"Thus we, my father, my brother and myself, found ourselves among four thousand men who defended the fort of Dubienka for five days against sixteen thousand Russians, when we had had only one day to fortify it.
"Some time later Stanislas yielded to Catherine's will. Kosciusko, unwilling to become the accomplice of the Czarina's lover, sent in his resignation, and my father, my brother and I returned to Dantzic, where I resumed my studies.
"One morning we learned that Dantzic had been ceded to the Prussians. There were among us at least two thousand patriots who protested with one hand and took up arms with the other; this tearing asunder of our native land, this dismemberment of our dear Poland, seemed to us a direct appeal, after moral protestation, to material protestation—the protestation of blood with which it is necessary to water the nations in order that they may not die. We went to meet the body of Prussians who had come to take possession of the city; they were ten thousand in number, and we were eighteen hundred.
"A thousand of us remained upon the battlefield. In the three days that followed three hundred died of their wounds. Five hundred remained.
"All were equally guilty, but our adversaries were generous. They divided us into three classes: the first were to be shot; the second were to be hanged; the third escaped with their lives after having received fifty lashes.
"They had divided us according to our strength. Those who were the most severely wounded were to be shot; those who were slightly wounded were to be hanged; those who were well and sound were to receive fifty lashes. Thus they would preserve the memory all their lives of the chastisement deserved by every ungrateful wretch who refuses to throw himself into the open arms of Prussia.
"My dying father was shot. My brother, who had a broken thigh, was hanged. I, who had only a scratch on my shoulder, received fifty lashes.
"At the fortieth I fainted; but the officers were conscientious men, and, although I did not feel the blows, they completed the number, and then left me lying upon the place of punishment without paying any further attention to me. My sentence read that when I had received the fifty lashes I was free. The punishment had taken place in one of the courts of the citadel. When I recovered consciousness it was night; I saw around me a number of inanimate bodies that resembled corpses, but who were men who, like myself, had probably fainted. I found my clothing, but, with the exception of my shirt, I was not able to put them on my bleeding shoulders. I threw them over my arm and endeavored to locate myself. A light was burning a short distance from me; I thought it belonged to the guard at the gate and I made my way to it. The sentinel was at his wicket.
"'Your name?' he asked.