34
THE SILESIAN WARS, 1740-5Sometimes this coincided with the season for the reviews, when
the ensigns brought out the colours from the Schloss and the
whole corps of drums beat out a march. Then the old horse
would rear up and go through its paces of its own accord, until
the flags and drummers had passed by. (Nicolai, 1788-92, IV,
51)Frederick was disinclined to make the further effort that was needed
to push the Austrians from Neisse and Upper Silesia. His army
required rest and repair, and he did not wish to plunge into a further
campaign until the new patterns of European alliances had assumed
recognisable shape.
From 20 April to 25 May 1741 Frederick devoted all his efforts to
fashioning a battleworthy army in his camp to the north of Mollwitz.
Belle-Isle and Torring, the French and Bavarian envoys, could scarce-
ly believe what they saw. Frederick rose at four eveiy morning and
made a rapid tour of the camp and the surroundings. He returned to
give instructions to the generals, to dictate letters to his two over-
worked secretaries, and to question spies, deserters and prisoners. The
cavalry was the object of Frederick's particular attention, as may
well be imagined, but he drove the entire corps of officers so hard that
several hundred of them asked to resign. The requests were refused.
With all of this going on, Frederick still found the leisure to entertain
sittings of forty officers at a time in his tent and to write verse to
Charles-Etienne Jordan, his secretaiy of the Rheinsberg days.
During this period of reconstruction Frederick looked naturally
to the assistance of the Anhalt-Dessau tribe. The Old Dessauer
himself was drilling 26,000 more troops in a camp at Gottin, and
Frederick tapped his experience in the course of a lively correspond-
ence. The eldest of the Anhalt-Dessau sons, the Hereditary Prince
Leopold Max, had already proved his coolness and resolution when
he stormed Glogau, and Frederick readily entrusted him with inde-
pendent commands. However, the third in the line, the amiable and
respected Dietrich, stood closest to Frederick in terms of friendship.
He was made field-marshal in 1747, but three years later Frederick
gave in to his repeated demands to be allowed to retire from the
military life.
The Old Dessauer's fourth and last son, Prince Moritz, was a
bizarre assemblage of practical ability and brutal ignorance. He was
said to have been left without any education whatsoever, as an
experiment on the part of his father, and he emerged into adulthood
as an almost complete Naturmensch. It is easy to see why contemp-
oraries believed that he was totally illiterate, whereas he probably
just gave the appearance of being so. Frederick, at any rate, found