ee, the sentry handles arms upon you;--and were like to die. To me,
Kriele, it is a miracle how the most of us lived; nay we never really
wanted food, so kind was Providence, so generous our poor neighbors out
of all the Towns round. The utmost of money that could be raised was
6,000 pounds; nothing but some little of plate, and our Bill for the
remainder. Soltikof, a high kind of gentleman, saw at last how it
stood; let the Magistrates out of ward; sent back the plate--'Nothing of
that!'--nay, Czarish Majesty was herself generous; and FORGAVE the Bill,
on our petition, next Year. Cossacks, indeed, were a plunderous wild
crew; but the Russians kept them mostly without the gates. The regular
Russians were civil and orderly, officers and men,--greatly beyond the
Austrians in behavior." [Kriele, _Schlacht bei Kunersdorf;_ pp. 1-15 (in
compressed state).] By these few traits conceive Frankfurt: this, now
forgotten in most books, is a background on which things were transacted
still memorable to everybody.
"Friday, August 3d, General Loudon came to hand: arrived early, in the
Guben (or Western) Suburb, his 18,000 and he. In high spirits naturally,
and somewhat exultant to have evaded Friedrich; but found a reception
that surprised him. The Russians had been living in the hope of
junction; but still more vividly in that of meal. 'Auxiliaries;
humph,--only 18,000 of them; how much welcomer had been as many
hundredweights of meal!' Loudon had pushed his baggage direct into
Frankfurt; and likewise a requisition of such and such proviants,
weights of meal and the like, in exuberant amount, to be furnished
straightway by the City: neither of which procedures would the
Russians hear of for a moment. 'Out with you!' said they roughly to the
baggage-people: 'quarter in the Guben Suburb, or where you like; not
here!' And with regard to the requisition of proviant, they answered
in a scornful angry key, 'Proviant? You too without it? You have not
brought us meal, according to covenant; instead of meal, you bring us
18,000 new eaters, most of them on horse-back,--Satan thank you! From
Frankfurt be very certain you can get no ounce of meal; Frankfurt is our
own poor meal-bag, dreadfully scanty: stay outside, and feed where and
how you can!'
"All this, Loudon, though of hot temper, easily capable of rising to
the fierce point, had to endure in silence, for the common interest.
Loudon's own table is furnished from Frankfurt; no other Au
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