rbearance of the Prussian governor,
and represented, in the most submissive strain, that as they were
unconcerned in the war, they hoped they should be exempted from the
horrors of devastation. In vain the royal family, who remained at
Dresden, conjured him to spare that last refuge of distressed royalty,
and allow them at least a secure residence, since they were deprived of
every other comfort. He continued inflexible, or rather determined to
execute the orders of his master, which indeed he could not disobey with
any regard to his own safety. On the ninth day of November, about
noon, the Austrian vanguard attacked the advanced post of the garrison,
repelled the hussars, drove the independent battalions into the suburbs,
and forced three of the redoubts, while their cannon played upon the
town. The governor, expecting a vigorous attack next day, recalled his
troops within the city after they had set fire to the suburbs. At three
in the morning the signal was made for this terrible conflagration,
which in a little time reduced to ashes the beautiful suburbs of Pirna,
which had so lately flourished as the seat of gaity, pleasure, and the
ingenious arts. Every bosom warmed with benevolence must be affected at
the recital of such calamities. It excites not only our compassion for
the unhappy sufferers, but also our resentment against the perpetrators
of such enormity. Next day mareschal Daun sent an officer to count
Schmettau, with a message, expressing his surprise at the destruction of
the suburbs in a royal residence, an act of inhumanity unheard of among
christians. He desired to know if it was by the governor's order this
measure was taken; and assured him, that he should be responsible in his
person for whatever outrages had been or might be committed against a
place in which a royal family resided. Schmettau gave him to understand,
that he had orders to defend the town to the last extremity, and that
the preservation of what remained depended entirely on the conduct of
his excellency; for, should he think proper to attack the place, he (the
governor) would defend himself from house to house, and from street to
street, and even make his last effort in the royal palace, rather
than abandon the city. He excused the destruction of the suburbs as a
necessary measure, authorized by the practice of war; but he would have
found it a difficult task to reconcile this step to the laws of eternal
justice, and far less to the dic