Poniatowski put a horse-blanket under his head and sat beside him to watch, together with the few horsemen who now comprised the royal bodyguard.
As soon as the moon was up another body of fugitives, by rare good luck, came up with them.
These were Cossacks, headed by their hetman, General Mazeppa.
From them the Swedes learnt some further particulars of the battle.
The Muscovites had taken everything; baggage, guns, stores, such as there were, and the treasure consisting of 6,000,000 crowns in specie, the remains of the spoils of Poland and Saxony, together with many thousand men taken prisoners and many more slain.
Lewenhaupt, Mazeppa added, was flying towards the Dnieper with the remainder of the army; and he himself, added the old Cossack chief, had managed to bring away some mules laden with provisions, and a number of carts loaded with silver and gold.
Karl did not hear this news, either good or bad; he lay in a swoon of fatigue and pain, the moonbeams striking through the thick summer foliage on to his low fair head and blood-stained uniform.
Mazeppa glanced at him; their mutual disaster was so complete that any lamentation or even comment seemed grotesque.
The Prince said nothing, therefore, but with the fortitude that belonged to his character and his mode of life, directed that the food and water that he had brought with him should be distributed among the Swedes, then lay down on the grass and slept.
The next day the painful march was continued, and a juncture effected with Lewenhaupt on the banks of the Dnieper almost at the same moment as news was received of the approach of the Muscovites.