ly signal which the
greater number obeyed,) it echoed immediately throughout the whole city,
and the rout again began.

De Wrede presented himself unexpectedly before the king of Naples. He
said, "the enemy were close at his heels! the Bavarians had been driven
back into Wilna, which they could no longer defend." At the same time,
the noise of the tumult reached the king's ears. Murat was astonished;
fancying himself no longer master of the army, he lost all command of
himself. He instantly quitted his palace on foot, and was seen forcing
his way through the crowd. He seemed to be afraid of a skirmish, in the
midst of a crowd similar to that of the day before. He halted, however,
at the last house in the suburbs, from whence he despatched his orders,
and where he waited for daylight and the army, leaving Ney in charge of
the rest.

Wilna might have been defended for twenty-four hours longer, and many
men might have been saved. This fatal city retained nearly twenty
thousand, including three hundred officers and seven generals. Most of
them had been wounded by the winter more than by the enemy, who had the
merit of the triumph. Several others were still in good health, to all
appearance at least, but their moral strength was completely exhausted.
After courageously battling with so many difficulties, they lost heart
when they were near the port, at the prospect of four more days' march.
They had at last found themselves once more in a civilized city, and
sooner than make up their minds to return to the desert, they placed
themselves at the mercy of Fortune; she treated them cruelly.

It is true that the Lithuanians, although we had compromised them so
much, and were now abandoning them, received into their houses and
succoured several; but the Jews, whom we had protected, repelled the
others. They did even more; the sight of so many sufferers excited their
cupidity. Had their detestable avarice been contented with speculating
upon our miseries, and selling us some feeble succours for their weight
in gold, history would scorn to sully her pages with the disgusting
detail; but they enticed our unhappy wounded men into their houses,
stripped them, and afterwards, on seeing the Russians, threw the naked
bodies of these dying victims from the doors and windows of their houses
into the streets, and there unmercifully left them to perish of cold;
these vile barbarians even made a merit in the eyes of the Russians of
torturin