“How great was our horror,” continued Saremba, “when, on descending into the valley, the fog lifted, and we found ourselves close to a post of Cossacks. It was too late to retreat. We marched forward in military order, keeping step as upon parade. The stratagem succeeded. The Cossack sentinel took us for a Russian patrol. We surrounded the house, made prisoners of the sentry and of seven half-drunken Cossacks, and learned from them that in the fog we had missed our way over the frontier. The piquet was thirty men strong, but two and twenty had marched that very day on patrol duty. The report of our flight had been received from Gumri, as well as information that the Cossacks should be reinforced by a detachment of infantry. The sentry had taken us for this expected detachment. We were well pleased with the issue of our adventure. The contents of the Cossacks’ larder revived and strengthened us, and we packed the fragments of the feast in our knapsacks. We also took their horses, and finally, at their own request bound them hand and foot; for, now that they were sober, they trembled for the consequences of having allowed themselves to be surprised and unresistingly overpowered. They anticipated a severe punishment, and consulted together how they should best extenuate their fault. The dense morning fog was a good circumstance to plead, and so was our superiority of numbers, and also the expectation of a Russian infantry piquet from Gumri. But when all was said, the poor fellows were still pretty sure to get the stick. At their request we fastened the door of the piquet-house before marching away with our booty. That afternoon we crossed the mountains, and reached, without further adventure, a Turkish military post.”