"By this five days' conflict our city was transformed into one vast hospital, 56 edifices being devoted to that purpose alone. The number of sick and wounded amounted to 36,000. Of these a large proportion died, but their places were soon supplied by the many wounded who had been left in the adjacent villages. Crowded to excess, what could be the consequence but contagious diseases? especially as there was such a scarcity of the necessaries of life—and unfortunately a most destructive nervous fever is at this moment making great ravages among us, so that from 150 to 180 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 killed and two wounded; but, a few doors off, not fewer than 60 were left dead in one single house.—Almost all the houses in the suburbs have been more or less damaged by the shower of balls on the 19th."

"It is with a sensation truly peculiar and extraordinary that I take up my pen to address you, to whom I had, some years since, the pleasure of writing several times on subjects of a very different kind: but it is that very difference between those times and the present, and the most wonderful series of events which have followed each other during that period in rapid succession, the ever-memorable occurrences of the last years and months, the astonishing success which rejoices all Europe, and has nevertheless plunged many thousands into inexpressible misery; it is all this that has long engaged my attention, and presses itself upon me at the moment I am writing. In events like these, every individual, however distant, must take some kind of interest, either as a merchant or a man of letters, a soldier or an artist; or, if none of these, at least as a man. How strongly the late events must interest every benevolent and humane mind I have no need to tell you, who must more feelingly sympathize in them from the circumstance that it is your native country, where the important question, whether the Continent of Europe should continue to wear an ignominious yoke, and whether it deserved the fetters of slavery, because it was not capable of bursting them, has been decisively answered by the greatest and the most sanguinary contest that has occurred for many ages. That same Saxony, which three centuries ago released part of the world from the no less galling yoke of religious bondage; which, according to history, has been the theatre of fifteen great battles; that same Saxony is now become the cradle of the political liberty of the Continent. But a power so firmly rooted could not be overthrown without the most energetic exertions; and, while millions are now raising the shouts of triumph, there are, in Saxony alone, a million of souls who are reduced to misery too severe to be capable of taking any part in the general joy, and who are now shedding the bitterest tears of abject wretchedness and want That such is the fact is confirmed to me by the situation of my acquaintance and neighbours, by that of my suffering tenants, and finally by my own. The ever-memorable and eventful battles of the 16th to the 19th of October began exactly upon and between my two estates of Störmthal and Liebertwolkwitz. All that the oppressive imposts, contributions, and quarterings, as well as the rapacity of the yet unvanquished French, had spared, became on these tremendous days a prey to the flames, or was plundered by those who called themselves allies of our king, but whom the country itself acknowledged as such only through compulsion. Whoever could save his life with the clothes upon his back might boast of his good fortune; for many, who were obliged, with broken hearts, to leave their burning houses, lost their apparel also. Out of the produce of a tolerably plentiful harvest, not a grain is left for sowing; the little that was in the barns was consumed in bivouac, or, next morning, in spite of the prayers and entreaties of the owners, wantonly burned by the laughing fiends. Not a horse, not a cow, not a sheep, is now to be seen; nay, several species of animals appear to be wholly exterminated in Saxony. I have myself lost a flock of 2000 Spanish sheep, Tyrolese and Swiss cattle, all my horses, waggons, and household utensils. The very floors of my rooms were torn up; my plate, linen, and important papers and documents, were carried away and destroyed. Not a looking-glass, not a pane in the windows, or a chair, is left. The same calamity