Here, then, I was left absolutely friendless in a hostile town in which my life was at the mercy of almost every inhabitant. And my poor brothers, what had become of them? How could I find out? My rescuer had informed me that the prisoners had already been transported into the country, and that the wounded were being cared for at the town-hall. In this dilemma my choice was not difficult. Deliberately walking into a tavern where the Russian staff were engaged in brewing punch, I declared myself a prisoner, hungry, and anxious to join my comrades, whose fate I wished to share. I did not conceal the fact that I hoped to find two brothers among them. To my agreeable surprise, I found these officers kindly-disposed, well-educated men, speaking either French or German fluently. Supper was instantly ordered for me, but, though a fast of fifteen hours was gnawing at my stomach, I could not prevail upon myself to taste anything before having seen our wounded, which I asked and obtained leave to do immediately. An orderly was directed to conduct me to the town-hall across the square. Here I was distressed to find over sixty of our men and officers of all arms more or less severely hurt, but none fatally, the unfortunates of that category, as rumor goes, having been finished by the citizens before the military took charge of them. I anxiously looked into every familiar face, but my brothers were not there. No one could tell me the names of our dead. Frank was seen alive after I fell, just before the close of the fight, but of Louis nothing whatever was known. Still, I breathed more freely. A Prussian surgeon in attendance with our own having called my attention to the contusion over my left ear, which had now swollen to the size of a small egg, I had it bathed and dressed.
During my supper at the tavern two of the Russian officers, taking seats around my table, conversed very freely upon the topics of the day, and, I must confess, with much delicate regard for the feelings of an enemy in my condition. They had seen Napoleon in Moscow, and hoped soon to return his visit in Paris. All Europe was tired of him, his own people not excepted. The Bourbons would be restored and universal peace would follow. This was their favorite theme, to which, I candidly own, your son's heart was not a total stranger. I have long been convinced that Germany could not be permanently subdued, and that French rule was the most unpopular of all. My impression is that this nation will henceforth unite and fight until the foreign yoke is shaken off for ever.
Supper over, I was informed that I could not be conveyed to my fellow-prisoners until morning, and that I might share the mattress of a French sergeant-major confined in an upper room, which turned out to be the garret. Imagine my surprise on recognizing my favorite Delâtre, though his face was black with mud and powder and his elegant form disguised in the linen gown of a Mecklenburger teamster! His sleep was too sweet and precious to be disturbed, and I much enjoyed his wonder when, awaking at the break of day, he beheld the countenance of one whom he had numbered among the dead. Our mutual stories were soon told. Delâtre had made an attempt to escape, but was recaptured, did not tell a very plausible tale, and was held for better identification in the morning. Of my brothers he knew only that they were both alive when I fell. It was supposed by the survivors of the company that if I was not killed by the blow I must have been crushed to death by horses' hoofs and cannon-wheels soon afterward.
My presence in the house proved to be a fortunate coincidence for my friend Delâtre, since it required my written statement and parole of honor to clear him of the suspicion of being a spy. These formalities accomplished, three very slightly wounded fusiliers from the hospital were added to our number, and we were at once conveyed to this hamlet, on the east side of the Elbe, where we found our fellow-sufferers quartered in the spacious outbuildings of a comfortable-looking farm. A deafening shout arose from one corner of the captive throng so soon as our faces could be distinguished; and need I, dear parents, describe the scene which immediately followed when all three of your sons, after a heart's agony of twenty-four hours, once more, alive and well, fell into each other's arms?
Frank, with the exception of a few buttons, was still in possession of his full regimentals, but poor Louis's condition, as already mentioned, was pitiable enough. My vest and overalls and half of my necktie restored him to relative decency, and out of a blanket which I purchased at the farmhouse he is at this moment engaged in planning an elegant-looking Talma cloak.
It is significantly remarked that among the three hundred prisoners—destined to Siberia, I suppose—there is not a single Saxon. There are reasons of state for this discrimination without a doubt.
On a Halt, 5th April, noon.
It was not far from sunset last evening when we began to move under the escort of about sixty Cossacks. Our course lay along the east bank of the Elbe, and we are promised to be taken to Russia by way of Berlin. It was near ten o'clock last night before we reached an enclosed farmyard secure enough to hold so many birds, and we went supperless to bed on a munificent litter of straw. Frank's humorous stories and mimicry of our friends the enemies answered admirably for dessert.
I was one of the first on foot this morning to take a good look at our escort. These semi-barbarians feel so secure in our utter helplessness that scarcely half a dozen of them remained on guard after the break of day. Here they lay stretched in the dew in every conceivable attitude of well-earned repose, snoring in concert almost under the very feet of their ponies, who enjoy in a standing position their equine dreams of home on the distant steppe. The whole barnyard scene, riders, horses and prisoners, composed one of the most striking pictures of which I ever formed a part, and to which my hasty sketches, herewith enclosed, do not aspire to do justice.
These Cossacks, or more properly Bashkirs, seem to belong to a different tribe from the Knights of the Don we captured nearly three weeks ago, and represent mentally and physically a less advanced type. There is no picturing to yourself exactly such faces as these unless you have once seen a specimen, upon which your imagination may then work ad libitum, without fear of exaggeration in the direction of the grotesque. A mythological cross between the fabled satyr and the domestic creature which furnishes the Westphalia ham is the nearest approach I can suggest to this type of humanity. How much of their dusky complexion is due to the sun and how much to the earth could only be determined by an exhaustive experiment with soap and water, the virtue of which, to them, is still an undiscovered blessing. To describe the extent to which the Bashkir carries his contempt for cleanliness in every function of daily life would require pages, and prematurely disgust you with my interesting subject. The atmosphere for half a hundred feet around a middle-aged Bashkir has no parallel in any sensation known to the human nostril. His sheepskin cloak, jacket or vest, as the case may be, teems with animal life, of which the wearer alone seems to be unconscious. In feature these people approach the Tartar type, of which, however, the stiff, wispy, yellow hair and beard, the small piggish eye, flat nose and fleshy Ethiopian lips seem to mark a characteristic variety. Many of them walk clumsily or with a stoop, and show other symptoms of grovelling habits and strong drink. As a rule, the Bashkirs, like the Cossacks, are armed with lances; among our custodians several carry long rifles; and at Lüneburg I even saw a few of these singular warriors with bows and arrows, though perhaps more for show than for use. As fighting soldiers they strike me as greatly overrated: their native instincts seem to qualify them much better for scouts and marauders. Both the Bashkir and Cossack when in action excel in the arts of self-preservation, skilfully manœuvring around the verge of danger, seeking the weak points, and if by force of numbers and long lances now and then succeeding in a charge à fond upon a baggage-train, yet easily persuaded into wholesome prudence by a bristling line of bayonets or a well-directed volley. Their battle-cry is the same as that of the English, "Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!" only more melodious; and the same may be said of their songs, which fall much more agreeably upon a musical ear than the popular ballads and comical rhymes of our Britannic neighbors. I wish I could speak as favorably of their religious devotions, which combine the most bigoted and ludicrous exercises I ever heard of in a Christian sect. Both the Don and the Bashkir Cossacks belong to the Greek Church, but whether their mode of worship is the orthodox form or adulterated with Bashkir improvements, I am not able to state. It is interesting to note here that the most extravagant professions are indulged in by the older members of the congregation, while the younger seem content to go through the principal motions, and not a few even slyly exchange quizzical glances over the prostrate backs of their seniors in superstition. Perhaps light will dawn some day even on the benighted banks of the Don and the Volga.