ich himself would at once have gone upon, and been already
well ahead with,--That of instantly taking measures for the relief
of Puttkammer. Dispute Gabel to the last; retreat, on loss of it,
Parthian-like, to Zittau, by that broad Highway, short and broad, whole
distance hence only thirty miles. 'Thirty miles,' say the multitude
of Counsellors: 'Yes, but the first fifteen, TO Gabel, is cross-road,
hilly, difficult; they have us in flank!' 'We are 25,000,' urges the
Prince; 'fifteen miles is not much!' The thing had its difficulties:
the Prince himself, it appears, faintly thought it feasible: '25,000
we; 20,000 they; only fifteen miles,' said he. But the variety of
Counsellors: 'Cross-roads, defiles, flank-march, dangerous,' said they.
And so the third course, which was incomparably the worst, found favor
in Council of War: That of leaving Gabel and Puttkammer to their fate;
and of pushing off for Zittau leftwards through the safe Hills,
by Kamnitz, Kreywitz, Rumburg;--which, if the reader look, is by a
circuitous, nay quite parabolic course, twice or thrice as far:--'In
that manner let us save Zittau and our Main Body!' said the Council of
War. Yes, my friends: a cannon-ball, endeavoring to get into Zittau
from the town-ditch, would have to take a parabolic course;--and the
cannon-ball would be speedy upon it, and not have Hill roads to go
by! This notable parabolic circuit of narrow steep roads may have its
difficulties for an Army and its baggages!" Enough, the poor Prince
adopted that worst third course; and even made no despatch in getting
into it; and it proved ruinous to Zittau, and to much else, his own life
partly included.

"JULY 16th-22d. Thursday night, or Friday 3 A.M., that third and
incomparably worst course was adopted: Gabel, Puttkammer with his
wagons, ensigns, kettledrums, all this has to surrender in a day: High
Road to Zittau, for the Austrians, is a smooth march, when they like to
gather fully there, and start. And in the Hills, with their jolts and
precipitous windings, infested too by Pandours, the poor Prussian
Main Body, on its wide parabolic circuit, has a time of it! Loses its
pontoons, loses most of its baggage; obliged to set fire, not to the
Pandours, but to your own wagons, and necessaries of army life; encamps
on bleak heights; no food, not even water; road quite lost, road to be
rediscovered or invented; Pandours sputtering on you out of every
bush and hollow, your peasant wagoners cut