ember, 1759"), that Hordt had his misfortune: he had been out
reconnoitring, with an Orderly or two, before the skirmish began, was
suddenly "surrounded by 200 Cossacks," and after desperate plunging into
bogs, desperate firing of pistols and the like, was taken prisoner. Was
carted miserably to Petersburg,--such a journey for dead ennui as Hordt
never knew; and was then tumbled out into solitary confinement in the
Citadel, a place like the Spanish Inquisition; not the least notice
taken of his request for a few Books, for leave to answer his poor
Wife's Letter, merely by the words, "Dear one, I am alive;"--and was
left there, to the company of his own reflections, and a life as if in
vacant Hades, for twenty-five months and three days. After the lapse
of that period, he has something to say to us again, and we transiently
look in upon him there.

The Book we excerpt from is _Memoires du Comte de Hordt_ (second
edition, 2 volumes 12mo, Berlin, 1789). This is Bookseller Pitra's
redaction of the Hordt Autobiography (Berlin, 1788, was Pitra's first
edition): several years after, how many is not said, nor whether Hordt
(who had become a dignitary in Berlin society before Pitra's feat) was
still living or not, a "M. Borelly, Professor in the Military School,"
undertook a second considerably enlarged and improved redaction;--of
which latter there is an English Translation; easy enough to read; but
nearly without meaning, I should fear, to readers unacquainted with the
scene and subject. [_Memoirs of the Count de Hordt:_ London, 1806: 2
vols. 12mo,--only the FIRST volume of which (unavailable here) is in my
possession.] Hordt was reckoned a perfectly veracious, intelligent kind
of man: but he seldom gives the least date, specification or precise
detail; and his Book reads, not like the Testimony of an Eye-witness,
which it is, and valuable when you understand it; but more like some
vague Forgery, compiled by a destitute inventive individual, regardless
of the Ten Commandments (sparingly consulting even his file of Old
Newspapers), and writing a Book which would deserve the tread-mill, were
there any Police in his trade!--

WEDNESDAY, 6th JANUARY, 1762, Hordt's vacant Hades of an existence in
the Citadel of Petersburg was broken by a loud sound: three minute-guns
went off from different sides, close by; and then whole salvos, peal
after peal: "Czarina gone overnight, Peter III. Czar in her stead!"
said the Officer, rushing in