those of his friend the author of La Pucelle, and he made no pretence to being a Christian. Voltaire represented a reaction against Christianity in belief and theory, Frederick a reaction against Christianity in the practice of life and the management of affairs; and the renown of the one and the success of the other furnish a comment on the whole a discouraging and melancholy comment-on Goethe's opinion that the race, having once attained to the height of Christianity, cannot recede from it. To follow the steps of a Homeric hero after seventeen hundred years of Christianity. is not edifying; but when our guide is such a describer as Carlyle, it is interesting; and the adventures of few heroes are so diversified, picturesque, and startling as those of Frederick. The many-counselled, much-enduring Ulysses never came through one half so much as the hero of the Seven Years' War; and whatever were Frederick's faults, he was not only as sagacious as Ulysses and as brave as Achilles, but had qualities and characteristics of his own that make his history more piquant than that of either. If it is the note of a poet to seek and find relief for his deepest feelings by pouring them forth in verse, whether the verse is particularly good or not, he was a born poet. His wit, also, if not refined, was as biting as his sword; and the crowned heads of Europe, ally and enemy pretty much alike, winced under the shafts of his wild mockery and bitter scorn. Here was a subject for the most racy historical describer of the century!

It is in the delineation of Frederick's campaigns that Mr. Carlyle's descriptive power is most signally displayed. Not only are the battles placed before the mind's eye with vivid distinctness, but we are made to understand the precise objects aimed at by the antagonist commanders and the means they took to attain them. In pictorial descriptions of battles, there are none but Homer and Scott who can be named in comparison with Carlyle; and Homer

Carlyle's Description of Battles.

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almost confined himself to the single combats of heroes; while Scott, though his Bannockburn and Flodden are admirable pictures of feudal fray, did not, in his Life of Napoleon, describe modern battles with corresponding skill. Carlyle describes the modern battle with the science of a military critic, and with the pictorial genius of a poet. It is totally impossible to do justice to these masterpieces of literary art by brief extracts. They are wholes, and deserve study as such. But I shall give the reader two successive glimpses of Frederick in the field, first winning, then losing, a battle.

It had been the object of Frederick, in the earlier part of 1745, to entice Prince Karl, who was at the head of an Austrian and Saxon army, numbering about 70,000 men, to enter Silesia through the passes from Bohemia. The impression which he had conveyed to the Prince was that he was too weak to face the Austrians in the field, and hoped for nothing better than to secure his retreat upon Breslau. When the French envoy, Valori, a man who knew something of war, expressed surprise to Frederick that he had left the passes undefended, "Mon ami," replied the King, "if you want to get the mouse, don't shut the trap!"

Carlyle paints for us a view of the Austrian generals, as they appeared on the top of the mountains overlooking Silesia, while their men were marching past, to descend, as they imagined, in the rear of a retreating foe. I shall quote the account of the battle of Hohenfriedberg from this point, omitting much but altering nothing. The details of the actual fighting are too complicated, and would occupy too much space, to be cited.

THE BATTLE OF HOHENFRIEDBERG, JUNE, 1745.

Prince Karl, with Weissenfels, General Berlichingen, and many plumed dignitaries are dining on the hill-top near Hohenfriedberg: after having given order about everything, they witness there, over their wine, the issue of their columns from the mountains; which goes on all the afternoon with field-music, spread banners; and the oldest general admits

he never saw a finer review-manœuvre, or one better done, if so well. Thus sit they on the hill-top in the beautiful June afternoon, Silesia lying beautifully azure at their feet; the Zobtenberg, enchanted mountain, blue and high on one's eastern horizon. The Austrian and Saxon gentlemen notice, four or five miles in the distance, a body of Prussian horse and foot, visibly wending northward; like a long glittering serpent, the glitter of their muskets flashing back yonder on the afternoon sun and us, as they mount from hollow to height. Ten or twelve thousand of them; making for Strigau, to appearance. Intending to bivouac or billet there, and keep some kind of watch over us; belike with an eye to being rearguard, on the retreat towards Breslau to-morrow? Or will they retreat without attempting mischief? Serenity of Weissenfels engages to seize the heights and proper posts, over yonder this night yet; and will take Strigau itself, the first thing, to-morrow morning.

Yes, your serenities, those are Prussians in movement: and it is not their notion to retreat without mischief. For there stands, not so far off, on the Stanowitz Fuchsberg, a brisk little gentleman, if you could notice him; with his eyes fixed on you, and plans in the head of him now getting nearly mature. For certain, he is pushing out that column of men; and all manner of other columns are getting order to push out, and take their ground; and to-morrow morning-you will not find him in retreat! Friedrich, I presume, at this late hour of four, may be snatching a morsel of dinner; his orderlies are silently speeding, plans taken, orders given: To start all, at eight in the evening, for the bridge of Strigau; there to cross, and spread to the right and to the left. Never will Valori forget the discipline of those Prussians, and how they marched. Difficult ways; the hard road is for their artillery; the men march on each side, sometimes to mid-leg in water,-never mind. Wholly in order, wholly silent; Valori followed them three leagues close, and there was not one straggler. Every private man, much more every officer, knows well what grim errand they are on; and they make no remarks. Steady as Time; and, except that their shoes are not of felt, silent as he. The Austrian watchfires glow silent manifold to leftward yonder; silent overhead are the stars the path of all duty, too, is silent (not about Strigau alone) for every well-drilled man. Friedrich's general order is, "No prisoners, you cavalry, in the heat of fight; cavalry, strike at the faces of them. You infantry, keep your fire till within fifty steps; bayonet withal is to be relied on." These were Friedrich's last general orders, given in the hollow of the night, near the foot of that Fuchsberg (Fox-hill) where he had been so busy all day.

To describe the battle which ensued, battle named of Strigau or Hohenfriedberg, excels the power of human talent, if human talent had leisure for such employment. It is the huge shock and clash of 70,000 against 70,000. An enormous furious simultas (or " both at once," as the Latins phrase it), spreading over ten square miles. Rather say, a wide congeries of electric simultaneities; all electric, playing madly into one another; most loud, most mad: the aspect of which is smoky, thunderous,

:

Battle of Kunersdorf.

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abstruse; the true sequences of which who shall unravel? Prince Karl beats retreat, about eight in the morning; is through Hohenfriedberg about ten back into the mountains; a thoroughly well-beaten man. Towards Bolkenhayn, the Saxons and he; their heavy artillery and baggage had been left safe there. Not much pursued, and gradually rearranging himself; with thoughts-no want of thoughts! Came pouring down, triumphantly invasive, yesterday; returns on these terms, in about fifteen hours. Not marching with displayed banners and fieldmusic this time; this is a far other march. The mousetrap had been left open, and we rashly went in!-Prince Karl's loss, including that of the Saxons, is 9,000 dead and wounded, 7,000 prisoners, 66 cannon, 73 flags and standards; the Prussian is about 5,000 dead and wounded.

Having seen Frederick victorious, let us now have a look at him in defeat. The battle of Kunersdorf, one of the most fiercely-contested in the history of war, was fought between the Prussians and the Russians, in August, 1759, on a series of hills, or big sandy knolls, on the right bank of the Oder. The battle, up to the time at which we strike into Carlyle's description, had been magnificently successful on the side of Frederick.

THE ROUT OF KUNERSDORF.

I should judge it must be three of the afternoon. The day is windless, blazing; one of the hottest August days; and "nobody, for twelve hours past, could command a drink of water: very fresh the poor Prussians cannot be! They have done two bouts of excellent fighting; tumbled the Russians well back, stormed many batteries, and taken in all 180 cannon. At this stage, it appears, Finck and many generals were of opinion that, in the present circumstances, with troops so tired, and the enemy nearly certain to draw off, if permitted, here had been enough for one day, and that there ought to be pause till to-morrow. Friedrich knew well the need of rest; but Friedrich, impatient of things half-done, especially of Russians half-beaten, would not listen to this proposal, which was reckoned upon him as a grave and tragic fault, all the rest of his life; though favourable judges, who were on the ground, are willing to prove that pausing here was not feasible or reasonable. Friedrich considers with himself, "Our left wing has hardly yet been in fire!"-calls out the entire left wing, foot and horse: these are to emerge from their meshwork of Lakes about Kunersdorf, and bear a hand along with us on the Russian front here, especially to sweep away that raging battery they have on the Big Spitzberg, and make us clear of it. The Big Spitzberg lies to south and ahead of the Russian right as now ranked; fatally covers their right flank, and half ruins the attack in front.

The left-wing infantry thread their lake-labyrinth, the soonest possible;

have to rank again on the hither side, under a tearing fire from that Spitzberg; can then, at last, and do, storm onwards, upwards; but cannot, with their best efforts, take the Spitzberg; and have to fall back under its floods of tearing case-shot, and retire out of range. To Friedrich's blank disappointment: "Try it you, then, Seidlitz; you saved us at Zorndorf!" Seidlitz, though it is an impossible problem to storm batteries with horse, does charge in for the Russian flank, in spite of its covering battery; but the torrents of grapeshot are insufferable; the Seidlitz people, torn in gaps, recoil, whirl round, and do not rank again till beyond the Lakes of Kunersdorf. Seidlitz himself has got wounded, and has had to be carried away.

And, in brief, from this point onwards, all goes aback with the Prussians more and more. Repeated attempts on that Spitzberg battery prove vain; to advance without it is impossible. Friedrich's exertions are passionate, almost desperate; rallying, animating, new-ordering; everywhere in the hottest of the fire. "Thrice he personally led on the main attack." He has had two horses shot down under him; mounting a third, this, too, gets a bullet in an artery of the neck, and is about falling, when two adjutants save the King. In his waistcoat pocket some small gold case (étui) has got smitten flat by a bullet, which would otherwise have ended matters. The people about him remonstrate on such exposure of a life beyond value; he answers, curtly, "We must all of us try every method here, to win the battle; I, like every other, must stand to my duty here."

Friedrich's wearied battalions fight desperately, but cannot prevail farther; and in spite of Friedrich's vehement rallyings and urgings, gradually lose ground. The Loudon grenadiers, and masses of fresh Russians, are not to be broken, but advance and advance. Fancy the panting death-labours, and spasmodic toilings and bafflings, of these poor Prussians and their king! Nothing now succeeding; the deathagony now come; all hearts growing hopeless; only one heart still seeing hope. Back, slowly back, go the Prussians generally, nothing now succeeds with them. Back to the Kuhgrund again; fairly over the steep brow there; the Russians serrying their ranks atop, rearranging their many guns. There, once more, rose frightful struggle; desperate attempt by the foredone Prussians to retake that height. "Lasted fifteen minutes, line to line, not fifty yards asunder;" such musketry,— our last cartridges withal. Ardent Prussian parties trying to storm up; few ever getting to the top, none ever standing there alive one minute. This was the death-agony of the battle. Loudon, waiting behind the Spitzberg, dashes forward now, towards the Kuhgrund and our left flank. At sight of which a universal feeling shivers through the Prussian heart. "Hope ended, then!"-and their solid ranks rustle everywhere; and melt into one wild deluge, ebbing from the place as fast as it can.

It is towards six o'clock; the sweltering sun is now fallen low and veiled; gray evening sinking over these wastes. "N'y a-t-il donc pas un bougre de boulet qui puisse m'atteindre (is there then not one b

of a