraid of us than even of the gallows." _

Read next: Chapter 13. Hochkirch

Read previous: Chapter 11. Leuthen

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