Next day the Joy-fire of the Prussians taught Guasco what disaster had happened; and on the fifth day afterwards (August 22d), hearing nothing farther of Daun, Guasco offered to surrender, on the principle of Free Withdrawal. "No, never," answered Tauentzien, by the King's order: "As Prisoners of War it must be!" Upon which Guasco stood to his defences again; and maintained himself,--Gribeauval and he did,--with an admirable obstinacy: the details of which would be very wearisome to readers. Gribeauval and he, Isaid; for from this time, Engineer Lefebvre, though he tried (with bad skill, thinks Tempelhof) some bits of assault above ground, took mainly to mining, and a grand underground invention called GLOBES DE COMPRESSION; which he reckoned to be the real sovereign method,--unlucky that he was! I may at least explain what GLOBE DECOMPRESSION is; for it becomes famous on this occasion, and no name could be less descriptive of the thing. Not a GLOBE at all, for that matter, nor intended to "compress," but to EXpress, and shatter to pieces in a transcendent degree: it is, in fact, a huge cubical mine-chamber, filled by a wooden box (till Friedrich, in his hurry, taught Lefebvre that a sack would do as well), loaded with, say, five thousand-weight of powder. Sufficient to blow any horn-work, bastion, bulwark, into the air,--provided you plant it in the right place; which poor Lefebre never can. He tried, with immense labor, successively some four or almost five of these "PRESS BALLS" so called (or Volcanoes in Little); mining on, many yards, 15 or 20 feet underground (tormented by Gribeauval all the way); then at last, exploding his five thousand-weight,--would produce a "Funnel," or crater, of perhaps "30 yards in diameter,"but, alas, "150 yards OFF any bastion." Funnel of no use to him;--mere sign to him that he must go down into it, and begin there again; with better aim, if possible. And then Gribeauval's tormentings; never were the like! Gribeauval has, all round under the Glacis, mine-galleries, or main-roads for Counter-mining, ready to his hand (mine-galleries built by Friedrich while lately proprietor); there Gribeauval is hearkening the beat of Lefebvre's picks: "Ten yards from us, think you? Six yards? Get a 30hundredweight of chamber ready for him!" And will, at the right moment, blow Lefebvre's gallery about his ears;--sometimes bursts in upon him bodily with pistol and cutlass, or still worse, with explosive sulphur-balls, choke-pots and infinitudes of mal-odor instantaneously developed on Lefebvre,--which mean withal, "You will have to begin again, Monsieur!" Enough to drive a Lefebvre out of his wits. Twice, or oftener, Lefebvre, a zealous creature but a thin-skinned, flew out into open paroxysm; wept, invoked the gods, threatened suicide: so that Friedrich had to console him, "Courage, you will manage it; make chicanes on Gribeauval, as he does on you,"--and suggested that powder-SACK instead of deal-box, which we just mentioned.
Friedrich's patience seems to have been great; but in the end he began to think the time long. He was in three successive head-quarters, Dittmannsdorf, Peterswaldau, Bogendorf, nearer and nearer; at length quite near (Bogendorf within a couple of miles);and wondering Gazetteers reported him on horseback, examining minutely the parallels and siege-works,--with a singular indifference to the cannon-balls flying about ("Not easy to hit a small object with cannon!"), and intent only on giving Tauentzien suggestions, admonitions and new orders. Here, prior to Bogendorf, are three snatches of writing, which successively have indications for us. KING TO PRINCE HENRI:--PETERSWALDAU, AUGUST 13th, 1762 (King has just shifted hither, August 10th, on the Bevern-REICHENBACH score; continues here till September 23d). ... "You are right to say, 'We ourselves are our best Allies.' I am of the same opinion; nevertheless, it is a clear duty and call of prudence to try and alleviate the burden as much as possible: and I own to you, that if, after all I have written, the thing fails this time [as it does], I shall be obliged to grant MAP GOES HERE--FACING PAGE 152, CHAP XII, BOOK 20------that there is nothing to be made of those Turks."--"We are now in the press of our crisis as to Schweidnitz. The Siege advances beautifully: but Beck is come hereabouts, Lacy masked behind him;and I cannot yet tell you [not till REICHENBACH and the 16th]
whether the Enemy intends some big adventure for disengaging Schweidnitz, or will content himself with disturbing and annoying us."PETERSWALDAU, 9th SEPTEMBER. Springs, water-threads coming into our mines delay us a little: "by the 12th [in 3 days' time, little thinking it would be 30 days!] I still hope to despatch you a courier with the news, All is over! Your Nephew [Prince of Prussia]
is out to-day assisting in a forage; he begins to kindle into fine action. We are nothing but pygmies in comparison to him [in point of physical stature]; imagine to yourself Prince Franz [of Brunswick; killed, poor fellow, at Hochkirch], only taller still:
this is the figure of him at present."
PETERSWALDAU, SEPTEMBER 19th. ... "Our Siege wearies all the world;people persecute me to know the end of it; I never get a Berlin Letter without something on that head;--and I have no resource myself but patience. We do all we can: but I cannot hinder the enemy from defending himself, and Gribeauval from being a clever fellow:--soon, however, surely soon, soon, we shall see the end.