With Frederick the Great Part 46

"I congratulate you, my dear Fergus, congratulate you with all my heart; and if there is just a shadow of regret that you should not have married and settled here entirely, it is but a small regret, in proportion to the pleasure I feel. It is not even reasonable, for when I consented to your going abroad to take service in Prussia, I knew that this would probably end in your settling down there altogether; for it was hardly likely that you could win a fortune that would admit of your coming back to live here.

"Of course, had your estate at that time been restored to you, you would probably not have gone at all; or if you had done so, it would have been but to stay for a few years, and see service under your cousin Keith, and then return to live among your own people.

As it was, there was no reason why you should greatly wish to return to Scotland, where you were landless, with no avenues open to employment. However, what you tell me, that the count and countess are willing that you should spend some months here, every year, is far better than I could have expected or even hoped; and, as you may imagine, quite reconciles me to the thought of your marrying abroad.

"In all other respects, nothing could be more satisfactory than what you tell me. Your promised wife must be a charming young lady, and her father and mother the kindest of people. Of course, your worldly prospects will be vastly beyond anything that even my wildest dreams have ever pictured for you, and in this respect all my cares for you are at an end.

"It will be delightful, indeed, to look forward to your homecoming every year; and I consider myself in every way a fortunate woman. I am sure that I shall come to love your Thirza very dearly.

"The only question is, when is the first visit to take place?

Everyone says that it does not seem that the war can go on very much longer; and that, wonderful as the king's resistance to so many enemies has been, it cannot continue. However, from what you say of his determination, and the spirit of the people, I cannot think that the end can be so near as people think. They have been saying nearly the same thing for the last three years; and yet, though everything seemed as dark as possible, he always extricated himself somehow from his difficulties.

"Besides, his enemies must at last get tired of a war in which, so far, they have had more defeats than victories, and have lavished such enormous sums of money. France has already impoverished herself, and Russia and Austria must feel the strain, too. In every church here prayers are offered for the success of the champion of Protestantism; and I am sure that if he had sent Scottish officers, as Gustavus Adolphus did, to raise troops in Scotland, he could have obtained forty or fifty thousand men in a very few weeks, so excited is everyone over the struggle.

"You would be surprised what numbers of people have called upon me, to congratulate me upon your rising to be a colonel in Frederick's army--people I have never seen before; and I can a.s.sure you that I never felt so important a person, even before the evil days of Culloden. When you come back the whole countryside will flock to give you welcome."

This letter was a great comfort to Fergus. That his mother would rejoice at his good fortune, he knew; but he feared that his marriage with a German lady, whatever her rank, would be a sore disappointment to her, not so much perhaps for her own sake as for that of the clansmen.

The English amba.s.sador was no longer with the army. At the fierce fight of Liegnitz he had been with Frederick, but had pa.s.sed the night in his carriage, which was jammed up among the baggage wagons, and had been unable to extricate himself or to discover how the battle was going on. Several times the Austrian cavalry had fallen upon the baggage, and had with great difficulty been beaten off by its guard; and the discomforts of the time, and the anxiety through which he had gone, so unhinged him that he was unable to follow Frederick's rapid movements throughout the rest of the campaign.

Fergus had confided to Earl Marischal Keith, later, his engagement to the Count Eulenfurst's daughter.

"You are a lucky young dog, Fergus," he said. "My brother and I came abroad too late for any young countess to fall in love with us. There is nothing like taking young to the business of soldiering abroad. Bravery is excellent in its way; but youth and bravery, combined with good looks, are irresistible to the female mind. I am heartily glad that one of our kin should have won something more than six feet of earth by his sword.

"Count Eulenfurst is one of the few men everyone speaks well of.

There is no man in Saxony who stands higher. In any other country he would have been the leading statesman of his time, but the wretched king, and his still more wretched minister, held in disfavour all who opposed their wanton extravagance and their dangerous plans.

"It is an honour indeed to be connected with such a family, putting aside all question of money; but indeed, in this respect nothing could be more satisfactory. His daughter is the sole heiress of his wide estates, and as her husband you will have a splendid position.

"I am very glad, lad, that the count has no objection to your pa.s.sing a portion of your time in Scotland. They say, you know, that much as Scotchmen boast of their love of their country, they are always ready to leave it to better themselves; and that it is very seldom they ever return to it. Such was, unhappily, the case with my brother; such will probably be the case with myself; but I am glad that you will be an exception, and that you will still keep up your connection with your old home.

"I hope, lad, that you will have more than one son. The first, of course, will make Saxony his home; but bring up the second as a Scotchman, send him home to be educated, and let him succeed you in the glens. If he has the family instinct for fighting, let him go into the British army--he can go into no better--but let your people have some one who will be their own laird, and whose interests will be identified with their own."

Fergus smiled at the old man's earnestness.

"That is rather looking ahead, sir," he said. "However, it is certainly what I should like to do, myself; and if, as you say, I have more than one son, I will certainly give the second the training you suggest, and make a Scotchman of him. Certainly, if he has fighting instincts, he will see that he will have more opportunities of active service, in the British army, than he could have in that of Saxony; which has been proved unable to stand alone, and can only act as a small ally to either Prussia or Austria. Even putting aside my nationality, I would rather be fighting under Clive, in India, than in any service in the world--even in that of Prussia."

"You are right, lad. Since the days of Marlborough, people have begun to think that the British were no longer a fighting people; but the way in which they have wrested Canada from the French, and achieved marvels in India, to say nothing of the conduct of their infantry at Minden, shows that the qualities of the race are unchanged; and some day they will astonish the world again, as they have done several times in their history."

The king soon heard the news from the Earl, and one evening said to Fergus:

"So, as the Earl Marischal tells me, you have found time, Colonel Drummond, for love making. I thought, that day I went to express my regrets for the outrage that had been committed at Count Eulenfurst's, that it would make a pretty romance if the young lady who received me should take a fancy to you; which was not altogether unlikely, after the gallant manner in which you had saved them all from those rascals of mine; and when you told me, at Dresden, that they had been nursing you, the idea again occurred to me. Well, I am glad you have done so well for yourself. As a king, I rejoice that one who has fought so bravely should obtain a meet reward; and as one who dabbles in poetry, the romance of the thing is very pleasant to me.

"But I am not to lose your services, I hope?"

"No, sire. So long as the war goes on, I shall continue to serve your majesty to the best of my powers."

The king nodded.

"It is what I should have expected, from one of Marshal Keith's relations," he said; "but it is not everyone who would care to go on leading this dog's life, when a pretty and well-endowed bride is awaiting him.

"However, it cannot last much longer. The crisis must come, ere long. If we can defeat Daun, it may be put off for a time. If we are beaten, I do not see that I can struggle longer against fate.

With Berlin already in their hands, with the country denuded of men and almost exhausted in means, with the Russian and Austrian armies already planted on Prussian soil, I can do no more, if I lose another great battle."

"We must hope that it will not be so, sire. The spirit of the soldiers is as high as ever and, now that they will be fighting nearly within sight of their homes, they can be trusted to achieve almost impossibilities."

"The men are good men," the king said, "and if I had Keith and Schwerin by my side, I should feel more hopeful; but they are gone, and there are none to fill their places. My brother Henry is a good soldier, but he is over cautious. Seidlitz has not recovered from his wounds. Hulsen has done well of late, and has shown wonderful energy, considering that he is an old man. But there are none of them who are at once prudent when it behoved them to be prudent, and quick to strike when they see an opening, like Schwerin and Keith.

"Ziethen is a splendid cavalry officer, but he is fit to command cavalry only; and the whole burden falls upon my shoulders, which are getting too old to bear so heavy a weight."

"I trust, sire, that they will not have to bear the burden much longer. Just at present Russia and Austria are doubtless encouraged by success; but the strain must be heavy on them also, and another defeat might well cause them to doubt whether it is worthwhile to continue to make sacrifices that produce such small results."

"Heaven grant that it may be so!" the king said earnestly. "G.o.d knows that I never wanted this war, and that from the day it began I have eagerly grasped every chance that presented itself of making peace, short of the dismemberment of my kingdom. I would at this moment willingly accede to any terms, however onerous, in order to secure peace for my country."

Chapter 20: Torgau.

After many marches and quick blows at the Confederate armies, and driving them beyond the borders of Saxony, Frederick moved towards Torgau, where Daun had established himself in a position that he deemed impregnable. It had been Prince Henry's camp during the previous autumn, and Daun had in vain beleaguered it. Hulsen had made it his headquarters during the summer.

Torgau was an old-fashioned town, surrounded by tracts of pine wood, with pleasant villages and much well-cultivated land. The town rose above the Elbe, on the shoulder of a broad eminence called the Sipt.i.tz. This height stands nearly a mile from the river. On the western and southern side of the town are a series of lakes and quagmires, the remains of an old course of the Elbe.

Set on Sipt.i.tz's heights was Daun's camp, girt about by intrenchments. The hill was mostly covered with vineyards. Its height was some two hundred feet above the general level of the country, and its area some five or six square miles. Covered, as its flanks were, by heights, woods, ponds, and mora.s.ses, the position was an extremely strong one, so much so that Daun had not ventured to attack Prince Henry, though in vastly superior force; and still more difficult was it for Frederick to do so, when held by an army greatly superior to his own, for the Austrian force numbered sixty-five thousand, while the king, after being joined by all his detachments, had but forty-four thousand. Nothing, indeed, but the most urgent necessity could have driven the king to attempt so difficult an enterprise.

[Map: Battle of Torgau]

His plan was to attack it simultaneously in front and rear; and to do this he decided that half the force, under Ziethen, should attack the Sipt.i.tz hill on the south side; while he himself, with the other half, was to make a long detour and a.s.sault it, at the same moment, on the north.

Frederick's march was some fifteen miles in length, while Ziethen had but six to traverse; and as the route was through forests, the difficulties in the way of the two columns arriving at their point of attack, simultaneously, were great indeed; and were increased by the fact that the weather was wet, the ground heavy, and the streams swollen.

The king's force marched in three columns, by roads through the forest. There were no villages here, no one to question as to the turns and branchings of roads, thus adding to the chances that even Frederick's force would not arrive together at the point of attack.

Frederick's own column contained eight thousand grenadiers and foot guards, with a force of cavalry; and his line of march was by the road nearest to Daun's position.

Two other columns--Hulsen's, composed princ.i.p.ally of infantry; and Holstein's, chiefly of cavalry--marched on parallel roads on a wider circle; and the baggage, in a column by itself, outside all.

Daun had news of Frederick's approach, and had strong detachments watching in the woods. The scouts of one of these parties brought in news of the king's march. A signal cannon was fired immediately, and Daun learned thereby of the movement to attack him from the north.

Daun at once wheeled round a portion of his force to receive Frederick's attack. Lacy, with twenty thousand men, had been placed as an advanced guard; and now shifted his position westward, to guard what had become Daun's rear; while two hundred fresh cannon were added, to the two hundred already placed, to defend the face threatened by Frederick.

For an hour before the king arrived at his point of attack, a heavy artillery fire had been heard from Ziethen's side; and it was supposed that he had already delivered his attack. Unfortunately, he had not done so. He had calculated his pace accurately, but had come upon a small Austrian force, like those Frederick had encountered. It had for a time held its ground, and had replied to his fire with cannon. Ziethen, not knowing how small the force was, drew up in order of battle and drove it back on Lacy, far to the east of his proper place of attack. Here he became engaged with Lacy, and a cannonade was kept up for some hours--precious time that should have been spent in ascending the hills, and giving aid to the king.

When Frederick's column emerged from the woods, there was no sign of either Hulsen or Holstein's divisions. The king sent out his staff to hurry them up, and himself reconnoitred the ground and questioned the peasants.

The ground proved so boggy as to be impa.s.sable, and Frederick withdrew into the wood again, in order to attack the Austrian left.

This had, in Prince Henry's time, been defended by a strong abattis; but since the cold weather set in, much of this had been used by the Austrians as firewood, and it could therefore be penetrated.

Frederick waited impatiently. He could hear the heavy cannonade on Ziethen, and feared that that general would be crushed before he could perform his part of the plan arranged. His staff were unable to find Holstein's cavalry, which had taken the wrong turning at some point, and were completely lost. Hulsen was still far away.