The morning of the stifling summer’s day was spent in marching along the line of the highroad towards Kolin, and it was after midday that the Prussian left turned upon the enemy. Zieten, the terrible hussar, put to flight the Austrian horse, but an oak-wood gave them shelter behind which to rally, and meanwhile Daun made all haste to move up supports to his right. But though the Austrians fought doggedly and poured in a deadly artillery fire, the matchless Prussian infantry pressed on. They captured point after point of Daun’s position until the moment came at which, although their cavalry had turned tail, they needed only reinforcements to crush his right. It was the duty of Prince Maurice, the son of the Old Dessauer, to bring help from the centre. The moment was critical. The Austrian musketeers, seven times charged by the Prussians, had shot away their last cartridge. “Four fresh battalions,” wrote the King four days after, “and the battle was won.” Daun had already begun to withdraw his heavy guns and to issue orders for retreat. But by a fatal misunderstanding, due, it is hinted, to the impatience of the King in giving orders, Maurice was attacking the enemy more than half a mile further down the line. Still nearer to the Prussian right General Manstein defied orders and dashed at the enemy. The Prussians were therefore involved in a frontal attack, and their inferiority in numbers at once began to tell against them. Yet still, though Frederick had only the reserves of cavalry in hand and these, even when he put himself at their head, refused to pass through the fire to aid them, the dauntless Prussian left achieved fresh triumphs. When the deadly wrestle reached its fourth hour they still maintained their hold upon the heights. Daun hurled his light Saxon cavalry upon them, but with a heroism worthy of Mollwitz field they formed into groups and drove back the foe. But at this moment the Count de Thiennes, colonel of a regiment of young dragoons from the Netherlands, begged for leave to attack. He won a grudging assent, at first refused, “but,” said Daun, “you won’t do much good with your beardless boys.” “You will see,” answered Thiennes and galloped back to his regiment. “Boys,” he cried, after repeating the field-marshal’s taunt, “show that though you are beardless you can bite.” Uniting with the Saxons, the “boys” swept the enemy’s horse from the field, then flung themselves on the grim square of tattered heroes, broke it, and drove it from the heights. This was the prelude to a general flight of the exhausted remnants of the Prussian infantry. Almost beside himself with rage and disappointment, Frederick collected some forty men and led them against the foe. But even the King could not persuade them to suicide. One by one they slunk away till at last his adjutant put the question, “Will your Majesty take the battery alone?” Frederick once more gazed at the enemy through his glass, then rode to Bevern on the