ns, as in this now done, that is their fixed plan.
Ferdinand, by unwearied effort, succeeded in defending Hanover,--nothing
of it but that inconsiderable slice or skirt round Gottingen, which they
kept long, could ever be got by the French. Ferdinand defended Hanover;
and wore out annually the big French Armies which were missioned
thither, as in the spasm of an expiring last effort by this poor
hag-ridden France,--at an expense to her, say, of 50,000 men per year.
Which was good service on Ferdinand's part; but done less and less in
the shining or universally notable way.

So that with him too we are henceforth, thank Heaven, permitted and
even bound to be brief. Hardly above two Battles more from him, if even
two:--and mostly the wearied Reader's imagination left to conceive
for itself those intricate strategies, and endless manoeuvrings on the
Diemel and the Dill, on the Ohm River and the Schwalm and the Lippe, or
wherever they may be, with small help from a wearied Editor!--

Chapter VI.--WINTER-QUARTERS 1760-1761.

A melancholy little event, which afterwards proved unexpectedly
unfortunate for Friedrich, had happened in England ten days before the
Battle of Torgau. Saturday, 25th October, 1760, George II., poor old
gentleman, suddenly died. He was in his 77th year; feeble, but not
feebler than usual,--unless, perhaps, the unaccountable news from
Kloster Kampen may have been too agitating to the dim old mind? On the
Monday of this week he had, "from a tent in Hyde Park," presided at a
Review of Dragoons; and on Thursday, as his Coldstream Guards were
on march for Portsmouth and foreign service, "was in his Portico at
Kensington to see them pass;"--full of zeal always in regard to military
matters, and to this War in particular. Saturday, by sunrise he was
on foot; took his cup of chocolate; inquired about the wind, and the
chances of mails arriving; opened his window, said he would have a turn
in the Gardens, the morning being so fine. It was now between 7 and 8.
The valet then withdrew with the chocolate apparatus; but had
hardly shut the door, when he heard a deep sigh, and fall of
something,--"billet of wood from the fire?" thought he;--upon which,
hurrying back, he found it was the King, who had dropt from his seat,
"as if in attempting to ring the bell." King said faintly, "Call
Amelia," and instantly died. Poor deaf Amelia (Friedrich's old love, now
grown old and deaf) listened wildly for some faint so