My dear Brother,Your bad conduct has greatly injured my affairs. It is not the enemy, but your ill-concerted measures, which have done me this harm. My generals also are inexcusable, whether they gave you bad advice or only suffered you to come to such injudicious resolutions. In this sad situation it only remains for me to make a last attempt. I must hazard a battle. If we can not conquer, we must all of us have ourselves killed.
Berlin, she writes, had become as odious to me as it once was dear. I flattered myself that, renouncing grandeurs, I might lead a soft and tranquil life in my new home, and begin a happier year than the one which had just ended.The ceremony of coronation was attended, near Presburg, on the 25th of June, with much semi-barbaric splendor, as the Iron Crown58 of St. Stephen was placed upon the pale, beautiful brow of the young wife and mother. All the renowned chivalry of Hungary were assembled upon that field. They came in gorgeous costume, with embroidered banners, and accompanied by imposing retinues. At the close of the ceremonies, the queen, who was distinguished as a bold rider, mounted a swift charger, and, followed by a long retinue of Magyar warriors, galloped to the top of a small eminence artificially constructed for the occasion, called the K?nigsburg, or Kings Hill, where she drew her sword, and, flourishing it toward the four quarters of the heavens, bade defiance to any adversary who should venture to question her claims. The knightly warriors who crowded the plain flashed their swords in the sunlight, as with one accord, with chivalric devotion, they vowed fidelity to their queen.
Frederick, having regained Silesia, was anxious for peace. He wrote a polite letter to Maria Theresa, adroitly worded, so as to signify that desire without directly expressing it. The empress queen, disheartened by the disasters of Rossbach and Leuthen, was rather inclined to listen to such suggestions; but the Duchess448 of Pompadour verified the adage that hell has no fury like a woman scorned. She governed the wretched Louis XV., and through him governed France. In her intense personal exasperation against Frederick she would heed no terms of compromise, and infused new energy into all warlike operations. Large subsidies were paid by France to Austria, Sweden, and Russia, to prepare for the campaign of 1758.Through the efforts of Maria Theresa there was another brief conference, but it amounted to nothing. Neither party wished for war. But Austria craved the annexation of Bavaria, and Frederick was determined that Austria should not thus be enlarged.557 Thus the summer passed away in unavailing diplomacy and in equally unavailing military man?uvrings. While engaged in these adventures, Frederick received the tidings of the death of Voltaire, who breathed his last on the 20th of May, 1778. The soul of Frederick was too much seared by lifes stern conflicts to allow him to manifest, or probably to feel, any emotion on the occasion. He, however, wrote a eulogy upon the renowned littrateur, which, though written by a royal pen, attracted but little attention.These two events so exasperated his Prussian majesty that the next morning, at an early hour, he reopened upon the doomed236 city with renewed vigor his fire of bombshells and red-hot shot. Fire companies were organized throughout the city, to rush with their engines wherever the glowing balls descended, and thus the flames which frequently burst out were soon extinguished. All day Thursday, Thursday night, Friday, and until nine in the morning of Saturday, the tempest of battle, with occasional lulls, hurled its bolts and uttered its thunders. There was then a short rest until four oclock on Sunday afternoon, when the batteries again opened their action more vigorously than ever, nine bombs being often in the air at the same time.The night was very dark and cold. A wintry wind swept the bleak, frozen fields. Still the routed Austrians pressed on. Still the tireless Prussians pursued. The Prussian soldiers were Protestants.445 Many of them were well instructed in religion. As they pressed on through the gloom, sweeping the road before them with artillery discharges, their voices simultaneously burst forth into a well-known Church hymn, a sort of Protestant Te Deum
