ciup. XX.] FREDERICK THE GREAI'S CAVALRY. 



326 



in 



In 



not 



charge at all, but merely kept firing their carbines at the 

 halt, and when the time came ran.^ 



This action shows that the Prussian training enabled 

 their horsemen to attack over ground that the Austrian 

 cavalry could not operate upon, and compelled the latter 

 to await the charge at the halt, and consequently to be 

 beaten. In the centre of the army, the cavalry of 

 Frederick also performed the most important services. 

 Licutenant-General Gessler, with the dragoon regiment 

 of Baireuth, was in the second line, and happened to be 

 exactly in rear of a gap that had opened in the Prussian 

 front during the manoeuvring that preceded the general 

 attack. While watching the result of the close struggle 

 that was going on desperately between the opposing 

 lines of inmntry, he saw the battalions in front of him 

 getting shaky and confused, the heavy fire of the 

 Prussians and the stress of battle beginning to tell 

 heavily upon them. The instant had arrived for action ; 

 requesting the infantry to open the gap a little wider to 

 give him room, he led his horsemen through in two 

 columns, sabre in hand, with fierce impetuosity, and 

 dashed pell-mell into the wavering Austrians. Everything 

 gave way at once, twenty battalions were broken 

 instantly, and thousands of prisoners taken, with 

 standards, kettle-drums, &c. That charge turned the 

 fate of the battle, and the Austrian commander drew oiF 

 the shattered remains of his army as best he could.^ 



The contrast between the cavalry of the Prussians 

 and that of the Austrians is very marked in this action, 

 and shows how much superior the horsemen of Frederick 

 were upon the field of battle, in all that constitutes a 

 good cavalry force. 



At the battle of Sohr, on the 30th September, 1745, 

 another splendid illustration was given of the superiority 

 of the Prussians in the field. The Austrian army 

 through the night had glided around Frederick's right 

 flank through the woods, in perfect silence without even 

 a pipe lit, and with a thick veil of hussars in front. 

 They secured a lodgment on some heights on the Pmssian 

 » Carlyle,iv. 118. = ibid. 119. 



