NICOTTO (Tyrolese-Italian); which the ignorant Vienna
people changed into "THU-NICHT-GUT (Do-no-good)," till Maria Theresa, in
very charity, struck out the negative, and made him "Do-good." Do-good
and his Congress held Friedrich till August 10th: five more weeks gone;
and nothing but reconnoitring,--with of course foraging, and diligently
eating the Country, which is a daily employment, and produces fencing
and skirmishing enough.

Henri, in the interim, has invaded from the West; seen Leitmeritz,
Lobositz;--Prag Nobility all running, and I suppose Prayers to St. Titus
going again,--and Loudon in alarm. Loudon, however, saved Prag "by two
masterly positions" (not mentionable here); upon which Henri took
camp at Niemes; Loudon, the weaker in this part, seizing the Iser as a
bulwark, and ranking himself behind it, back-to-back of Lacy. Here for
about five weeks sat Henri, nothing on hand but to eat the Country. Over
the heads of Loudon and Lacy, as the crow flies, Henri's Camp may be
about 70 miles from Jaromirtz, where the King is. Hussar Belling, our
old Anti-Swede friend, a brilliant cutting man, broke over the Iser
once, perhaps twice; and there was pretty fencing by him and the like
of him: "but Prince Henri did nothing," says the King, [_OEuvres de
Frederic,_ vi. 154]--was, in fact, helping the King to do nothing.
By the 10th of September, as Henri has computed, this Country will be
eaten; "Forage, I find, will be quite done here on September 10th,"
writes Henri, after a week or two's experience.

There was always talk of Henri and the King, who are 100,000 each,
joining hands by the post of Arnau, or some weak point of Lacy's
well north of Konigsgratz; thus of cutting off the meal-carts of that
back-to-back copartnery, and so of tumbling it off the ground (which
was perfectly possible, says Schmettau); and small detachments and
expeditious were pushed out, General Dahlwig, General Anhalt, partly for
that object: but not the least of it ever took effect. "Futile, lost by
loitering, as all else was," groans Schmettau. Prince Henri was averse
to attempt, intimates the King,--as indeed (though refusing to own
it) was I. "September 10th, my forage will be out, your Majesty," says
Henri, always a punctual calculating man.

The Austrians, on their side, were equally stagnant; and, except the
continual skirmishing with the Prussian foragers, undertook nothing.
"Shamefully ill-clone our foraging, too," exclaims Schmettau