2. DAUPHINESS PROPER (that is, Soubise) IN THURINGEN, AT A LATE STAGE:--"LETTER FROM FREIBURG, SHORTLY AFTER ROSSBACH.--It was on the 23d October, a Sunday, that we of Freiburg had our first billeting of French; a body of Cavalry from different regiments [going to take Leipzig, take Torgau, what not]: and from that day Freiburg never emptied of French, who kept marching through it in extraordinary quantities. The marching lasted fourteen days, namely, till the 6th November [day AFTER Rossbach; when they burnt our poor Bridge, and marched for the last time]; and often the billeting was so heavy, that in a single house there were forty or fifty men. Who at all times had to be lodged and dieted gratis; nay many householders, over and above the ordinary meal, were obliged to give them money too; and many poor people, who can scarcely get their own bit of bread, had to run and bring at once their sixteen or eighteen groschen [pence] worth of wine, not to speak of coffee and sugar.
And a great increase of the mischief it was always, that the soldiers and common people did not understand one another's language."--Heavy billeting; but what was that? ... "Vast, nearly impossible, quantities of forage and provision," were wrung from us, as from all the other Towns and Villages about, "under continual threatening to burn and raze us from the earth. Often did our French Colonel threaten, 'He would have the cannon opened on Freiburg straightway.' Nay, had it stood by foraging, we might have reckoned ourselves lucky. But our straits increased day by day;and sheer plundering became more and more excessive.
"The robbing and torturing of travellers, the plundering and burning of Saxon Villages ... Almost all the Towns and Villages hereabouts are so plundered out, that many a one now has nothing but what he carries on his body. Plundering was universal: and no sooner was one party away, than another came, and still another;and often the same house was three or four times plundered.
Branderode, a Village two leagues from this [stands on the Field of Rossbach, if we look], is so ruined out, that nobody almost has anything left: Chief Inspector Baron von Bose's Schloss there, with its splendid appointments, they ruined utterly; took all money, victuals, valuables, furniture, clothes, linen and beds, all they could carry; what could not be carried away, they cut, hewed and smashed to pieces; broke the wine-casks; and even tore up the documents and letters they found lying in the place.
Branderode Dorf was twice set fire to by them; and was, at last, with Zeuchfeld, which is an Amtsdorf,--after both had been plundered,--reduced to ashes. The Churches of Branderode and Zeuchfeld, with several other Churches, were plundered; the altars broken, the altar-cloths and other vestures cut to pieces, and the sacred vessels and cups carried away,--except [for we have a notarial exactness, and will exaggerate nothing] that in the case of Branderode they sent the cup back. Of the pollution of the altars, and of the blasphemous songs these people sang in the churches, one cannot think without horror.
"And it was merely our pretended Allies and Protectors that have desecrated our divine service, utterly wasted our Country, reduced the inhabitants to want and desperation, and, in short, have so behaved that you would not know this region again. Truly these troops have realized for us most of the infamies we heard reported of the Cossacks, and their ravagings in Preussen lately.
"It is one of their smallest doings that they robbed a Saxon Clergyman [name and circumstances can be given if required), three times over, on the public Highway; shot at him, tied him to a horse's tail and dragged him along with them; so that he is now lying ill, in danger of his life. On the whole, it is our beloved Pastors, Clergymen most of all, that have been plundered of everything they had.
"Balgart and Zschieplitz, both Villages half a league from this, have likewise been heavily plundered; they have even left the Parson nothing but what he wore on his back. Grost," another Rossbach place, "which belongs to the Kammerjunker Heldorf, has likewise" ... OHE, SATIS!--"All this happened between the 23d and 3lst October; consequently before the Battle. ... In many Villages you see the trees and fields sprinkled with feathers from the beds that have been slit up.
"In several Villages belonging to the Royal Electoral privy Councillor von Bruhl [who is properly the fountain of all this and of much other misery to us, if we knew it!] the plundering likewise had begun; and a quantity of about a hundred swine [so ho!] had been cut in pieces: but in the midst of their work, the Allies heard that these were Bruhl estates, and ceased their havoc of them. These accordingly are the only lands in all this region whose fate has been tolerable.
"The appellation, every moment renewed, of 'Heretic!' was the courteous address from these people to our fellow-Christians;'heretic dogs (KETZERISCHE HUNDE)' was a PRADICAT always in their mouth.
"In Weischutz," a mile or two from us, up the Unstrut, "a French Colonel who wanted to ride out upon the works, made the there Pastor, Magister Schren, stoop down by way of horse-block, and mounted into the saddle from his back. [Messieurs, you will kindle the wrath of mankind some day, and get a terrible plucking, with those high ways of yours!]
"Churches are all smashed; obscene songs were sung, in form of litany, from the pulpits and altars; what was done with the communion-vessels, when they were not worth stealing,"--is hideous to the religious sense, and shall not be mentioned in human speech.