ening of his
first march, Wednesday, April 20th, finds his way barred; and that the
difficulties may be considerable. "Nothing to be made of it to-night,"
thinks Bevern; "but we must try to-morrow!" and has to take camp,
"with a marshy brook in front of him," some way on the hither side of
Reichenberg; and study overnight what method of unbarring there may be.
Thursday morning early, Bevern, having well reconnoitred and studied,
was at work unbarring. Bevern crossed his own marshy brook; courageously
assaulted Konigseck's position, left wing of Konigseck; stormed the
abatis, the batteries, plunged in upon Konigseck, man to man, horse to
horse, and after some fierce enough but brief dispute, tumbled Konigseck
out of the ground. Konigseck made some attempt to rally; attempted
twice, but in vain; had fairly to roll away, and at length to run,
leaving 1,000 dead upon the field, about 500 prisoners; one or two guns,
and I forget how many standards, or whether any kettle-drums. This
was thought to be a decidedly bright feat on Bevern's part
(rather mismanaged latterly on Konigseck's); [Tempelhof, i. 100;
_Helden-Geschichte,_ iii. 1077 (Friedrich's own Account, "Linay in
Bohmen, 24th April, 1757"); &c. &c. There is, in Busching's _Magazin_
(xvi. 139 et seq.), an intelligible sketch of this Action of
Reichenherg, with satirical criticisms, which have some basis, on Lacy,
Maguire and others, by an Anonymous Military Cynic,--who gives many
such in BUSCHING (that of Fontenoy, for example), not without force of
judgment, and signs of wide study and experience in his trade.]--much
approved by Friedrich, as he hears of it, at Linay, on his own
prosperous march Prag-ward. A comfortable omen, were there nothing more.

Konigseck and Company, torn out of Reichenberg, and set running, could
not fairly halt again and face about till at Liebenau, twenty miles off,
where they found some defile or difficult bit of ground fit for them;
and this too proved capable of yielding pause for a few hours only. For
Schwerin, with his Silesian Column, was coming up from the northeast,
threatening Konigseck on flank and rear: Konigseck could only tighten
his straps a little at this Liebenau, and again get under way; and
making vain attempts to hinder the junction of Schwerin and Bevern, to
defend the Jung-Bunzlau Magazine, or do any good in those parts, except
to detain the Schwerin-Bevern people certain hours (I think, one day in
all), had nothing for i