but these things were devoured in an instant. There were 10 thousand
wounded in the so-called hospitals, and among these unfortunates typhus and
hospital gangraene developed rapidly; the sick lying on the floor without
even straw.

Holzhausen gives the following description:

After Smolensk had been evacuated by the Russians, most houses had been
burnt out; the retreating Russians had destroyed everything that could be
of any use. Corpses everywhere. Nobody had time to remove them, and the
cannons, the freight wagons, the horses, and the infantry passed over them.
On August 17th and 18th, was the battle of Polotsk in which the Bavarians
distinguished themselves. There were no medicines for the wounded, not even
drinking water, no bread, no salt. Of the many unhealthy places in Russia
this is the worst, it swarms with insects. Nostalgia was prevailing. They
had a so-called dying chamber in the hospital for which the soldiers were
longing, to rest there on straw, never to rise again.

Awaiting their last the pious Bavarians repeated aloud their rosary, took
refuge with the Jesuits, who had a convent at Polotsk, to receive the
consolation of their religion.

Some thought Napoleon would rest here to establish the Polish kingdom. But
this reasonable idea, if he had ever entertained it, he discarded. By
giving his troops winter quarters, establishing magazines and hospitals he
would have succeeded in subduing Russia by reinforcing his army; instead of
all this he went on to Moscow without provisions, without magazines.

On August 30, the army reached Wiasma, a city of 8 thousand or 9 thousand
inhabitants which had been set on fire upon the approach of the French. All