“I ask nothing better than a close union with His Most Christian Majesty, whose interests will always be dear to me, and I flatter myself that he will have no less regard for mine.” At the same time he was making proposals for a close union with the natural enemy of France. In the same month, January, 1741, he addressed the following sentences to George II.: “My Brother! I am delighted to see that I have not deceived myself in placing confidence in Your Majesty. “As I have had no alliance with anyone I have not been able to open my mind to anyone; but as I see Your Majesty’s good intentions I regard you as already my ally, from whom I ought in future to have nothing secret or concealed. Far from desiring to disturb Europe, I demand only that heed be paid to the justice of my uncontestable rights. I place unbounded confidence in Your Majesty’s friendship and in the common interests of Protestant princes, which require that those oppressed for their religion should be succoured. The tyranny under which the Silesians have groaned is frightful, and the barbarity of the Catholics towards them inexpressible. If the Protestants lose me they have no other resort. “If Your Majesty desires to attach to yourself a faithful ally of inviolable constancy, this is the time: our interests, our religion, our blood is the same, and it would be sad to see ourselves acting against each other: it would be still more grievous to oblige me to concur in the great plans of France, which I intend to do only if I am compelled.” The question of alliances was still unsettled on February 19th, when Frederick again left Berlin for the scene of war. Prussia might be doomed to act alone; her safety lay in her own right hand. New armies were set on foot, but a skirmish at Baumgarten, in which he narrowly escaped capture, proved to Frederick that the Austrians were moving and that his own troops were not all that could be desired. Nor was the Prussian strategy above criticism. The Old Dessauer, the father of the army, held up his hands in horror at the dispositions of Schwerin. Weak detachments were cantoned everywhere and the mountain-passes not secured, although Neisse, Brieg, and Glogau were still Austrian, and the Prussians would be at the mercy of an army entering Silesia from the Bohemian side.