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In the evening, Torstenson had, by a great effort, ridden quite round the town, marking out the points to be specially attacked, assigning his troops their respective places, and ordering several new batteries to be placed in position. As Wallenstein once before Stralsund, so now Torstenson before Freiberg, swore to take the city, even though it were under the special protection of Heaven itself.
'Don't you know the gout has him in tight grips? why, he can't even stir out of his arm-chair. His people have to play cat's paw for him, and burn their fingers just when he bids them. 'I just wish, said the other, 'that Torstenson might go into such a rage at not taking the town, that the gout might rise into his body. Then he would die, and a good thing for us!
Their sensibilities were blunted by the horrors of a Thirty Years' War; they had been born and reared amid bloodshed and rapine; some of them must have served in the campaigns of Banér, Torstenson and Wrangel, where human life went for nothing, and honor for less than nothing. Some of them, perhaps, could not name their parents.
With thoughts like these working in his mind, Schönleben betook himself to the commandant, who laughed boisterously as he shook hands with his visitor, and began at once with: 'Torstenson has already sent a third time to demand the surrender of the city, as if he thought he had knocked us into a cocked hat by that assault we repulsed so easily.
Hardly had he turned his back on the fortifications, when the Swedish cannon opened fire on the Peter Gate and the neighbouring defensive works. After firing a score of shots, however, Torstenson sent to the commandant, demanding the surrender of the town.
Before commencing hostilities, however, the Swedish marshal sent a trumpeter to the town to inquire whether the commandant intended to defend the place, what was his name, and whether he knew him, Torstenson.
Forty-one years old and brought up from boyhood in camps under the eye of his brother, Frederick Henry was now to show that he was one of the most accomplished masters of the military art, and especially siege-craft, in an age of famous generals, for Bernard of Saxe-Weimar, Torstenson, Turenne, Charles Gustavus and the Great Elector were all trained in his school.
He was allowed to march out next morning, with escort to Neisse; parole pledged, Not to serve against us for two years coming. This was a pretty enough piece of Siege-practice. Torstenson, with his Swedes, had furiously besieged Brieg in 1642, a hundred years ago; and could do nothing to it. Nothing, but withdraw again, futile; leaving 1,400 of his people dead.
The next day, February 15th, the Friebergers, wishful to gain time, resolved on asking Marshal Torstenson for an armistice, hoping to use that opportunity of smuggling two or three persons unobserved out of the city, and so sending word to Dresden of Freiberg's desperate straits.
The lad was now summoned to appear before Field-Marshal Torstenson. This was worse than his worst expectations; for was not this man the cause of all the trouble, the scourge that with its thousand lashes was tormenting the Saxon land?
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