Fuel was so scarce that even the Viceroy Eugène, for instance, had to make shift without a fire. It is said that on one occasion, in order to scrape together a few billets of wood, his attendants had to remind the Bavarians that Prince Eugène was married to their king’s daughter, and consequently had a right to command them! To make matters worse, on the far side of the Beresina, and during the first stages of the retreat, the arrival of the fugitives came as a complete surprise to the towns and halting-places along the road. At Vilna, for instance, there was a supply of flour for 100,000 men for forty days, exclusive of the corn in the granaries; there was meat for 100,000 men for thirty-six days, unkilled; beer and brandy in still larger proportions; 30,000 pairs of boots; 27,000 rifles, and an immense quantity of clothing, ammunition, saddlery, harness, and equipments of every kind. The officials, however, having received no instructions, did not dare to make an immediate distribution of these stores. They waited so long that the greater part of the supplies fell into the hands of the Russians, who followed close upon the heels of the French. Vilna was, like Smolensk, a sort of Promised Land in the eyes of the soldiers. Here, they thought, they would be able to eat their fill at last and enjoy at least some rest from their flight. But they were disappointed in their hopes, and forced to continue their flight without a pause. The town was nothing but a plague-stricken cesspool. Thousands of corpses lay unburied, simply flung out of the houses into the yards, where the invalids also lay, forming a confused mass of sick and dead. Most of the houses in the town were turned into hospitals, crammed full of sick and wounded. As soon as the French left Vilna the house-owners, who were Jews, stripped the sick of all their money and clothes and turned them, stark naked, into the streets. The Russian authorities, including the Emperor Alexander himself, were obliged to take stern and vigorous measures for housing the wounded and relieving their sufferings. A few miles beyond Vilna is a steep hill, which was at that time covered with ice. It gave the French baggage as much trouble as the Beresina. In vain did the horses put forth every effort to surmount it—the French saved hardly a gun or private carriage. At the foot of the hill they were forced to abandon the whole of the artillery of the Guard, the Emperor’s baggage, and the army treasure-chest.