SKIRMISHES BETWEEN THE PRUSSIANS AND AUSTRIANS.

While the king of Prussia was taking these measures in Saxony, two skirmishes happened on the frontiers of Bohemia, between his troops and the Austrians. On the twentieth of February, a body of six thousand Austrians surrounded the little town of Hirschfeld, in Upper Lusatia, garrisoned by a battalion of Prussian foot. The first attack was made at four in the morning, on two redoubts without the gates, each of which was defended by two field pieces: and though the Austrians were several times repulsed, they at last made themselves masters of one of the redoubts, and carried off the two pieces of cannon. In their retreat they were pursued by the Prussians, who fell upon their rear, killed some, and took many prisoners: this affair cost the Austrians at least five hundred men. About a fortnight after, the prince of Bevern marched out of Zittau, with a body of near nine thousand men, in order to destroy the remaining strongholds possessed by the Austrians on the frontiers. In this expedition he took the Austrian magazine at Friedland in Bohemia, consisting of nine thousand sacks of meal, and great store of ammunition; and after making himself master of Reichenberg, he returned to Zittau. The van of his troops, consisting of an hundred and fifty hussars of the regiment of Putkammer, met with a body of six hundred Croats, sustained by two hundred Austrian dragoons of Bathiania, at their entering Bohemia; and immediately fell upon them sword in hand, killed about fifty, took thirty horses, and made ten dragoons prisoners. The Prussians, it is said, did not lose a single man on this occasion; and two soldiers only were slightly wounded, the Austrians having made but a slight resistance.