Page:Surprising adventures and sufferings of Frederick Baron Trenck.pdf/11

11 explanation, I received many marks of it in the course of the following winter which we passed Berlin.

In our retreat from Bohemia, the King entered Kolin with his horse Guards, the piquets Horse belonging to head quarters, and the second and third battalions of Guards: we had but four pieces of cannon, and our squadron was posted in the suburbs. Towards the evening, our advanced guards were driven in; the Hussars entered with them pell mell into the suburbs, and the enemy’s light troops swarmed in all the environs.

Our commandant sent me immediately to receive the King’s orders. After having sought him a great while, I found him at last on the top of a steeple, with a perspective glass in his hand. I never saw him so uneasy and undetermined as on that day. We were ordered to retreat immediately and to retire through the town to the opposite suburb, when we were directed to halt without taking the bridles or saddles off our horses.

We were scarcely there when a dark night came on, accompanied by a deluge of rain. Abut nine o’clock, Trenck (an Austrian commander, and a relation of mine) appeared with his turkish music, and set fire to several houses. As soon as we perceived it, we began to fire musketry out of the windows. The tumult was terrible. The town was so full of people that we could not force an entrance; the gate was shut and our field pieces kept firing from above. Trenck stopped the passage of the water; by midnight it was as high as our horses’ bellies, and we were almost