"The Oblique Order, SCHRAGE STELLUNG," let the hasty reader pause to understand, "is an old plan practised by Epaminondas, and revived by Friedrich,--who has tried it in almost all his Battles more or less, from Hohenfriedberg forward to Prag, Kolin, Rossbach;but never could, in all points, get it rightly done till now, at Leuthen, in the highest time of need. "It is a particular manoeuvre," says Archenholtz, rather sergeant-wise, "which indeed other troops are now [1793] in the habit of imitating; but which, up to this present time, none but Prussian troops can execute with the precision and velocity indispensable to it. You divide your line into many pieces; you can push these forward stairwise, so that they shall halt close to one another," obliquely, to either hand; and so, on a minimum of ground, bring your mass of men to the required point at the required angle. Friedrich invented this mode of getting into position; by its close ranking, by its depth, and the manner of movement used, it had some resemblance to the "Macedonian Phalanx,"--chiefly in the latter point, I should guess;for when arrived at its place, it is no deeper than common.
"Forming itself in this way, a mass of troops takes up in proportion very little ground; and it shows in the distance, by reason of the mixed uniforms and standards, a totally chaotic mass of men heaped on one another," going in rapid mazes this way and that. "But it needs only that the Commander lift his finger;instantly this living coil of knotted intricacies develops itself in perfect order, and with a speed like that of mountain rivers when the ice breaks,"--is upon its Enemy. [Archenholtz, i. 209.]
"Your Enemy is ranked as here, in long line, three or two to one.
You march towards him, but keep him uncertain as to how you will attack; then do on a sudden march up, not parallel to him, but oblique, at an angle of 45 degrees,--swift, vehement, in overpowering numbers, on the wing you have chosen. Roll that wing together, ruined, in upon its own line, you may roll the whole five miles of line into disorder and ruin, and always be in overpowering number at the point of dispute. Provided, only, you are swift enough about it, sharp enough! But extraordinary swiftness, sharpness, precision is the indispensable condition;--by no means try it otherwise; none but Prussians, drilled by an Old Dessauer, capable of doing it. This is the SCHRAGE ORDNUNG, about which there has been such commentating and controversying among military people: whether Friedrich invented it, whether Caesar did it, how Epaminondas, how Alexander at Arbela; how"--Which shall not in the least concern us on this occasion.
The four columns rustled themselves into two, and turned southward on the two sides of Borne;--southward henceforth, for about two hours; as if straight towards the Magic Mountain, the Zobtenberg, far off, which is conspicuous over all that region.
Their steadiness, their swiftness and exactitude were unsurpassable. "It was a beautiful sight," says Tempelhof, an eye-witness: "The heads of the columns were constantly on the same level, and at the distance necessary for forming; all flowed on exact, as if in a review. And you could read in the eyes of our brave troops the noble temper they were in." [Tempelhof, i. 288, 287.] I know not at what point of their course, or for how long, but it was from the column nearest him, which is to be first line, that the King heard, borne on the winds amid their field-music, as they marched there, the sound of Psalms,--many-voiced melody of a Church Hymn, well known to him; which had broken out, band accompanying, among those otherwise silent men. The fact is very certain, very strange to me: details not very precise, except that here, as specimen, is a verse of their Hymn:--"Grant that with zeal and skill, this day, I do What me to do behooves, what thou command'st me to;Grant that I do it sharp, at point of moment fit, And when I do it, grant me good success in it."<italic>
"Gieb dass ich thu' mit Fleiss was mir zu thun gebuhret, Wozu mich dein Befehl in meinem Stande fuhret, Gieb dass ich's thue bald, zu der Zeit da ich's soll;Und wenn ich's thu', so gieb dass es gerathe wohl."<end italic> ["HYMN-BOOK of Porst" (Prussian Sternhold-and-Hopkins), "p. 689:" cited in Preuss, ii. 107.]