d it to the king."

"Our loss must be terribly heavy."

"Terrible! There is no saying how severe it is, yet; but not half
the grenadiers are on their feet.

"There is nothing I can do for you?"

"Nothing at all. My orders are to lie still; and as I feel too weak
to move, and there is no one to carry me away, and nowhere to take
me to, I am not likely to disobey the order."

The officer rode off again. Karl soon had a fire lighted,
sufficiently close to Fergus for him to feel its warmth. Wounded
men, who had made their way down the hill, came and sat down on the
other sides of it. Many other fires were lighted, as it grew dusk.

In front the battle had broken out again, as furiously as ever; and
ere long wounded men began to come down again. They brought
cheering news, however. The Prussians were still pressing forward,
the cavalry had thrown the Austrian line into terrible confusion.
No one knew exactly where any of the Prussian battalions had got
to, but all agreed that things were going on well.

At five o'clock the roar gradually ceased, and soon all was quiet.
The wounded now came in fast, but none could say whether the battle
was won or lost; for the night was so dark that each could only
speak of what had happened to his own corps.

Presently the number round the fires was swelled by the arrival of
numerous Austrians, wounded and unwounded. Most of these laid their
rifles by, saying:

"It is a bitter night, comrades. Will you let us have a share of
the fire?"

"Come in, come in," the Prussians answered. "We are all friends for
tonight, for we are all in equally bad plight. Can you tell us how
matters have gone, up there?"

But these knew no more than the Prussians. They had got separated
from their corps in the confusion and, losing their way altogether,
had seen the glow of the fires in the forest, and had come down for
warmth and shelter.

Presently Major Kaulbach rode up again.

"How have things gone, major?" Fergus asked eagerly.

"No one knows," he said. "The Austrians are broken up; and our
battalions and theirs are so mixed that there is no saying where
they are, or how matters will stand in the morning. The king has
gone to Elsnig, two or three miles away."

"Is there no news of Ziethen?"

"None. They have just begun to fire heavily again in that
direction, but what he has been doing all day, no one has any
idea."

But little was said round the fires. A short distance away the
surg