yet at a loss to conceive: an hour before, I should have estimated them at scarcely 10,000 men; and, what I now saw, my inexperienced eye computed at more than 200,000 on both sides. This prodigious army seemed about to form in order of battle. A few cannon-shot which it fired were probably designed only to announce its arrival to the other chiefs. Immediately afterwards, the cannonade beyond Lindenau, which had lasted about two hours, entirely ceased. On the left wing of the French the action was still very vigorously continued. It was about twelve o'clock when we descended, to learn what accounts had meanwhile been received in the city, that our relations with the lower world might not be totally suspended. Before the residence of our sovereign there was a crowd of officers of all ranks. The city-guard was drawn out on parade as well as the grenadier-guard. A full band was playing, by French order, though nobody could conceive what was the meaning of all this, while the cannon were yet thundering before the city. We soon learned that the allies had sustained a total defeat; that an Austrian prince, the archduke Ferdinand, had lost an arm, and been taken prisoner with 40,000 men; and that an immense quantity of artillery had been captured. This intelligence had been forwarded by marshal Ney from the field of battle, and preparations were instantly made to celebrate the victory. A regiment of the French guards marched to the promenade before the city--now, alas! an offensive sewer,--and, agreeably to command, expressed their exultation in the acquisition of these new laurels by a loud _Vive l'empereur!_ Of the citizens, but a very small portion took part in their joy; for what else could they have expected from such a victory than inevitable death by famine? The more intelligent shook their heads; and in truth there were but too many reasons to suspect the truth of the account. If you asked the wounded, who in troops either hobbled or were carried in at the gates, the answer, was, _Les Cossaques ont encore la même position_--(The Cossacks are still in the same position). None of them had heard any thing about captured cannon, but they well knew that they had themselves lost five pieces that morning. I was unable to comprehend how the French commander-in-chief, possessing in so eminent a degree the quality of a correct military _coup d'œil_, could so early announce that he had won the battle, when such numerous armies of the allies had but just arrived upon the field, and had not yet fired a single shot. Country-people, who had fled from the neighbourhood of Grimma, declared that a fresh army of Russians, under general Bennigsen, was in full march towards that place. In truth, only a small part of the allied forces had yet been engaged. Bennigsen, the crown-prince of Sweden, and field-marshal Blücher, had not yet entered the lists. If this fiction was intended merely to pacify our king at the