f by the tumbrels of amputated
limbs about to be thrown away at a distance; in a word, all that is
horrible and odious out of fields of battle, completely disarmed him.
Smolensk was but one vast hospital, and the loud groans which issued
from it drowned the shout of glory which had just been raised on the
fields of Valoutina.

The reports of the surgeons were frightful: in that country a spirit
distilled from grain is used instead of wine and brandy made from
grapes. Narcotic plants are mixed with it. Our young soldiers, exhausted
with hunger and fatigue, conceived that this liquor would cheer them;
but its perfidious heat caused them to throw out at once all the fire
that was yet left in them, after which they sank exhausted, and became
the victims of disease.

Others, less sober, or more debilitated, were seized with dizziness,
stupefaction, and torpor; they squatted into the ditches and on the
roads. Their half-open, watery, and lack-lustre eyes seemed to watch,
with insensibility, death gradually seizing their whole frame; they
expired sullenly and without a groan.

At Wilna, it had not been possible to establish hospitals for more than
six thousand sick: convents, churches, synagogues, and barns, served to
receive the suffering multitude. In these dismal places, which were
sometimes unhealthy, but still too few, and too crowded, the sick were
frequently without food, without beds, without covering, and without
even straw and medicines. The surgeons were inadequate to the duty, so
that every thing, even to the very hospitals, contributed to create
disease, and nothing to cure.

At Witepsk, 400 wounded Russians were left on the field of battle: 300
more were abandoned in the town by their army; and as the inhabitants
had been taken away, these unfortunate wretches remained three days
before they were discovered, without assistance, huddled together
pell-mell, dead and dying, amidst the most horrible filth and infection:
they were at length collected together and mixed with our own wounded,
who, like those of the Russians, amounted to 700. Our surgeons tore up
their very shirts, and those of these poor creatures, to dress them; for
there already began to be a scarcity of linen.

When at length the wounds of these unfortunate men were healed, and they
required nothing but wholesome food to complete their cure, they
perished for want of sustenance: few either of the French or Russians
escaped. Those who were preve