Having stripped me of every article of value, and ripped all the gold lace from my lancer jacket and blue pantaloons, I have no doubt those savage wretches would soon have despatched me; but a wounded officer rode up—the same personage with the many decorations and long grim moustache. He ordered them to desist, striking those who were near him with a whip that was attached to his bridle. He then placed me in charge of his aide-de-camp, Captain Anitchoff, a fashionable-looking young Muscovite, who wore the light blue and yellow-laced uniform of a hussar corps (the Princess Maria Paulowna’s), and who has since that time published a work on the Crimean campaign. He courteously informed me, in French, that he was on the general staff of the Russian army, and that the name of my preserver was Lieutenant-General Karlovitch Baur. He also desired me to remain close by his side, while we proceeded quickly to the rear. By this time, every trace of Travers and my squadron had disappeared. And so I was actually a prisoner! I was, perhaps, the sole trophy of the Russian army, so they were disposed to make the most of me. I had a special escort of a corporal and two well-bearded and ill-washed Cossacks, who rode one on each side of me, and one in the rear, each trussed up among his forage plunder and fleas—their shaggy little horses being so laden that little more than their noses and tails were visible. If I lagged, the corporal used to grin and shake his lance ominously; and when not occupied in scratching themselves, they were very merry and not unpleasant, though totally incomprehensible companions. I knew not in what direction they were conveying me, and our mutual ignorance of each other’s language prevented me from discovering. I could but trust to chance and patience. Meanwhile, my friends were, I am pleased to say, under no small concern on my account elsewhere. The army halted at Belbeck, where five hundred sick—among whom were many of my lancer comrades—were left behind, all ill with cholera. Lord Raglan occupied the château of a fugitive Russian noble, and there Travers rode to report that he had seen the Russians in strength among the woods between Belbeck and Khutor-Mackenzie, where, as all the world knows, a sharp engagement took place with them soon after, and where they were driven back with the loss of baggage and ammunition for more than twenty-five thousand men. Among the former were a great quantity of watches, jewellery, and gay hussar jackets, in which the artillery and Highlanders masqueraded for a time.