For when Discipline and a Republic are wedded
we shall have the millennium. Liberty, they cry: meaning, I may do
as I like. Equality: I am better than you. Fraternity: what is
yours is mine, if I want it.
So they quarrelled over everything, and fought for a place round the
fire that another had lighted. They burnt the houses in which they
had passed a night, though they knew that thousands trudging behind
them must die for lack of this poor shelter.
At the Beresina they had fought on the bridge like wild animals, and
those who had horses trod their comrades underfoot, or pushed them
over the parapet. Twelve thousand perished on the banks or in the
river; and sixteen thousand were left behind to the mercy of the
Cossacks.
At Vilna the people were terrified at the sight of this inhuman
rabble, which had commanded their admiration on the outward march.
And the commander, with his staff, crept out of the city at night,
abandoning sick, wounded, and fighting men.
At Kowno they crowded numbly across the bridge, fighting for
precedence, when they might have walked at leisure across the ice.
They were no longer men at all, but dumb and driven animals, who
fell by the roadside, and were stripped by their comrades before the
warmth of life had left their limbs.
"Excuse me, comrade? I thought you were dead," said one, on being
remonstrated with by a dying man. And he went on his way
reluctantly, for he knew that in a few minutes another would snatch
the booty.
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