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This letter having no other object, I pray that God, my cousin, may have you in his holy keeping. The King of Saxony reared a monument to the Duke of Istria on the exact spot where he fell. The victory so long disputed in this battle of Lutzen was on that account only the more glorious for the Emperor, and was gained principally by the young conscripts, who fought like lions.
After these successful measures, he was in a condition to take the field, and prosecute the war with fresh vigour. Soon after the victory at Lutzen, the troops of Saxony and Lunenburg united with the Swedish main body; and the Imperialists were, in a short time, totally driven from Saxony.
With the death of Gustavus Adolphus, the enemy had formed new hopes; and however gloomy might be the situation of his affairs after the battle of Lutzen, still the death of his dreaded rival was an event too disastrous to the allies, and too favourable for the Emperor, not to justify him in entertaining the most brilliant expectations, and not to encourage him to the prosecution of the war.
On the 2d of May Napoleon won the battle of Lutzen. A week after he was at Dresden, not as on his departure for the Russian campaign, like the Sovereign of the West surrounded by his mighty vassals: he was now in the capital of the only one of the monarchs of his creation who remained faithful to the French cause, and whose good faith eventually cost him half his dominions.
At length I fell asleep, but I awoke every hour, and behind us, toward the road leading from the old bridge of Poserna to Lutzen and Leipzig, I heard the rolling of wagons, of artillery and caissons, rising and falling through the silence. Sergeant Pinto did not sleep; he sat smoking his pipe and drying his feet at the fire.
"To be sure," he continued, as Kohlhaas bent to kiss his hand, "whether the Elector will be lenient, I do not know, for I have heard that he has collected an army and is about to start out to apprehend you in the castle at Lützen; however, as I have already told you, there shall be no lack of effort on my part" and, as he spoke, he got up from his chair prepared to dismiss him.
Among all the generals who distinguished themselves in this campaign, none could be compared with Wallenstein, in experience, talents, and reputation; and yet, after the battle of Lutzen, we lose sight of him entirely.
After a long and almost fruitless search, the corpse of the King was discovered not very far from the great stone which, for a hundred years before, had stood between Lutzen and the Canal, and which, from the memorable disaster of that day, still bears the name of the "Stone of the Swede."
At length since I must continue this sad story on the evening of the nineteenth, we bivouacked at Lutzen, where our regiments re-formed as best they might. The next day early, as we marched on Weissenfels, we had to skirmish with the Westphalians, who followed us as far as the village of Eglaystadt. The twenty-second we bivouacked on the glacis at Erfurt, where we received new shoes and uniforms.
Then really commenced the severity of the contest, for Wallenstein was now stronger than Gustavus. Nevertheless, the heroic Swede offered to give his rival battle at Nuremburg, which was declined. He then attacked his camp, but was repulsed with loss. At last, the two generals met on the plains of Lutzen, in Saxony, 1632.
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