ONE:On the 15th of November Frederick arrived at Lauban, within a hundred miles of Dresden. General Daun immediately raised the siege and retired into Bohemia. Frederick marched triumphantly into the city. Thus, as the extraordinary result of the defeat at Hochkirch, Frederick, by the exhibition of military ability which astonished Europe, regained Neisse, retained Dresden, and swept both Silesia and Saxony entirely free of his foes. Frederick remained in Dresden about a month. He then retired to Breslau, in Silesia, for winter quarters. The winter was a very sad one to him. Private griefs and public calamities weighed heavily upon his heart.125 Though during the year he had destroyed a hundred thousand of his enemies, he had lost thirty thousand of his own brave little band. It was almost impossible, by any energies of conscription, to replace this waste of war. His treasury was exhausted. Though he wrenched from the wretched Saxons every dollar which military rapacity and violence could extort from them, still they were so impoverished by the long and desolating struggle that but little money could be found in the almost empty purses of a beggared people. Another campaign was soon to open, in which the allies, with almost unlimited resources of men and treasure, would again come crowding upon him in all directions in overpowering numbers.
ONE:The zealous bishop, perhaps not unwilling to secure the crown of martyrdom, pressed on, preaching the Gospel, in face of prohibitions and menaces, until he entered one of the sacred inclosures which was a sanctuary of the idols of these heathen. The priests rushed upon him, endeavored to drive him out, and struck him with a dagger in the back of his neck. He uttered but one cry, Jesus, receive me! and, stretching out his arms, fell with his face to the ground, and lay dead there in the form of a crucifix. The place is yet pointed out where Adalbert fell. Still the seeds of Christianity were sown. Other missionaries followed. Idolatry disappeared, and the realm became nominally Christian. Revealed religion introduced increased enlightenment and culture, though there still remained much of the savagery of ancient days.The fault-finding character of the king, and his intense devotion to perfecting his army, both increased with his advancing years. After one of his reviews of the troops in Silesia, in the year 1784, he wrote in the following severe strain to the commanding general:
ONE: Frederick.The heir to the Russian throne was an orphan boy, Peter Federowitz. The Russian court was looking around to obtain for him a suitable wife. Fredericks commandant at Stettin, a man of renowned lineage, had a beautiful daughter of fourteen. She was a buxom girl, full of life as she frolicked upon the ramparts of the fortress with her young companions. Frederick succeeded in obtaining her betrothal to the young Prince of Russia. She was solemnly transferred from the Protestant to the Greek religion; her name was changed to Catharine; and she was eventually married, greatly to the satisfaction of Frederick, to the young Russian czar.
