ch my curiosity had
involved me on the preceding day, I had in fact seen and heard nothing
as far as related to my principal object. It was no battle, but merely
an indecisive, though warm, affair. The first act of the piece concluded
with aft illumination extending farther than the eye could reach, and
occasioned by the innumerable watch-fires which were kindled in every
quarter, and gradually spread farther and farther, as the lines of the
bivouacking army were lengthened by the arrival of fresh columns. By way
of variety, the flames rising from a number of burning houses in the
distance formed as it were points of repose. Scarcely was the night over
when all eyes and ears were on the alert, in expectation that the
sanguinary scene would commence with the morning's dawn. All, however,
remained quiet. People, therefore, again ventured abroad, and there
thought themselves more secure than the preceding day, because they
might the more easily avoid the danger while at a distance-than they
could have done the night before. It required, to be sure, considerable
strength of nerves not to be shocked at the spectacles which every where
presented themselves. Many dead bodies of soldiers, who had come sick
into bivouac, lay naked in the fields and upon the roads. The heirs had
taken especial care to be on the spot at the moment of their decease, to
take possession of all that the poor wretches had to bequeath. The
mortality among the horses had been still greater: you met with their
carcasses almost at every step; and, which way soever you turned your
eyes, you beheld a still greater number which Death had so firmly seized
in his iron grasp, that they inclined their heads to the ground, and
fell, in a few minutes, to rise no more! Scarcely was there sufficient
room on the high road for a slender pedestrian to find a passage. All
the fields were covered with troops and baggage. Even on the place of
execution they had erected bivouacs, and not the most inconvenient,
because they were there less crowded than in other places. Except single
musket-shots, nothing was to be heard but incessant cries of _Serrez!
Serrez!_ (Closer! Closer!)--The dice yet lay in the box, and were not
destined to be thrown that day. It was probably spent in reconnoitring,
in order to make up the parties for the grand game in which empires were
the stake. The preparations for the defence of the city became more
serious and alarming. The exterior avenues had b