APRIL 1st-2d,--Siege-material being got to the ground, and Siege Division and Covering Army all in their places,--in spite of the heavy rains, we open our first parallel, Austrian Commandant not noticing till it is nearly done. April 8th, we have our batteries built; and burst out, at our best rate, into cannonade; aiming a good deal at "Fort No. 1," called also "GALGEN or Gallows Fort," which we esteem the principal. Cannonade continues day after day, prospers tolerably on Gallows Fort,"--though the wet weather, and hardship to the troops, are grievous circumstances, and make Friedrich doubly urgent. "Try it by storm!" counsels Balbi, who is Engineer. Night of APRIL 15th-16th storm takes place; with such vigor and such cunning, that the Gallows Fort is got for almost nothing (loss of ten men);-and few hours after, Austria beat the chamade. [Tempelhof, ii. 21-25; _Helden-Geschichte,_ _v. 109-123: above all, Tielcke, _Beytrage zur Kriegs-Kunst und zur Geschichte des Krieges von 1756 bis 1763_ _(6 vols. 4to, Freyberg, 1775-1786), iv. 43-76. Volume iv. is wholly devoted to Schweidnitz and its successive Sieges.] Fifty-one new Austrian guns, for one item, and about 7,000 pounds of money. Prisoners of War the Garrison, 8,000 gone to 4,900; with such stores as we can guess, of ours and theirs added: Balbi was Prussian Engineer-in-Chief, Treskau Captain of the Siege;--other particulars I spare the reader. Unfortunate Schweidnitz underwent four Sieges, four captures or recaptures, in this War;--upon all of which we must be quite summary, only the results of them important to us. For the curious in sieges, especially for the scientifically curious, there is, by a Captain Tielcke, excellent account of all these Schweidnitz Sieges, and of others;--Artillery-Captain Tielcke, in the Saxon or Saxon-Russian service; whom perhaps we shall transiently fall in with, on a different field, in the course of this Year. Chapter XII.--SIEGE OF OLMUTZ. Fouquet, on the first movement towards Schweidnitz, had been detached from Landshut to sweep certain Croat Parties out of Glatz; Ziethen, with a similar view, into Troppau Country; both which errands were at once perfectly done. Daun lies behind the Bohemian Frontier (betimes in the field he too, "arrived at Konigsgratz, March 13th"); and is, with all diligence, perfecting his new levies; intrenching himself on all points, as man seldom did; "felling whole forests," they say, building abatis within abatis;--not doubting, especially on these Ziethen-Fouquet symptoms, but Friedrich's Campaign is to be an Invasion of Bohemia again. "Which he shall not do gratis!" hopes Daun; and, indeed, judges say the entrance would hardly have been possible on that side, had Friedrich tried it; which he did not.