deaths commonly occur in one week, in a city whose ordinary
proportion was between 30 and 40. In the military hospitals there
die at least 300 in a day, and frequently from 5 to 600. By this
extraordinary mortality the numbers there have been reduced to
from 14 to 10,000. Consider too the state of the circumjacent
villages, to the distance of 10 miles round, all completely
stripped; in scarcely any of them is there left a single horse,
cow, sheep, hog, fowl, or corn of any kind, either hay or
implements of agriculture. All the dwelling-houses have been
burned or demolished, and all the wood-work about them carried
off for fuel by the troops in bivouac. The roofs have shared the
same fate; the shells of the houses were converted into forts and
loop-holes made in the walls, as every village individually was
defended and stormed. Not a door or window is any where to be
seen, as those might be removed with the greatest ease, and,
together with the roofs, were all consumed. Winter is now at hand,
and its rigours begin already to be felt. These poor creatures are
thus prevented, not only by the season, from rebuilding their
habitations, but also by the absolute want of means; they have no
prospect before them but to die of hunger, for all Saxony,
together with the adjacent countries, has suffered far too
severely to be able to afford any relief to their miseries.

"Our commercial house, God be thanked I has not been plundered;
but every thing in my private house, situated in the suburb of
Grimma, was carried off or destroyed, as you may easily conceive,
when I inform you that a body of French troops broke open the door
on the 19th, and defended themselves in the house against the
Prussians. Luckily I had a few days before removed my most
valuable effects to a place of safety. I had in the house one