new successive
marches, the Prussian quarterstaff stuck into the back of defeated
Austria, "Home with you; farther home!"--and shogging it on,--without
pause, for about a fortnight to come. And then only with temporary
pause; that is to say, with intricate manoeuvrings of a month long,
which shove it to Konigsgratz, its ultimatum, beyond which there is no
getting it. The stages and successive campings, to be found punctually
in the old Books and new, can interest only military readers. Here is a
small theological thing at Landshut, from first hand:--

JUNE 8th, 1745. "The Army followed Dumoulin's Corps, and marched upon
Landshut. On arriving in that neighborhood, the King was surrounded by
a troop of 2,000 Peasants,"--of Protestant persuasion very evidently!
(which is much the prevailing thereabouts),--"who begged permission of
him 'to massacre the Catholics of these parts, and clear the country of
them altogether.' This animosity arose from the persecutions which the
Protestants had suffered during the Austrian domination, when
their churches used to be taken from them and given to the Popish
priests,"--churches and almost their children, such was the anxiety to
make them orthodox. The patience of these peasants had run over; and
now, in the hour of hope, they proposed the above sweeping measure. "The
King was very far from granting them so barbarous a permission. He told
them, 'They ought rather to conform to the Scripture precept, to bless
those that cursed them, and pray for those that despitefully used them;
such was the way to gain the Kingdom of Heaven.' The peasants," rolling
dubious eyes for a moment, "answered, His Majesty was right; and
desisted from their cruel pretension." [_OEuvres de Frederic,_
ii.218.]...--"On Hohenfriedberg Day," says another Witness, "as far as
the sound of the cannon was heard, all round, the Protestants fell on
their knees, praying for victory to the Prussians;" [In Ranke, iii.
259.] and at Breslau that evening, when the "Thirteen trumpeting
Postilions" came tearing in with the news, what an enthusiasm without
limit!

Prince Karl has skill in choosing camps and positions: his Austrians are
much cowed; that is the grievous loss in his late fight. So, from June
8th, when they quit Silesia,--by two roads to go more readily,--all
through that month and the next, Friedrich spread to the due width,
duly pricking into the rear of them, drives the beaten hosts onward and
onward. They do no