The enemy destroyed
everything on retreating, the cattle were taken to distant provinces; the
French saw the destruction of the fields, the villages were deserted, the
peasants fled upon the appearance of the French army, all inhabitants had
left except the Jews. When the army came to Lithuania everything seemed to
be in league against the French. It was a rainy season, the soldiers
marched through vast and gloomy forests, and all was melancholy. One could
have imagined himself to be in a desert if it had not been for the
vehicles, the cursing of the drivers, discontented on account of hunger and
fatigue, the imprecations of the soldiers on every occasion; bad humor, due
to privations, prevailed everywhere. It would seem as if the furies of hell
were marching at the heels of the army. The roads were in a terrible
condition, almost unpassable on account of the rain which had been
continuous since the crossing of the Niemen; the artillery wagons
especially gave great trouble in passing marshes, and, on account of the
extreme exhaustion of the horses, a great many of these vehicles had to be
abandoned. The horses receiving no nourishment but green herbs could resist
even less than the men and they fell by the hundred.
The improper feeding of the animals caused gastric disturbances,
alternately diarrhoea and constipation, enormous tympanitis, peritonitis.
It is touching to read of the devotion of German cavalrymen to their poor
horses. They would introduce the whole arm into the bowel to relieve the
suffering creatures of the accumulated fecal masses.
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