Biscuits and raw fish were here also served out. The fish was not cooked in the least, but seemed to have been preserved in wet salt. So far from being a revolting food, it was quite tasty, and I became very fond of it. We had to eat this meal as we marched along; and that without any other drink than water; and we were kept on the tramp until far into the night. It was too dark to read a watch, and we were strictly forbidden to strike matches or to smoke; but I suppose it was two or three o'clock in the morning when we received permission to lie down in the streets of a village. The people gladly received us into their houses; but we were ordered not to undress, and to be ready to fall in at a moment's notice. I lay down on the outside of a bed which a woman pointed out to me, and immediately went to sleep; but I suppose she soon aroused me, and presented a bowl containing about three pints of strong tea without milk and sugar. I was almost too sleepy to drink it, badly as I wanted a refresher; and the large parcel of food she gave me I put into my haversack: then dropped asleep again. It was scarcely daylight when I was again aroused. A military band was playing noisily in the street, and the battalion was falling in outside the door. The band did not belong to our regiment; but as it marched not far behind, we had the benefit of its music, such as it was, consisting principally of brass instruments and drums, with plenty of tinkling cymbals. Soon after midday we crossed the Vistula by the bridge at Novogeorgevsk, and went along a road running, for a long distance, almost parallel with the right bank of that river. The people in the town, and in the villages we passed through, were in a state of extreme excitement, and Sawmine said they were asserting that severe fighting had occurred at Plock, and the Russians had got the worst of it, and were retreating. Plock is a large town on the right bank of the Vistula, seventy-three versts from Novogeorgevsk. There is no railway running between the two towns, nor between Plock and the Prussian frontier, distant another 100 versts. Nothing can show the poverty of Russia more than this want of railways: for the nearest station to Plock is Vroclavick on the left bank of the Vistula, and distant fully fifty versts (two days' long marches); yet Plock is in the centre of an important district on the main road from Warsaw to the Prussian fortress of Thorn, a place of such strength that the Russians have not dared to approach it. On the 15th we met many thousands of Russians in retreat. They were in good order, and under the perfect control of their officers; but still they were defeated troops, and showed by their sullen demeanour that they knew it. We were drawn up in quarter-column to let them pass, which they took three hours to do. Towards the close of the day we came up with 7000 Cossacks who were covering their retreat.