“Their appearance,” said Major Richardson,[85] “was miserable to the last degree. They had the air of men to whom cleanliness was a virtue unknown, and their squalid bodies were covered by habiliments that had evidently undergone every change of season, and were arrived at the last stage of repair.... It was the depth of winter; but scarcely an individual was in possession of a great coat or cloak, and few of them wore garments of wool of any description. They still retained their summer dress, consisting of cotton stuff of various colors shaped into frocks, and descending to the knee. Their trowsers were of the same material. They were covered with slouched hats, worn bare by constant use, beneath which their long hair fell matted and uncombed over their cheeks; and these, together with the dirty blankets wrapped round their loins to protect them against the inclemency of the season, and fastened by broad leathern belts, into which were thrust axes and knives of an enormous length, gave them an air of wildness and savageness which in Italy would have caused them to pass for brigands of the Apennines. The only distinction between the garb of the officer and that of the soldier was that the one, in addition to his sword, carried a short rifle instead of a long one, while a dagger, often curiously worked and of some value, supplied the place of the knife.” This description gave a lifelike idea of what Harrison justly thought the best material in the world for soldiery, had it been properly handled. Men who for four months had suffered every hardship, and were still unclothed, unfed, uncared for, and sacrificed to military incompetence, but hardened to cold, fatigue, and danger, had no reason to be ashamed of their misfortunes or of their squalor. Fortunately about five hundred were saved as prisoners, and thirty or forty escaped to the rapids; the rest, four hundred in number, were killed in battle, or massacred afterward.