LETTER LXXVIII.
Potsdam.
I am afraid you will think the anecdotes and conversation which I sometimes send you are rather tedious. Your curiosity about certain characters has led me into this practice; for I choose to give you opportunities of forming an opinion of your own, rather than to trouble you with mine. My opinion might very probably be erroneous; the accounts I give of what I have seen or heard are always true. And, notwithstanding that the actions and conversations I relate, may be apparently of small importance, still as the persons in some measure describe themselves, an understanding like yours will be able from thence to draw juster ideas of character than I could have given.
In a former letter I mentioned the great difficulty of deserting from a Prussian garrison, and of what importance it is thought to prevent it. An incident which happened a few days since, will give you a stronger idea of this than any general account.
Two soldiers of the Prince of Prussia’s regiment got over the walls in the night-time, with an intention to desert; but unluckily for them, this town stands on a peninsula formed by the river, and the neck of land is guarded in such a manner that it is almost impossible to pass that way without permission. These men could not swim, and they durst not present themselves at any of the ferries, because the boatmen are forbid, under the severest penalties, to connive at the escape of any deserters, and strictly ordered to assist in apprehending them. A reward is also offered, as a greater inducement to this piece of service.
All these circumstances being known in the garrison, it was imagined that, as none of the peasants would in all probability venture to harbour them, they were still skulking in the fields among the standing corn. On this supposition, parties of men were employed for three days successively in traversing the fields, and beating the bushes, as if they had been in chace of a hare. Great numbers of the officers of this regiment, some of the highest rank, rode about for three or four hours every day, all employed in the same manner. But not finding the men, they were at last convinced that they had by some means or other got out of the peninsula, and all further search was given up as unnecessary.
On the morning of the fourth day, these two unfortunate men came and surrendered to the guard at one of the gates. Finding it impracticable to effect their escape, and not daring to enter a house, they were at length compelled by hunger and fatigue to deliver themselves up.