Officers are daily named on the parade whose duty it is to follow fugitives as soon as the alarm-guns are fired.
The peasants in the villages, likewise, are daily appointed to rim to the guard of certain posts. The officers immediately fly to these posts to see that the peasants do their duty, and prevent the prisoner’s escape. Thus does it seldom happen that a soldier can effect his escape unless he be, at the very least, an hour on the road before the alarm-guns are fired.
I now return to my story.
I came to the Neiss, which was a little frozen, entered it with my friend, and carried him as long as I could wade, and when I could not feel the bottom, which did not continue for more than a space of eighteen feet, he clung round me, and thus we got safely to the other shore.
My father taught all his sons to swim, for which I have often had to thank him; since by means of this art, which is easily learnt in childhood, I had on various occasions preserved my life, and was more bold in danger. Princes who wish to make their subjects soldiers, should have them educated so as to fear neither fire nor water. How great would be the advantage of being able to cross a river with whole battalions, when it is necessary to attack or retreat before the enemy, and when time will not permit to prepare bridges!
The reader will easily suppose swimming in the midst of December, and remaining afterwards eighteen hours in the open air, was a severe hardship. About seven o’clock the hoar-fog was succeeded by frost and moonlight. The carrying of my friend kept me warm, it is true, but I began to be tired, while he suffered everything that frost, the pain of a dislocated foot (which I in vain endeavoured to reset), and the danger of death from a thousand hands, could inflict.
We were somewhat more tranquil, however, having reached the opposite shore of the Neiss, since nobody would pursue us on the road to Silesia. I followed the course of the river for half an hour, and having once passed the first villages that formed the line of desertion, with which Schell was perfectly acquainted, we in a lucky moment found a fisherman’s boat moored to the shore; into this we leaped, crossed the river again, and soon gained the mountains.
Here being come, we sat ourselves down awhile on the snow; hope revived in our hearts, and we held council concerning how it was best to act. I cut a stick to assist Schell in hopping forward as well as he could when I was tired of carrying him; and thus we continued our route, the difficulties of which were increased by the mountain snows.
Thus passed the night; during which, up to the middle in snow, we made but little way. There were no paths to be traced in the mountains, and they were in many places impassable. Day at length appeared: we thought ourselves near the frontiers, which are twenty English miles from Glatz, when we suddenly, to our great terror, heard the city clock strike.
Overwhelmed, as we were, by hunger, cold, fatigue, and pain, it was impossible we should hold out through the day. After some consideration, and another half-hour’s labour, we came to a village at the foot of the mountain, on the side of which, about three hundred paces from us, we perceived two separate houses, which inspired us with a stratagem that was successful.