frontiers of Brandenburg.
Wittenberg and Leipsic were recovered; and the troops of the circle were
repulsed to a distance too considerable for it to be feared they should
join the Imperialists with promptitude; but all was not yet done, and
the projects that remained were the most difficult part of the whole.

The Russians kept at Landsberg on the Wartha and there might remain
peaceful spectators of what should pass in Saxony. The King, however,
was informed that other reasons engaged them not to march to too great a
distance; for their design was, should the Austrians obtain any
advantages over the army of the King, or should Marshal Daun maintain
Torgau, to reenter the electorate of Brandenburg, and, conjointly with
the Austrians, to take up their quarters on the banks of the Elbe. The
consequence of such a project would have been fatally desperate to
Prussia. By this position they would cut off the army, not only from
Silesia and Pomerania, but from Berlin itself--that nursing mother which
supplied clothing, arms, baggage, and every necessary for the men. Add
to which the troops would have no quarters to take except beyond the
Mulde, between the Pleisse, the Saale, the Elster, and the Unstrut. This
would have been a space too narrow to supply the army with subsistence
through the winter. And whence should magazines for the spring,
uniforms, and recruits be obtained?

The army thus pressed, and thrown back upon the allies, would have
starved them by starving itself.

Without any profound military knowledge every rational man would
comprehend that, had the King remained quiet during autumn, and formed
no new attempts, he would but have delivered himself, tied hand and
foot, into the power of the enemy. Let us still further add that the
provisions that had been deposited at Duben scarcely would supply the
troops for the space of a month; that the frost, which began to be felt,
would soon impede the navigation of the Elbe; consequently the boats
could no longer bring provisions from Magdeburg; and, in fine, that the
very last distress must have succeeded had not good measures been taken
to remove the enemy, and gain ground on which the army might encamp and
subsist.

After having maturely examined and weighed all these reasons, it was
determined to commit the fortune of Prussia to the issue of a battle, if
no other means by manoeuvring could be found of driving Marshal Daun
from his post at Torgau. It will be proper