England, while endeavoring to subsidize Russia against Frederick, entered secretly into a sort of alliance with Frederick, hoping thus to save Hanover. The Empress Elizabeth, of Russia, heartily united with Maria Theresa against Frederick, whom she personally disliked, and whose encroachments she dreaded. His Prussian majesty, proud of his powers of sarcasm, in his poems spared neither friend nor foe. He had written some very severe things against the Russian empress, which had reached her ears.100
Your letter, my dear brother, has made me twenty years younger. Yesterday I was sixty, to-day hardly eighteen. I bless Heaven for preserving your health, and that things have passed so happily. It is a service so important rendered by you to the state that I can not enough express my gratitude, and will wait to do it in person. Frederick.His majesty pledged his word of honor that he would fulfill these obligations, but declared that, should the slightest intimation of the agreement leak out, so that the French should discover it, he would deny the whole thing, and refuse in any way to be bound by it. This was assented to.
ONE:Far away in the east the Austrian officers discerned a Prussian column of observation, consisting of about twelve thousand horse and foot, wending along from hollow to height, their polished weapons flashing back the rays of the afternoon sun. Frederick, carefully examining the ground, immediately made arrangements to bring forward his troops under curtain of the night for a decisive battle. His orderlies were silently dispatched in all directions. At eight oclock the whole army was in350 motion. His troops were so concentrated that the farthest divisions had a march of only nine miles. Silently, not a word being spoken, not a pipe being lighted, and all the baggage being left behind, they crossed the bridge of the Striegau River, and, deploying to the right and the left, took position in front of the slumbering allied troops.
Sed ut perspiciatis unde omnis iste natus error sit voluptatem
accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa
quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae vitae dicta
sunt explicabo accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa
quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae.
Sed ut perspiciatis unde omnis iste natus error sit voluptatem
accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa
quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae vitae dicta
sunt explicabo accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa
quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae.
Sed ut perspiciatis unde omnis iste natus error sit voluptatem
accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa
quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae vitae dicta
sunt explicabo accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa
quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae.
THREE: Had all our fatalities been limited to stoppages of speed on the journey, we should have taken patience. But after frightful roads we found lodgings still more frightful.
FORE:
At vero eos et accusamus et iusto odio dignissimos ducimus
qui blanditiis praesentium voluptatum deleniti atque corrupti
quos dolores et quas molestias excepturi sint occaecati
cupiditate non provident, similique sunt in culpa qui officia
deserunt mollitia animi, id est laborum et dolorum fuga.
At vero eos et accusamus et iusto odio dignissimos ducimus
qui blanditiis praesentium voluptatum deleniti atque corrupti
quos dolores et quas molestias excepturi sint occaecati
cupiditate non provident, similique sunt in culpa qui officia
deserunt mollitia animi, id est laborum et dolorum fuga.
FORE:This visit to Dresden, so fatal to Fritz, was closed on the 12th of February. The dissipation of those four weeks introduced the Crown Prince to habits which have left an indelible stain upon his reputation, and which poisoned his days. Upon his return to Potsdam he was seized with a fit of sickness, and for many years his health remained feeble. But he had entered upon the downward course. His chosen companions were those who were in sympathy with his newly-formed tastes. The career of dissipation into which the young prince had plunged could not be concealed from his eagle-eyed father. The kings previous dislike to his son was converted into contempt and hatred, which feelings were at times developed in almost insane ebullitions of rage.
FORE:It was in these hours of apparently insurmountable difficulty that the marvelous administrative genius of Frederick was displayed. No modern reader can imagine the difficulties of Frederick at this time as they already lay disclosed, and kept gradually disclosing themselves, for months coming; nor will ever know what perspicacity, what patience of scanning, sharpness of340 discernment, dexterity of management, were required at Fredericks hands; and under what imminency of peril toovictorious deliverance or ruin and annihilation, wavering fearfully in the balance, for him more than once, or rather all along.78
The reception of the princess was so cruel, by Queen Sophie and her younger daughter Charlotte, that the inexperienced maiden of but seventeen summers must have been perfectly wretched. But she could only bear her anguish in silence. There was nothing for her to say, and nothing for her to do. She was led, by resistless powers, a victim to the sacrifice.My discourse, she writes, produced its effect. He melted into tears, and could not answer me for sobs. He explained his thoughts by his embracings of me. Making an effort at length, he said, I am in despair that I did not know thee. They had told me such horrible talesI hated thee as much as I now love thee. If I had addressed myself direct to thee I should have escaped much trouble, and thou too. But they hindered me from speaking. They said that thou wert ill-natured as the devil, and wouldst drive to extremities, which I wanted to avoid. Thy mother, by her intriguings, is in part the cause of the misfortunes of the family. I have been deceived and duped on every side. But my hands are tied. Though my heart is torn in pieces, I must leave these iniquities unpunished.The Prussian kingdom, which thus fell to Frederick by divine right, consisted of an assemblage of duchies, marquisates, principalities, and lordships, comprising an area of nearly fifty-seven thousand square miles, being about the size of the State of Michigan, and very similarly situated as to climate and soil. It was unfortunately not a compact country, as several of the states could only be reached by passing through the territories of other powers. The annual revenue amounted to a little over six million dollars. There was also in the treasury a sum, which Frederick William had saved, of about seven million dollars. The army consisted of seventy-six thousand men, in the highest state of discipline, and abundantly furnished with all the materiel of war.The king was very far from granting so barbarous a permission. He told them they ought rather to conform to the precepts of Scripture, and to bless those that curse them, and pray for those that despitefully use them. Such, the king assured them, was the way to gain the kingdom of heaven. The peasants, after a little reflection, declared that his majesty was right, and desisted from their cruel intention.82Frederick, establishing his head-quarters at Chrudim, did not suppose the Austrians would think of moving upon him until the middle of June. Not till then would the grass in that cold region afford forage. But Maria Theresa was inspired by energies fully equal to those of her renowned assailant. Undismayed by the powerful coalition against her, she sent Prince Charles, her brother-in-law, early in May, at the head of an army thirty thousand strong, to advance by a secret, rapid flank march, and seize the Prussian magazines beyond the Elbe.The Russians, with empty meal-wagons and starving soldiers, had taken possession of Frankfort-on-the-Oder on the 29th of July. The city contained twelve thousand inhabitants. The ransom which the Russian general demanded to save the city from pillage by the Cossacks was four hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Pillage by the Cossacks! No imagination can conceive the horrors of such an event. Nearly one hundred thousand men, frenzied with intoxication, brutal in their habits, restrained by no law, would inflict every outrage which fiends could conceive of. Well might fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, turn pale and feel the blood curdle in their veins at the thought. Four hundred and fifty thousand dollars ransom! That was nearly forty dollars for each individual, man, woman, and child! Compliance with the demand was impossible. Frankfort, in its impoverishment, could by no possibility raise a tenth part of the sum. Dreadful was the consternation. There was no relenting; the money or the pillage!