The Life and Adventures of Baron Trenck, vol 1 | Page 9

me to take six volunteers from the body guard, to execute this latter
duty, I was obliged to add to them horse chasseurs, and hussars, with
whom I was continually in motion. I was peculiarly fortunate on two
occasions, by happening to come after the enemy when they had left
loaded waggons and forage bundles.
I seldom passed the night in my tent during this campaign, and my
indefatigable activity obtained the favour and entire confidence of
Frederic. Nothing so much contributed to inspire me with emulation as
the public praises I received, and my enthusiasm wished to perform
wonders. The campaign, however, but ill supplied me with
opportunities to display my youthful ardour.
At length no one durst leave the camp, notwithstanding the extremity of
the dearth, because of the innumerable clouds of pandours and hussars
that hovered everywhere around.
No sooner were we arrived in Silesia, than the King's body guard were
sent to Berlin, there to remain in winter quarters.
I should not here have mentioned the Bohemian war, but that, while
writing time history of my life, I ought not to omit accidents by which
my future destiny was influenced.
One day, while at Bennaschen, I was commanded out, with a
detachment of thirty hussars and twenty chasseurs, on a foraging party.
I had posted my hussars in a convent, and gone myself, with the
chasseurs, to a mansion-house, to seize the carts necessary for the

conveyance of the hay and straw from a neighbouring farm. An
Austrian lieutenant of hussars, concealed with thirty-six horsemen in a
wood, having remarked the weakness of my escort, taking advantage of
the moment when my people were all employed in loading the carts,
first seized our sentinel, and then fell suddenly upon them, and took
them all prisoners in the very farm-yard. At this moment I was seated at
my ease, beside the lady of the mansion-house, and was a spectator of
the whole transaction through the window.
I was ashamed of and in despair at my negligence. The kind lady
wished to hide me when the firing was heard in the farm-yard. By good
fortune, the hussars, whom I had stationed in the convent, had learnt
from a peasant that there was an Austrian detachment in the wood: they
had seen us at a distance enter the farmyard, hastily marched to our aid,
and we had not been taken more than two minutes before they arrived. I
cannot express the pleasure with which I put myself at their head. Some
of the enemy's party escaped through a back door, but we made
two-and-twenty prisoners, with a lieutenant of the regiment of
Kalnockichen. They had two men killed, and one wounded; and two
also of my chasseurs were hewn down by the sabre, in the hay-loft,
where they were at work.
We continued our forage with more caution after this accident: the
horses we had taken served, in part, to draw the carts; and, after raising
a contribution of one hundred and fifty ducats on the convent, which I
distributed among the soldiers to engage them to silence, we returned to
the army, from which we were distant about two leagues.
We heard firing as we marched, and the foragers on all sides were
skirmishing with the enemy. A lieutenant and forty horse joined me;
yet, with this reinforcement, I durst not return to the camp, because I
learned we were in danger from more than eight hundred pandours and
hussars, who were in the plain. I therefore determined to take a long,
winding, but secret route, and had the good fortune to come safe to
quarters with my prisoners and five-and-twenty loaded carts. The King
was at dinner when I entered his tent. Having been absent all night, it
was imagined I had been taken, that accident having happened the same
day to many others.
The instant I entered, the King demanded if I returned singly. "No,
please your Majesty," answered I; "I have brought five-and-twenty

loads of forage, and two-and-twenty prisoners, with their officer and
horses."
The King then commanded me to sit down, and turning himself
towards the English ambassador, who was near him, said, laying his
hand on my shoulder, "C'est un Matador de ma jeunesse."
A reconnoitring party was, at the same moment, in waiting before his
tent: he consequently asked me few questions, and to those he did ask, I
replied trembling. In a few minutes he rose from the table, gave a
glance at the prisoners, hung the Order of Merit round my neck,
commanded me to go and take repose, and set off with his party.
It is easy to conceive the embarrassment of my situation; my
unpardonable negligence deserved that I should have been broken,
instead of which I was rewarded; an