2d-10th April, 1741. are lying. The peculiarity of Neipperg at this time is, that the ground he occupies bears no proportion to the ground he commands. His regular Horse are supposed to be the best in the world; and of the Pandour kind, who live, horse and man, mainly upon nothing (which means upon theft), his supplies are unlimited. He sits like a volcanic reservoir, therefore, not like a common fire of such and such intensity and power to burn; casts the ashes of him, on all sides, to many miles distance.

Friday, 7th April, Friedland (still Head-quarters). Unluckily, on trying, there is no passage to be had at Sorgau. The Officer on charge there still holds the Bridge, but has been obliged to break away the farther end of it, 'Lentulus and Dragoons, several thousand strong' (such is the report), having taken post there. Friedrich commands that the Bridge be reinstated: field-pieces to defend it; Prince Leopold to cross, and clear the ways. All Friday, Friedrich waiting at Friedland, was spent in these details. Leopold in due force started for Sorgau, himself with Cavalry in the van; Leopold did storm across, and go charging and fencing, some space, on the other side; but, seeing that it was in truth Lentulus, and Dragoons without limit, had to send report accordingly, and then to wind himself to this side again, on new order from the King. What is to be done, then? Here is no crossing. Friedrich decides to go down the River; he himself to Löwen, perhaps nearly twenty miles farther down, but where there is a Bridge and Highway leading over; Prince Leopold, with the heavier divisions and baggages, to Michelau, some miles nearer, and there to build his Pontoons and cross, which was effected with success. And so,

"Saturday, 8th April, with great punctuality, the King and Leopold met at Michelau, both well across the Neisse. Here, on Pontoons, Leopold had got across about noon, and precisely as he was finishing, the King's Column, which had crossed at Löwen, and come up the left bank again, arrived. The King, much content with Leopold's behavior, nominates him General of Infantry, a stage higher in promotion, there and then. Brieg Blockade is, as natural, given up, the Blockading Body joining with the King this morning while he passed that way. From Holstein-Beck not the least whisper, nor to him, if we knew it. "Neipperg has quitted Neisse, but walks invisible within clouds of Pandours; nothing but guessing as to Neipperg's motions. Rightly swift, and awake to his business, Neipperg might have done, might still do, a stroke upon us here. But he takes it easy; marches hardly five miles a day since he quitted Neisse again. From Michelau, Friedrich, for his part, turns southwestward in quest of Holstein and other interests; marches toward Grotkau, not intending much farther that night. Thick snow blowing in their faces, nothing to be seen ahead, the Prus

2d-10th April, 1741.

sian column tramps along.25 In Leipe, a little Hamlet sideward of the road, short way from Grotkau, our Hussar Vanguard had found Austrian Hussars; captured forty, and from them learned that the Austrian Army is in Grotkau; that they took Grotkau half an hour before, and are there! A poor Lieutenant Mitschepfal (whom I think Friedrich used to know in Reinsberg) lay in Grotkau,' with some sixty recruits and deserters' says Friedrich, and with several hundreds of camp-laborers (intended for the trenches, which will not now be opened). Mitschepfal made a stout defense; but, after three hours of it, had to give in; and there is nothing now for us at Grotkau. 'Halt,' therefore! Neipperg is evidently pushing toward Ohlau, toward Breslau, though in a leisurely way; there it will behoove us to get the start of him, if humanly possible: To the right-about, therefore, without delay! The Prussians repass Leipe (much to the wonder of its simple people); get along, some seven miles farther, on the road for Ohlau, and quarter that night in what handy villages there are; the King's Corps in two Villages, which he calls' Pogrel and Alsen,'" which are to be found still on the Map as Pogarell and Alzenau,” on the road from Löwen toward Ohlau.

This is the end of that March into the Mountains, with Neisse Siege hanging triumphant ahead. These are the King's quarters, this wintry Spring night, Saturday, 8th April, 1741, and it is to be guessed there is more of care than of sleep provided for him there. Seldom in his life was Friedrich in a more critical position, and he well knows it; none better; and could have his remorses upon it, were these of the least use in present circumstances. Here are two Letters which he wrote that night, veiling, we perceive, a very grim world of thoughts, betokening, however, a mind made up. Jordan, Prince August Wilhelm HeirApparent, and other fine individuals who shone in the Schweidnitz circle lately, are in Breslau, safe sheltered against this bad juncture; Maupertuis was not so lucky as to go with them.

The King to Prince August Wilhelm (in Breslau).

"Pogarell, 8th April, 1741.

"My dearest Brother, The Enemy has just got into Silesia; We are not more than a mile (quart de mille) from them. To-morrow must decide our fortune.

"If I die, do not forget a Brother who has always loved you very tenderly. I recommend to you my most dear Mother, my Domestics,

25 Euvres de Frédéric, ii., 156.

66

26

2d-10th April, 1741. and my First Battalion” (Lifeguard of Foot, men picked from his own old Ruppin Regiment and from the disbanded Giants, star of all the Battalions). "Eichel and Schuhmacher" (Two of the Three Clerks) are informed of all my testamentary wishes. Remember me always, you, but console yourself for my death: the glory of the Prussian arms and the honor of the House have set me in action, and will guide me to my last moment. You are my sole Heir: I recommend to you, in dying, those whom I have the most loved during my life: Keyserling, Jordan, Wartensleben; Hacke, who is a very honest man; Fredersdorf" (Factotum)," and Eichel, in whom you may place entire confidence. I bequeath 8000 crowns (£1200), which I have with me, to my Domestics; but all that I have elsewhere depends on you. To each of my Brothers and Sisters make a present in my name; a thousand affectionate regards (amitiés et compliments) to my Sister of Baireuth. You know what I think on their score; and you know, better than I could tell you, the tenderness and all the sentiments of most inviolable friendship with which am, dearest Brother, your faithful Brother and Servant till death, FÉDÉRIC. "27

I

The King to M. Jordan (in Breslau).

"Pogarell, 8th April, 1741.

"My dear Jordan,—We are going to fight to-morrow. Thou knowest the chances of war; the life of Kings not more regarded than that of private people. I know not what will happen to me.

"If my destiny is finished, remember a friend who loves thee always tenderly; if Heaven prolong my days, I will write to thee after to-morrow, and thou wilt hear of our victory. Adieu, dear friend; I shall love thee till death.-FÉDÉRIC.'

1928

The King, we incidentally discover somewhere, "had no sleep that night;" none, "nor the next night either;" such a crisis coming, still not come.

26 See Preuss, i., 144; iv., 309; Nicolai, Beschreibung von Berlin, iii., 1252.

27 Euvres de Frédéric, xxvi., 85; List of Friedrich's Testamentary arrangements in Note there-Six in all, at different times, besides this. 28 Euvres de Frédéric, xvii., 98.

10th April, 1741.

CHAPTER X.

BATTLE OF MOLLWITZ.

“TO-MORROW,” Sunday, did not prove the Day of Fight, after all. Being a day of wild drifting snow, so that you could not see twenty paces, there was nothing for it but to sit quiet. The King makes all his dipositions; sketches out punctually, to the last item, where each is to station himself, how the Army is to advance in Four Columns, ready for Neipperg wherever he may be-toward Ohlau at any rate, whither it is not doubted Neipperg is bent. These snowy six-and-thirty hours at Pogarell were probably, since the Cüstrin time, the most anxious of Friedrich's life.

Neipperg, for his part, struggles forward a few miles this Sunday, April 9th; the Prussians rest under shelter in the wild weather. Neipperg's head-quarters this night are a small Village or Hamlet called Mollwitz: there and in the adjacent Hamlets, chiefly in Laugwitz and Grüningen, his Army lodges itself: he is now fairly got between us and Ohlau, if, in the blowing drift we knew it or he knew it. But, in this confusion of the elements, neither party knows of the other: Neipperg has appointed that to-morrow, Monday, 10th, shall be a rest-day-appointment which could by no means be kept, as it turned out!

Friedrich had dispatched messengers to Ohlau that the force there should join him; messengers are all captured. The like message had already gone to Brieg, some days before, and the Blockading Body, a good few thousands strong, quitted Brieg, as we saw, and effected their junction with him. All day, this Sunday, 9th, it still snows and blows; you can not see a yard before you. No hope now of Holstein-Beck. Not the least news from any quarter; Ohlau uncertain, too likely the wrong way. What is to be done? We are cut off from our Magazines; have only provision for one other day. "Had this weath

10th April, 1741.

er lasted," says an Austrian reporter of these things, "his Majesty would have passed his time very ill."1

Of the Battle of Mollwitz, as, indeed, of all Friedrich's Battles, there are ample accounts, new and old, of perfect authenticity and scientific exactitude, so that in regard to military points the due clearness is, on study, completely attainable; but as to personal or human details, we are driven back upon a miscellany of sources, most of which, indeed all of which except Nicolai, when he sparingly gives us any thing, are of questionable nature, and, without intending to be dishonest, do run out into the mythical, and require to be used with caution. The latest and notablest of these, in regard to Mollwitz, is the Pamphlet of a Dr. Fuchs, from which, in spite of its amazing quality, we expect to glean a serviceable item here and there.2 It is definable as probably the most chaotic Pamphlet ever written; and in many places, by dint of uncorrected printing, bad grammar, bad spelling, bad sense, and, in short, of intrinsic darkness in so vivacious a humor, it has become abstruse as Sanscrit, and really is a sharp test of what knowledge you otherwise have of the subject. Might perhaps be used in that way by the Examining Military Boards in Prussia and elsewhere, if no other use lie in it? Fuchs's own contributions, mere ignorance, folly and credulity, are not worth interpreting; but he has printed, and in the same abstruse form, one or two curious Parish Manuscripts, particularly a “History” of this War, privately jotted down by the then Schoolmaster of Mollwitz, a good, simple, accurate old fellow-creature, through whose eyes it is here and there worth while to look. In regard to Fuchs himself, a late Tourist says:

1

Feldzüge der Preussen (the complete Title is, Sammlung ungedrückter Nachrichten so die Geschichte der Feldzüge der Preussen von 1740 bis 1779 erläutern, or in English words, Collection of unprinted Narratives which elucidate the Prussian Campaigns from 1740 to 1779: 5 vols., Dresden, 1782–5), i., 33. Excellent Narratives, modest, brief, effective (from Private Diaries and the like; many of them given also in Seyfarth); well worth perusal by the studious military man, and creditably characteristic of the Prussian writers of them and actors in them.

2 Jubelschrift zur Feier (Centenary) der Schlacht bei Mollwitz, 10 April, 1741, von Dr. Medicinæ Fuchs (Brieg, 10th April, 1841).