p, rascals!" We
began to run, but I suddenly turning round, presented my piece, and shot
the nearest dead on the spot. Schell fired his pistols; our oppressors
did the same, and Schell received a ball in the neck at this discharge.
It was now my turn; I took out my pistols, one of the assailants fled,
and I enraged, pursued him three hundred paces, overtook him, and as he
was defending himself with his sword, perceiving he bled, and made a
feeble resistance, pressed upon him, and gave him a stroke that brought
him down. I instantly returned to Schell, whom I found in the power of
two others that were dragging him towards the carriage, but when they saw
me at their heels, they fled over the fields. The coachman, perceiving
which way the battle went, leaped on his box, and drove off full speed.

Schell, though delivered, was wounded with a ball in the neck, and by a
cut in the right hand, which had made him drop his sword, though he
affirmed he had run one of his adversaries through.

I took a silver watch from the man I had killed, and was going to make
free with his purse, when Schell called, and showed me a coach and six
coming down a hill. To stay would have exposed us to have been
imprisoned as highwaymen; for the two fugitives who had escaped us would
certainly have borne witness against us. Safety could only be found in
flight. I, however, seized the musket and hat of him I had first killed,
and we then gained the copse, and after that the forest. The road was
round about, and it was night before we reached Parsemechi.

Schell was besmeared with blood; I had bound up his wound the best I
could; but in Polish villages no surgeons are to be found: and he
performed his journey with great difficulty. We met with two Saxon under-
officers here, who were recruiting for the regiment of guards at Dresden.
My six feet height and person pleased them, and they immediately made
themselves acquainted with me. I found them intelligent, and entrusted
them with our secret, told them who we were, related the battle we had
that day had with our pursuers, and I had not reason to repent of my
confidence in them. Schell had his wounds dressed, and we remained seven
days with these good Saxons, who faithfully kept us company.

I learned, meantime, that of the four men by whom we had been assaulted,
one only, and the coachman, returned to Glatz. The name of the officer
who undertook this vile business was Gersdorf; he had a