Gay young Englishmen of twenty thousand a year, accustomed to liberty and luxury, would not easily submit to these Spartan restraints.The King could not venture to keep them in order as he kept his own subjects in order.Situated as he was with respect to England, he could not well imprison or shoot refractory Howards and Cavendishes.On the other hand, the example of a few fine gentlemen, attended by chariots and livery servants, eating in plates, and drinking champagne and Tokay, was enough to corrupt his whole army.He thought it best to make a stand at first, and civilly refused to admit such dangerous companions among his troops.
The help of England was bestowed in a manner far more useful and more acceptable.An annual subsidy of near seven hundred thousand pounds enabled the King to add probably more than fifty thousand men to his army.Pitt, now at the height of power and popularity, undertook the task of defending Western Germany against France, and asked Frederic only for the loan of a general.The general selected was Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick, who had attained high distinction in the Prussian service.He was put at the head of an army, partly English, partly Hanoverian, partly composed of mercenaries hired from the petty princes of the empire.He soon vindicated the choice of the two allied Courts, and proved himself the second general of the age.
Frederic passed the winter at Breslau, in reading, writing, and preparing for the next campaign.The havoc which the war had made among his troops was rapidly repaired; and in the spring of 1758he was again ready for the conflict.Prince Ferdinand kept the French in check.The King in the meantime, after attempting against the Austrians some operations which led to no very important result, marched to encounter the Russians, who, slaying, burning, and wasting wherever they turned, had penetrated into the heart of his realm.He gave them battle at Zorndorf, near Frankfort on the Oder.The fight was long and bloody.Quarter was neither given nor taken; for the Germans and Scythians regarded each other with bitter aversion, and the sight of the ravages committed by the half savage invaders, had incensed the King and his army.The Russians were overthrown with great slaughter; and for a few months no further danger was to be apprehended from the east.
A day of thanksgiving was proclaimed by the King, and was celebrated with pride and delight by his people.The rejoicings in England were not less enthusiastic or less sincere.This may be selected as the point of time at which the military glory of Frederic reached the zenith.In the short space of three quarters of a year he had won three great battles over the armies of three mighty and warlike monarchies, France, Austria, and Russia.
But it was decreed that the temper of that strong mind should be tried by both extremes of fortune in rapid succession.Close upon this series of triumphs came a series of disasters, such as would have blighted the fame and broken the heart of almost any other commander.Yet Frederic, in the midst of his calamities, was still an object of admiration to his subjects, his allies, and his enemies.Overwhelmed by adversity, sick of life, he still maintained the contest, greater in defeat, in, flight, and in what seemed hopeless ruin, than on the fields of his proudest victories.
Having vanquished the Russians, he hastened into Saxony to oppose the troops of the Empress Queen, commanded by Daun, the most cautious, and Laudohn, the most inventive and enterprising of her generals.These two celebrated commanders agreed on a scheme, in which the prudence of the one and the vigour of the other seem to have been happily combined.At dead of night they surprised the King in his, camp at Hochkirchen.His presence of mind saved his troops from destruction; but nothing could save them from defeat and severe loss.Marshal Keith was among the slain.The first roar of the guns roused the noble exile from his rest, and he was instantly in the front of the battle.He received a dangerous wound, but refused to quit the field, and was in the act of rallying his broken troops, when an Austrian bullet terminated his chequered and eventful life.
The misfortune was serious.But of all generals Frederic understood best how to repair defeat, and Daun understood least how to improve victory.In a few days the Prussian army was as formidable as before the battle.The prospect was, however, gloomy.An Austrian army under General Harsch had invaded Silesia, and invested the fortress of Neisse.Daun, after his success at Hochkirchen, had written to Harsch in very confident terms:--"Go on with your operations against Neisse.Be quite at ease as to the King.I will give a good account of him." In truth, the position of the Prussians was full of difficulties.
Between them and Silesia, lay the victorious army of Daun.It was not easy for them to reach Silesia at all.If they did reach it, they left Saxony exposed to the Austrians.But the vigour and activity of Frederic surmounted every obstacle.He made a circuitous march of extraordinary rapidity, passed Daun, hastened into Silesia, raised the siege of Niesse, and drove Harsch into Bohemia.Daun availed himself of the King's absence to attack Dresden.The Prussians defended it desperately.The inhabitants of that wealthy and polished capital begged in vain for mercy from the garrison within, and from the besiegers without.The beautiful suburbs were burned to the ground.It was clear that the town, if won at all, would be won street by street by the bayonet.At this conjuncture came news, that Frederic, having cleared Silesia of his enemies, was returning by forced marches into Saxony.Daun retired from before Dresden, and fell back into the Austrian territories.The King, over heaps of ruins, made his triumphant entry into the unhappy metropolis, which had so cruelly expiated the weak and perfidious policy of its sovereign.
