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regiments what you have heard from me.’
And he
added, ‘The regiment of cavalry which shall not instantly, at the order, charge, shall be dismounted and sent into garrisons; the battalion of infantry that shall but falter shall lose its colors and its swords.
Now farewell, friends; soon we shall have vanquished, or we shall see each other no more.’
On the morning of December fifth, at half past 4, the army was in motion, the king in front, the troops to warlike strains singing,
Grant, Lord, that we may do with might
That which our hands shall find to do!
‘With men like these,’ said Frederic, ‘God will give me the victory.’
The
Austrians were animated by no common kindling impulse.
The
Prussians, on that day, moved as one being, endowed with intelligence, and swayed by one will.
Never did the utmost daring so combine with severe prudence, as in the arrangements of Frederic.
His eye seized every advantage of place, and his manoeuvres were inspired by the state of his force and the character of the ground.
The hills and the valleys, the copses and the fallow land, the mists of morning and the clear light of noon, came to meet his dispositions, so that nature seemed instinct with the resolve to conspire with his genius.
Never had orders been so executed as his on that day; and never did military genius, in its necessity, so summon invention to its rescue from despair.
His line was formed to make an acute angle with that of the Austrians; as he moved forwards, his left wing was kept disengaged; his right came in contact with the enemy's left, outwinged it, and attacked it in front and
