History of Friedrich II of Prussia Volume XVII Part 6

From Browne there has nothing come this Wednesday; but to-morrow morning at seven there comes a Letter from him, written this night at ten; to the effect:--

"HEAD-QUARTER, LICHTENHAYN, Wednesday, October 13th, 10 P.M.

"EXCELLENZ,--Have [omitting the I] waited here at Lichtenhayn since Tuesday, expecting your signal-cannon; hearing nothing of it, conclude you have by misfortune not been able to get across; and that the Enterprise is up. My own position being dangerous [Prussians of double my strength intrenched within few miles of me], I turn homewards to-morrow at nine A.M.: ready for whatever occurs TILL then; and sorrowfully say adieu," [PRECIS (ut supra), p. 493; _Helden-Geschichte, _iii. 940; &c.]

Dreadful weather for Browne in his bivouac, and wearisome waiting, with Prussians and perils acc.u.mulating on him! Browne was ill of lungs; coughing much; lodging, in these violent tempests, on the cold ground.

A right valiant soldier and man, as does appear; the flower of all the Irish Brownes (though they have quite forgotten him in our time), and of all those Irish Exiles then tragically spending themselves in Austrian quarrels! "You saw the great man," says one who seems to have been present, "how he sacrificed himself to this Enterprise. What Austrian Field-marshal but himself would ever have lowered his loftiness to lead, in person, so insignificant a Detachment, merely for the public good!

I have seen staff-officers, distinguished only by their sasheries and insignia, who would not have stirred to inspect a vedette without 250 men. Our Field-marshal was of another turn. Sharing with his troops all the hards.h.i.+ps, none excepted, of these critical days; and in spite of a violent cough, which often brought the visible blood from his lungs, and had quite worn him down; exposing himself, like the meanest of the Army, to the tempests of rainy weather. Think what a sight it was, going to your very heart, and summoning you to endurance of every hards.h.i.+p,--that evening [not said which], when the Field-marshal, worn out with his fatigues and his disorder, sank out of fainting-fits into a sleep! The ground was his bed, and the storm of clouds his coverlid. In crowds his brave war-comrades gathered round; stripped their cloaks, their coats, and strove in n.o.ble rivalry which of them should have the happiness to screen the Father of the Army at their own cost of exposure, and by any device keep the pelting of the weather from that loved head!"

[Cogniazzo, _Gestandnisse eines OEsterreichischen Veterans, _ii. 251.]

There is a picture for you, in the heights of Lichtenhayn, as you steam past Schandau, in contemplative mood; and perhaps think of "Justice to Ireland!" among other sad thoughts that rise.

From Thurmsdorf to the Pontoon-Bridge there was a kind of road; down which the Saxons scrambled yesterday; and, by painful degrees, got wriggled across. But, on the other sh.o.r.e, forward to the Hamlets of Halbstadt and Ebenheit, there is nothing but a steep slippery footpath: figure what a problem for the 14,000 in such weather! Then at Ebenheit, close behind, Browne-wards, were Browne now there, rises the Lilienstein, abrupt rocky mountain, its slopes on both hands washed by the River (River making its first elbow here, closely girdling this Lilienstein): on both these slopes are Prussian batteries, each with its abatis; needing to be stormed:--that will be your first operation.

Abatis and slopes of the Lilienstein once stormed, you fall into a valley or hollow, raked again by Prussian batteries; and will have to mount, still storming, out of the valley, sky-high across the Ziegenruck (GOAT'S-BACK) ridge: that is your second preliminary operation. After which you come upon the work itself; namely, the Prussian redoubts at Lichtenhayn, and 12,000 men on them by this time! A modern Tourist says, reminding or informing:

"From the Konigstein to Pirna, Elbe, if serpentine, is like a serpent rus.h.i.+ng at full speed. Just past the Konigstein, the Elbe, from westward, as its general course is, turns suddenly to northward; runs so for a mile and a half; then, just before getting to the BASTEI at Raden, turns suddenly to westward again, and so continues. Tourists know Raden,"--where the Prussians have just fished out a Bridge for themselves,--"with the BASTEI high aloft to west of it. The Old Inn, hospitable though sleepless, stands pleasantly upon the River-brink, overhung by high cliffs: close on its left side, or in the intricacies to rear of it, are huts and houses, sprinkled about, as if burrowed in the sandstone; more comfortably than you could expect. The site is a narrow dell, narrow chasm, with labyrinthic chasms branching off from it; narrow and gloomy as seen from the River, but opening out even into cornfields as you advance inwards: work of a small Brook, which is still industriously tinkling and gus.h.i.+ng there, and has in Pre-Adamite times been a lake, and we know not what. Nieder-Raden, this, on the north side of the River; of Ober-Raden, on the south side, there is nothing visible from your Inn windows,"--nor have we anything to do with it farther.

An older Guide of Tourists yields us this second Fraction (capable of condensation):--

... "To Halbstadt, thence to Ebenheit, your path is steeper and steeper; from Ebenheit to the Lilienstein you take a guide. The Mountain is conical; coa.r.s.e RED sandstone; steps cut for you where needed: August the Strong's Hunting-Lodge (JAGDHUTTE) is here (August went thither in a grand way, 1708, with his Wife); Lodge still extant, by the side of a wood;--Lilienstein towering huge and sheer, solitary, grand, like some colossal Pillar of the Cyclops, from this round Pediment of Country which you have been climbing; tops of Lilienstein plumed everywhere with fir and birch, Pediment also very green and woody. August the Strong, grandly visiting here, 1708, on finish of those stair-steps cut for you, set up an Ebenezer, or Column of Memorial at this Hunting-Hut, with Inscription which can still be read, though now with difficulty in its time-worn state:--

"FRIEDERICUS AUGUSTUS, REX [of what? Dare not say of POLAND just now, for fear of Charles XII.], ET ELECTOR SAX., UT FORTUNAEM VIRTUTE, ITA ASPERAM HANC RUPEM PRIMUS [PRIMUS not of men, but of Saxon Electors]

SUPERAVIT, ADITUMQUE FACILIOREM REDDI CURAVIT. ANNO 1708."--"UT FORTUNAM VIRTUTE, As his fortune by valor, SO he conquered this rugged rock by"--Poor devil, only hear him:--and think how good Nature is (for the time being) to poor devils and their 354 b.a.s.t.a.r.ds! [M.(agister) Wilhelm Lebrecht Gotzinger, _Schandau und seine Umgebungen, oder Beschreibung der Sachsischen Schweitz _(Dresden, 1812), pp. 145-148. Gotzinger, who designates himself as "Pastor at Neustadt near Stolpen" (northwest border of the Pirna Country), has made of this (which would now be called a TOURIST'S GUIDE, and has something geological in it) a modest, good little Book, put together with industry, clearness, brevity. Gives interesting Narrative of our present Business too, as gathered from his "Father" and other good sources and testimonies.]

Bruhl and the Polish Majesty, safe enough they, and snug in the Konigstein, are clear for advancing: "Die like soldiers, for your King and Country!" writes Polish Majesty, "Thursday, two in the morning:"

that also Rutowski reads; and I think still other Royal Autographs, sent as Postscripts to that. From the Konigstein they duly fire off the two Cannon-shot, as signal that we are coming; signal which Browne, just in the act of departing, never heard, owing to the piping of the winds and rattling of the rain. "Advance, my heroes!" counsel they: "You cannot drag your ammunitions, say you; your poor couple of big guns? Here are his Majesty's own royal horses for that service!"--and, in effect, the royal stud is heroically flung open in this pressure; and a splas.h.i.+ng column of sleek quadrupeds, "150 royal draught-horses, early in the forenoon," [Gotzinger, p. 156.] swim across to Ebenheit accordingly, if that could encourage. And, "about noon, there is strong cannonading from the Konigstein, as signal to Browne," who is off. Polish Majesty looking with his spy-gla.s.s in an astonished manner. In Vain! Rutowski and his Council of War--sitting wet in a hut of Ebenheit, with 14,000 starved men outside, who have stood seventy-two hours of rain, for one item--see nothing for it but "surrender on such terms as we can get."

"In fact," independently of weather and circ.u.mstances, "the Enterprise,"

says Friedrich, "was radically impossible; n.o.body that had known the ground could have judged it other." Rutowski had not known it, then?

Browne never pretended to know it. Rutowski was not candid with the conditions; the conditions never known nor candidly looked at; and THEY are now replying to him with candor enough. From the first his Enterprise was a final flicker of false hope; going out, as here, by spasm, in the rigors of impossibility and flat despair.

That column of royal horses sent splas.h.i.+ng across the River,--that was the utmost of self-sacrifice which I find recorded of his Polish Majesty in this matter. He was very obstinate; his Bruhl and he were. But his conduct was not very heroic. That royal Autograph, "General Rutowski, and ye true Saxons, attack these Prussian lines, then; sell your lives like men" (not like Bruhl and me), must have fallen cold on the heart, after seventy-two hours of rain! Rutowski's wet Council of War, in the hut at Ebenheit, rain still pouring, answers unanimously, "That it were a leading of men to the butchery;" that there is nothing for it but surrender. Bruhl and Majesty can only answer: "Well-a-day; it must be so, then!"--

Winterfeld, Prussian Commander hereabouts, grants Armistice, grants liberal "wagon-loads of bread" first of all; terms of Capitulation to be settled at Struppen to-morrow.

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 15th, Rutowski goes across to Struppen, the late Saxon head-quarter, now Friedrich's;--Friday gone a fortnight was the day of Lobositz. Winterfeld and he are the negotiators there; Friedrich ratifying or refusing by marginal remarks. The terms granted are hard enough: but they must be accepted. First preliminary of all terms has already been accepted: a gift of bread to these poor Saxons; their haversacks are empty, their cartridge-boxes drowned; it has rained on them three days and nights. Last upshot of all terms is still well known to everybody: That the 14,000 Saxons are compelled to become Prussian, and "forced to volunteer"!

That had been Friedrich's determination, and reading of his rights in the matter, now that hard had come to hard. "You refused all terms; you have resisted to death (or death's-DOOR); and are now at discretion!"

Of the question, What is to be done with those Saxons? Friedrich had thought a great deal, first and last; and had found it very intricate,--as readers too will, if they think of it. "Prisoners of War,--to keep them locked up, with trouble and expense, in that fas.h.i.+on?

They can never be exchanged: Saxony has now nothing to exchange them with; and Austria will not. Their obstinacy has had costs to me; who of us can count what costs! In short, they shall volunteer!"

"Never did I, for my poor part, authorize such a thing," loudly a.s.severated Rutowski afterwards. And indeed the Capitulation is not precise on that interesting point. A lengthy Doc.u.ment, and not worth the least perusal otherwise; we condense it into three Articles, all grounding on this general Basis, not deniable by Rutowski: "The Saxon Army, being at such a pa.s.s, ready to die of hunger, if we did NOT lift our finger, has, so to speak, become our property; and we grant it the following terms:"--

"1. Kettle-drums, standards and the like insignia and matters of honor,--carry these to the Konigstein, with my regretful respects to his Polish Majesty. Konigstein to be a neutral Fortress during this War.

Polish Majesty at perfect liberty to go to Warsaw [as he on the instant now did, and never returned].

"2. Officers to depart on giving their parole, Not to serve against us during this War [Parole given, nothing like too well kept].

"3. Rest of the Army, with all its equipments, munitions, soul and body (so to speak), is to surrender utterly, and be ours, as all Saxony shall for the present be." [In _Helden-Geschichte, _iii. 920-928, at full length--with Briedrich's MARGINALIA noticeably brief.]

That is, in sum, the Capitulation of Struppen. Nothing articulate in it about the one now interesting point,--and in regard to that, I can only fancy Rutowski might interject, interrogatively, perhaps at some length: "Our soldiers to be Prisoners of War, then?" "Prisoners; yes, clearly,--unless they choose to volunteer, and have a better fate!

Prisoners can volunteer. They are at discretion; they would die, if we did NOT lift our finger!" thus I suppose Winterfeld would rejoin, if necessary;--and that, in the Winterfeld-Rutowski Conferences, the thing had probably been kept in a kind of CHIAROSCURO by both parties.

Very certain it is, Sunday, 17th October, 1756, Capitulation being signed the night before, Friedrich goes across at Nieder-Raden (where the Pilgrim of the Picturesque now climbs to see the BASTEI; where the Prussians have, by this time, a Bridge thrown together out of those Pontoons),--goes across at Nieder-Raden, up that chasmy Pa.s.s; rides to the Heights of Waltersdorf, in the opener country behind; and pauses there, while the captive Saxon Army defiles past him, laying down its arms at his feet. Unarmed, and now under Prussian word of command, these Ex-Saxon soldiers go on defiling; march through by that Chasm of Nieder-Raden; cross to Ober-Raden; and, in the plainer country thereabouts, are--in I know not what length of hours, but in an incredibly short length, so swift is the management--changed wholly into Prussian soldiers: "obliged to volunteer," every one of them!

That is the fact; fact loudly censured; fact surely questionable,--to what intrinsic degree I at this moment do not know. Fact much blamable before the loose public of mankind; upon which I leave men to their verdict. It is not a fact which invites imitation, as we shall see! Fact how accomplished; by what methods? that would be the question with me; but even that is left dark. "The horse regiments, three of heavy horse, he broke; and distributed about, a good few in his own Garde-du-Corps." Three other horse regiments were in Poland, the sole Saxon Army now left,--of whom, at least of one man among whom, we may happen to hear. "Ten foot regiments [what was reckoned a fault] he left together; in Prussian uniform, with Prussian Officers. They were scattered up and down; put in garrisons; not easy handling them: they deserted by whole companies at a time in the course of this War."

[Preuss, ii. 22, 135; in Stenzel (v. 16-20) more precise details.] Not a measure for imitation, as we said!--How Friedrich defended such hard conduct to the Saxons? Reader, I know only that Destiny and Necessity, urged on by Saxons and others, was hard as adamant upon Friedrich at this time; and that Friedrich did not the least dream of making any defence;--and will have to take your verdict, such as it may be.

Moritz of Dessau had a terrible Winter of it, organizing and breaking in these Saxon people,--got by press-gang in this way. Polish Majesty, "with 500 of suite," had driven instantly for Warsaw; post-horses most politely furnished him, and all the Prussian posts and soldiers well kept out of his road,--road chosen for him to that end. Poor soul, he never came back. For six years coming, he saw, from Warsaw in the distance (amid anarchy and NIE-POZWALAM, which he never lacked there), the wide War raging, in Saxony especially; and died soon after it was done. Nor did Bruhl return, except broken by that event, and to die in few months after. Let us pity the poor fat-goose of a Majesty (not ill-natured at all, only stupid and idle): some pity even to the doomed-phantasm Bruhl, if you can;--and thank Heaven to have got done with such a pair!--

Friedrich's treatment of the Saxon Troops, Saxon Majesty and Country: who shall say that it was wise in all points? It would be singular treatment, if it were! In all things, AFTER is so different from BEFORE and DURING. The truth is, Friedrich hoped long to have made some agreement with the Saxons. And readers now, in the universal silence, have no notion of Friedrich's complexities from fact, and of the loud howl of hostile rumor, which was piping through all journals, diplomacies and foreign human throats, against him at that time.

"The essential pa.s.sages of War and Peace," says a certain Commentator, "during those Five weeks of Pirna, can be made intelligible in small compa.s.s. But how the world argued of them then and afterwards, and rang with hot Gazetteer and Diplomatic logic from side to side, no reader will now ever know. A world-tornado extinct, gone:--think of the sounds uttered from human windpipes, shrill with rage some of them, hoa.r.s.e others with ditto; of the vituperations, execrations, printed and vocal,--grating harsh thunder upon Friedrich and this new course of his.

Huge melody of Discords, shrieking, droning, grinding on that topic, through the afflicted Universe in general, for certain years. The very Pamphlets printed on it,--cannot Dryasdust give me the number of tons weight, then? Dead now every Pamphlet of them; a thing fallen horrible to human nature; extinct forever, as is the wont in such cases."

I will give only this of Voltaire; a mild Epigram, done at The DELICES, in pleasant view of Ferney and good things coming. A bolt shot into the storm-tost Sea and its wreckages, by a Mariner now cheerily drying his clothes on the sh.o.r.e there;--in fact, an indifferent Epigram, on Kings Friedrich and George, which is now flying about in select circles:--

"Rivaux du Vainqueur de l'Euphrate, L'Oncle et le Neveu, L'un fait la guerre en pirate, L'autre en parti bleu."

"Rivals of Alexander the Great, this Uncle and Nephew make war, the one as a Pirate [seizure of those French s.h.i.+ps], the other [Saxony stolen]

as Captain of an Accidental Thieving-squad,"--PARTI BLEU, as the French soldiers call it. [Walpole's LETTERS, "To Sir Horace Mann, 8th December; 1756."]

MAP facing page 365, Chap VII, Book 17----

Pirna was no sooner done than Friedrich returned to the "Camp at Lobositz," where his victorious Keith-Army has been lying all this while. The Camp of Lobositz, and all Camps Prussian and Austrian, are about to strike their tents, and proceed to Winter-quarters, to prepare against next Spring. Friedrich set off thither October 18th (the very day after that of Waltersdorf); with intent to bring home Keith's Army, and see if Browne meant anything farther (which Browne did not, or does only in the small Tolpatch way); also to meet, Schwerin, whom he had summoned over from Silesia for a little conference there. Schwerin, after eating Konigsgratz Country well,--which was all he could do, as Piccolomini would not come out, and we know how strong the ground is,--had retired to Silesia again, in due season (snapping up, in a sharply conclusive manner, any Tolpatcheries that attempted chase of him); taken Winter cantonments in Silesia, headquarter Schweidnitz; and is now getting his Instructions, here personally, in the Metal Mountains, for a day or two. [_Helden-Geschichte, _iii. 946, 948.]

Friedrich brought his Keith-Army home to Gross-Sedlitz, to join the other Force there; and distributed the whole into their Winter-quarters.

Cantoned far and wide, spreading out from Pirna on both hands: on the left or western hand, by Zwickau, Freyberg, Chemnitz, up to Leipzig, Torgau; and on the right or northeast hand, by Zittau, Gorlitz, Bautzen, to protect the Lausitz against Austrian inroads,--while a remote Detachment, under Winterfeld, watches the Bober River with similar views. [In _Helden-Geschichte, _iii. 948 et seq., a minute List by Place and Regiment.] All which done, or settled to be done, Friedrich quits Gross-Sedlitz, November 14th; and takes up his abode at Dresden for this Winter.

Chapter VIII.--WINTER IN DRESDEN.

The Saxon Army is incorporated, then; its King gone under the horizon; the Saxon Country has a Prussian Board set over it, to administer all things of Government, especially to draw taxes and recruits from Saxony.

Torgau, seat of this new Board, has got fortified; "1,500 inhabitants were requisitioned as spademen for that end, at first with wages,"--latterly, I almost fear, without!

The Saxon Ministers are getting drilled, cas.h.i.+ered if necessary; and on all hands, rigorous methods going forward;--till Saxony is completely under grasp; in which state it was held very tight indeed, for the six years coming. There is no detailing of all that; details, were they even known to an Editor at such distance, would weary every reader. Enough to understand that Friedrich has not on this occasion, as he did in 1744, omitted to disarm Saxony, to hobble it in every limb, and have it, at discretion, tied as with ropes to his interests and him.

[_Helden-Geschichte, _iii. 945-956.] His management was never accounted cruel; and it was studiously the reverse of violent or irregular: but it had to be rigorous as the facts were;--nor was it the worst, or reckoned the worst, of Saxony's miseries in this time.

Poor Country, suffering for its Bruhl! In the Country, except for its Bruhl, there was no sin against Prussia; the reverse rather. The Saxon population, as Protestants, have no good-will to Austria and its aims of aggrandizement. In Austrian spy-letters, now and afterwards, they are described to us as "GUT PREUSSISCH;" "strong for Prussia, the most of them, even in Dresden itself."

Whether Friedrich could have had much real hope to end the War this Year, or scare it off from beginning, may be a question. If he had, it is totally disappointed. The Saxon Government has brought ruin on itself and Country, but it has been of great damage to Friedrich. Would Polish Majesty have consented to disband his soldiers, and receive Friedrich with a BONA-FIDE "Neutrality," Friedrich could have pa.s.sed the Mountains still in time for a heavy stroke on Bohemia, which was totally unprepared for such a visit, And he might--from the Towers of Prag, for instance--have, far more persuasively, held out the olive-branch to an astonished Empress-Queen: "Leave me alone, Madam; will you, then!

Security for that; I wanted and want nothing more!" But Polish Majesty, taking on him the character of Austrian martyr, and flinging himself into the gulf, has prevented all that; has turned all that the other way.

Austria, it appears, is quite ungrateful: "Was n't he bound?" thinks Austria,--as its wont rather is. Forgetful of the great deliverance wrought for it by poor Polish Majesty; whom it could not deliver-except into bottomless wreck! Austria, grateful or not, stands unscathed; has time to prepare its Armaments, its vocal Arguments: Austria is in higher provocation than ever; and its very Arguments, highly vocal to the Reich and the world, "Is not this man a robber, and enemy of mankind?" do Friedrich a great deal of ill. Friedrich's sudden Campaign, instead of landing him in the heart of the Austrian States, there to propose Peace, has kindled nearly all Europe into flames of rage against him,--which will not consist in words merely! Never was misunderstanding of a man at a higher pitch: "Such treatment of a peaceable Neighbor and Crowned Head,--witness it, ye Heavens and thou Earth!" Dauphiness falling on her knees to Most Christian Majesty; "Princess and dearest Sister" to Most Christian Majesty's Pompadour; especially no end of Pleading to the German Reich, in a furious, Delphic-Pythoness or quasi-inspired tone: all this goes on.

From the time when Pirna was blockaded, Kaiser Franz, his high Consort and sense of duty urging him, has been busy in the Reich's-Hofrath (kind of Privy-Council or Supreme Court of the Reich, which sits at Vienna); busy there, and in the Reich's Diet at Regensburg; busy everywhere, with utmost diligence over Teutschland,--forging Reich thunder. Manifestoes, HOF-DECRETS, DEHORTATORIUMS, EXCITATORIUMS; so goes it, exploding like Vesuvius, shock on the back of shock:--20th September it began; and lasts, CRESCENDO, through Winter and onwards, at an extraordinary rate.

[In _Helden-Geschichte_(iv. 163-174; iii. 956; and indeed Pa.s.sIM through those Volumes), the Originals in frightful superabundance.] Of all which, leaving readers to imagine it, we will say nothing,--except that it points towards "Armed Interference by the Reich," "Reich's Execution Army;" nay towards "Ban of the Reich" (total excommunication of this Enemy of Mankind, and giving of him up to Satan, by bell, book and candle), which is a kind of thunder-bolt not heard of for a good few ages past! Thunder-bolt thought to be gone mainly to rust by the judicious;--

which, however, the poor old Reich did grasp again, and attempt to launch. As perhaps we shall have to notice by and by, among the miracles going.