“And the Prince of Wurtemberg and General Rehnsköld?” he asked.
“They also are prisoners,” said Poniatowski mournfully.
The King shrugged his shoulders.
“Prisoners of the Russians!” he exclaimed. “Let us rather be prisoners of the Turks!”
He said no more, and the flight towards the Dnieper was continued.
Another misfortune overtook the unhappy King; a wheel of the carriage was wrenched off on the barbarous road, and there was no time to stop and repair it; he was therefore obliged to continue his journey on horseback.
The day was insufferably hot; they could find neither food nor water, nor was there any prospect of obtaining any in this desolate country, arid and uninhabited; several of the men were lost on the way or had dropped with fatigue; only a small number remained with the King.
These, towards evening, lost themselves in a vast trackless wood that was believed to stretch to the banks of the Dnieper.
Here, while they wandered about in the endeavor to find some road, the King’s horse fell under him with fatigue, and no efforts could get Karl any further.
Blood-stained and soiled with dust and powder, without food, drink, or repose, maddened by the pain of his wound which increased with his fatigue, his spirit tortured equally with his body by the agony of defeat at the hands of the man he most hated, even the courage and endurance of Karl could support him no longer, and though he was told that the Muscovites were searching for him in this very wood, he made no effort to move but crept under a great tree and lay there motionless.